Spouse doesn't know how to help our child with learning. How do I approach this?

[Anonymous]

Why are you even doing this in the first place? Sounds like hell.

[Anonymous]

I could never do this with my kids nor would I want to.

[Anonymous]

My PhD husband is a terrible teacher to children of all ages. He lapses into lecture mode, show off mode, skips steps, doesn’t think in terms of process/just answer, can’t tell when someone has zoned out from him.
The kids don’t even ask him much anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have an eight year old daughter. She's starting third grade this fall and this summer we are taking her through spelling, math, and reading. However, whenever our daughter sits with my wife and goes through subjects it's like pulling teeth. Our daughter isn't focused, takes too long, etc. When she is with me we go through spelling and math. It's 30-45 minute a day and she's focused and learning.

I've had a great deal of experience mentoring others, coaching sports, and training employees. My wife doesn't have any background in teaching. Every single time she sits with our daughter it's 1.5 to 2 hours to complete 30 minutes of work. I look through everything and I know it could have been done much quicker. Problem is my wife has no experience teaching and allows our daughter to get distracted. The entire ordeal ends up with my wife angry and my daughter sad. Then I don't want to be around them and the house is uncomfortable.

I need to tell my wife she has to learn how to teach or just stick with basics worksheets. But, this will start a screaming match.

30 mins max with an ES aged kid.

Maybe need lesson “plan”?

[Anonymous]

I had a Tiger Dad who structured every minute of my childhood with lessons like this.

I have PTSD around him now. I do not love him.

[Anonymous]

First, stop all this summer learning nonsense.

Second, when you keep doing it anyway, you take it over entirely and let your wife off the hook.

Third, be ready for your kid to really resent you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My PhD husband is a terrible teacher to children of all ages. He lapses into lecture mode, show off mode, skips steps, doesn’t think in terms of process/just answer, can’t tell when someone has zoned out from him.
The kids don’t even ask him much anymore.

Can’t tell if OP wants us all to say his wife is dumb or what.
If he’s so smart he should be able to better pinpoint why his wife’s teaching style or mother/daughter relationship isn’t working for the 8 yo.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You do it. The end.

This x 100

Plus you married down. This is the consequence.

I’m the PP you replied after. This may not be true. My DH is TERRIBLE with school work with elementary kids. He can never just do the basics. He always has to ratchet it up 10 notches and it’s bad for the kids. He does the same thing for school projects. He never wants to plan or help start, but he does like to swoop in last minute to let me/the kids know what we could do better. So none of us ask him for help with that. He’s great at teaching them other stuff, though.

[Anonymous]

Apparently, reading comprehension is lacking in here. The OP says he spends 30-45 minutes A DAY with his kid going over spelling and math and gets through everything.

Hello? What are you people reading besides what you want to read?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Apparently, reading comprehension is lacking in here. The OP says he spends 30-45 minutes A DAY with his kid going over spelling and math and gets through everything.

Hello? What are you people reading besides what you want to read?

Plus another 1.5 hours with mom... this kid is getting hit by both parents.

[Anonymous]

I’d go ape if I had to do worksheets with my kids. I didn’t like them as a kid, and I don’t like them now.
I prefer to teach them things based on what we’re doing or talking about, my first grader got stuck on a lesson about George Washington so I played her a couple of the songs from Hamilton.. that got her sorted out.
For telling time, I set the ipad to unlock at a certain time and within two days, she could tell time, I just needed the right motivation. I remember telling my kid’s teacher, “believe me, these kids know how to tell time, they just don’t care about the lessoon which has nothing to do with you as a teacher”. I didn’t want the teacher to feel bad, she is a nice lady, I could see though that she was worried about what the kids were picking up.

My husband is great with teaching reading concepts, I was the one that figured out how to motivate her.

Nobody cares about your mentoring and teaching experience. As I told my husband “I’m a mother, not a teacher, they are very different skill sets.. I can say things to my kids the classroom teacher can’t. I know what interests my kids in a way the classroom teacher can’t and doesn’t”.

If you want someone to do worksheets, hire that person or do it yourself.
Many conversations may be going on during worksheet time.

I remember my first grader having a real tough time spelling the word art. One day I showed her how if you add a letter you can change the word, so bart is the transit system in San Fran Sisco, cart is the thing at the grocery store, dart is something you throw at someone you don’t like.. and then we got to f and I told her, just remember art is a fart without the f. Not very mature, but she knows how to spell art now and we laughed about it.
In a professional setting, you have hard metrics that have to be met. It doesn’t work that way with parenting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You do it. The end.

Exactly