Math Tests and Sports Teams
I noticed that some of Ax’s friends were talking about homework as if it were a big part of their lives. Then, one evening, we were hanging out at his classmate Lila’s house when her dad Ben said, “Ok Lila it’s time for you to do your hour of homework before dinner.” And off she went to her room.
Ax announced, “We don’t do homework at night.”
“Oh, when do you do it?” Ben asked.
“In the morning.”
“Oh, cool.”
And what I didn’t mention is that we do like maybe 5 or 6 minutes of homework, which sometimes takes 15 because of the complaining and negotiating.
Ben said, “So how do you feel about school, Ax?”
“I love it!”
“What do you think about the work?”
“I’m great at it!”
“How about the Friday tests?”
“They’re easy!”
So I’m listening to this conversation and I’m thinking, “Holy crap my son has white man syndrome.” He gets maybe 7/10 on his tests, does the minimum, and even that much under duress, and feels like the King of second grade. From his perspective he is rocking school.
I, and Lila, and all the Lilas, work our butts off, get perfect scores most of the time, maybe one wrong here and there, and have a constant feeling of imminent failure if we let up for a minute. Hmmm.
But that night, back home, I said to Ax, “So, I’ve noticed that some kids are spending more time on homework than we do.”
“Uh huh.”
“And I wanted to check in with you to see if you would like to get better grades on your tests too?”
“Our tests aren’t graded.”
“Yes they are.” And I got his last math test and showed him. There was no grade on it, only, “Keep practicing” written at the top. He’d left five of the twenty problems blank, but the fifteen he’d answered were correct.
“So, I see you’re right there’s no grade but I notice you did not have time to get to all the questions even though you knew them and that is just a matter of practice. So if you’d like to do better we could do a bit more practicing.”
“No thanks,” he said, munching a sweet potato at the counter.
“Okay,” I said, feeling deeply conflicted in my bones. “The thing is, Ax, as your mother it’s part of my job to help make sure you are getting to do what’s best for you, even if sometimes you don’t want to do it. So for example if you want to be able to be a Lego engineer or an architect you will need to know math.”
“I know.”
“So if you want to get better at math I want you to know I will help you, and right now your brain is in a very good stage for learning and you are an excellent learner so it wouldn’t take that much effort to get much much better.”
“Ok,” he said.
“So what do you think?”
“I just hope when I grow up and get married I’ll be as good a parent as you and Mike.”
And I was floored.
“Thank you, Ax! That is such a nice thing to say!”
I gave him a hug and then brought him a bowl of edamame.
Part of me wondered if he’d gotten so dang smart he knew how to get me off the homework case, but I hadn’t really been on the homework case, not really. Anyway, today I feel there is a strong possibility that everything might just be okay as it is. I’m gonna keep going.
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