Letting Kids Learn Tomorrow

It is an exciting time when your kids are learning. They learn to speak, and then the letters, and then they learn to read words. As they continue to grow and start going to school, they will start to quickly gain more knowledge about the world around them and how things work. They are usually curious about just about everything, and enjoy learning about how those things work. Sometimes, you just need a break.

You’ll definitely understand this feeling if you have kids who are old enough to ask questions. They hear something they don’t know the answer to or don’t understand and they ask you why things work that way. You give an answer and they ask a follow up question about something you explained. Before you know it, you’re into a 30 minute conversation with them all because of something they didn’t know.

Some kids are more curious than others. While it’s definitely exciting when your child is asking questions and trying to figure out how the world works, it can quickly become overwhelming. If your child likes to ask a lot of questions, then you’re probably a bit tired with trying to explain everything to them. If you’re in a situation where you simply don’t have the energy to answer more questions, put it off to tomorrow.

Kids will often forget by tomorrow what they wanted to learn about, and you simply won’t have to explain something that they’ll learn about naturally over the course of their life. If they remember the next day, then they really are interested in learning about whatever they asked about, and that means that you should definitely work through helping them to learn more about the subject.

This may sound a bit counterintuitive or like a bad idea, but if your child is always asking questions, it may be the only choice that you have without explaining everything. Remember, some kids aren’t as curious as others may be. If your child doesn’t ask a hundred questions a days about how the world works, then you don’t need to use this strategy. If you know the feeling, then give this strategy a try.

For topics that kids show a deeper interest in, you should look to see what books may be available to them to learn more on their own as well. If your child is always asking about animals, then a book about animals would make a lot of sense to help them learn more details. Depending on the topic, taking your child to a museum or other location to learn more about the topic is a great idea.

When it’s late in the evening or you’re getting them ready for bed, this is a time that you should put the learning and questions off until tomorrow. Some kids may realize that they’re trying to make excuses about going to bed, but many kids do not. They simply are asking more questions in order to learn more. Curiosity is great for them to learn more quickly, but there’s a time and a place for those questions.

Let your kids learn as much as they can today, but put things off to tomorrow that don’t have time for today or that require other foundation knowledge first. Help your kids learn, but don’t overwhelm yourself because of it.