Do you try and limit what your kids learn?

[kristinannie]

My son loves learning. He is interested in just about everything!!! We are doing a unit study on the Solar System right now (his absolute favorite). Today he is watching Big Cat Diary (highly recommended). The dental hygenist told him about it yesterday when he was there to get a filling. We were at the library yesterday and he picked out books on dinosaurs, cheetahs, tigers, a folktale from Japan and tons on the Solar System. I am of the opinion of just letting him learn about whatever interests him, but I also want to make sure that it doesn't get confusing for him either. I'd love to hear some opinions on this! Is it OK to just keep doing what we are doing?

[MerryAtHope]

Just try and stop a kid from learning when he wants to learn something! I think you're doing great, keep letting him check out many subjects/books, that's wonderful!

 

Merry :-)

[boscopup]

If it gets too much, they'll slow themselves down. ;) As long as they are choosing to get books on the topics and such and you're not shoving books down their throats (which you're clearly not doing), it's all good!

 

My 5 year old is in a thirst for knowledge phase too, though he can't read yet on his own. At the library, he told me he wanted a book on hockey and a book on trains, so we did that. He also "reads" the Apologia science books to study shark pictures, since he loves those. And he loves dinosaurs. He is always having me google pictures. Yesterday, we googled cow stomachs because he wanted to know more about those. :ack2: He was intrigued by the hole in the cow pictures (and I very well remember having to watch a video about those back in high school biology... which was just before lunch :tongue_smilie:).

 

So no, I don't limit what they want to learn. If they want to read more about something, I'm happy to get books for them to read. I put library books in a basket, so they can read whatever they want whenever they want. If they got 10 books about sharks from the library and they get bored after 2 books, that's fine. They don't have to read the others. Note that that hasn't actually happened here yet. :lol:

[Critterfixer]

I wouldn't limit learning, but I do try to limit some graphic content. As an example, my boys had the chance to get some first hand anatomy yesterday, as I had an autopsy to do. BUT, I knew, based on the fact that my son is often upset just to think of an animal dying, that he should not witness the whole thing, just yet. However, he and his brother were fascinated by the "cleaned up" internal organs that I brought out for them to see.

[Staceyshoe]

My oldest seemed (well, still does) CRAVE learning. He was an early reader and taught himself all kinds of things for 3 years before we started homeschooling. I think he needed the type of stimulation that learning provided. If I had to do it all over again, I would have started directing his learning more early on. When we finally started homeschooling, he had these odd gaps in every single subject but hated reviewing what he already knew. It presented a lot of challenges in choosing curriculum. In fact, 2 yrs later, we're still dealing with that issue to some extent.

[jar7709]

I am not trying to be snarky, but why would you even want to limit what your kids learn? Specially at that age. They are little sponges, so let them soak it up! :001_smile: I let mine work with stuff way, way above their grade level, too. They like it, so why not? But of course I was never one to baby-talk to my kids when they were tiny though, and always used big words around them, so feel free to take my opinion with a big grain of salt. :lol:

[Ellie]

If he's interested, he won't be confused. I say let him loose.

[Ritsumei]

I am not trying to be snarky, but why would you even want to limit what your kids learn? Specially at that age. They are little sponges, so let them soak it up! :001_smile: I let mine work with stuff way, way above their grade level, too. They like it, so why not? But of course I was never one to baby-talk to my kids when they were tiny though, and always used big words around them, so feel free to take my opinion with a big grain of salt. :lol:

 

Heavens no, I wouldn't limit them. That would, IMO, be sending the entirely wrong message! I feed the curiosity whenever possible. Since Monkey's not reading independently yet, there are limits to what I can do for him. But if he asks we try to answer.

 

We do/did pretty much the same thing as the post above. Right now, the thing that's most obviously above grade level for my 5yo is that we are starting to introduce multiplication and today we bumped into negative numbers, courtesy of Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. (Grandma Georgina is 78. She eats 4 pills that take 20 years each off her age. Why did she disappear? When can we expect her back?) He wasn't that interested, at least, not that I could tell, but the concept is in there, fermenting.

 

And, having been exposed to the rich language since he was tiny, he has an awesome vocabulary. I can't find the notebook that I write some of the stuff he says down in, but he comes up with some awesome stuff! Keeps us in stitches.:D

[kristinannie]

Good to know. I will just keep doing what we have been doing! I guess he will slow down and go deeper into things as he gets older. Sometimes I just feel like it is really chaotic!