Katelyn, I think I may have said this in my prior post but I'll say it again lol, just find a balance. Show your child what you are passionate about, whatever it is (well as long as it's legal lol). Play ball, play on the swings, make music together, read lots, lots of nature study, and occasionally pull out those workbooks lol.
The boredom discussion usually splits two ways b/c half is talking about one thing and the other half something entirely different. And Acs, I realize you're in the camp w/ Kriston and I, I'm talking about folks in general I've spoken about. What Kriston and I mentioned is not a casual state of boredom. My son is bored at home quite often. He'll lay around doing nothing, thinking, and will eventually go off and find something to do. Sometimes he asks me for recommendations and I'll give some which he is free to accept or ignore. I in no way feel like the boy needs to be entertained 24/7.
the boredom we are talking about, and I think Kriston, we need to change our word b/c I've had this conversation sooo many times that I think the word gets in the way, is the kind of mind-numbing boredom that actually prevents learning. When your child comes home and says, "What's the purpose of school? I thought school was a place to learn something?" or when you ask DC what he would like the teacher to do to help him, he responds, "Nothing. The other kids need to learn this stuff and it wouldn't be fair to them if the teacher did something different for me." So this child had accepted his fate. This child would drag his feet walking to the bus every morning and wouldn't even look me in the face. THis child had a breakdown at the door as the bus came down the street crying and screaming "Mommy I just can't take it anymore, I just can't. the day is soooo long. I just can't take it anymore." So, yes I don't think "boredom" is the right word for it and does it a dis-service. Perhaps undernourished to go w/ Kriston's analogy?
I've even gotten from many people "Well learning is not supposed to be fun." huh? or "School is not supposed to be fun." or "School is work."
All of this really boils down to personality. You can have a highly MG (not HG) kid like mine who is climbing the walls w/ under-nourishment. WHereas, you can have a PG+ kid, completely content to doodle all day, sneak books into class, challenge himself by making up his own math word problems and working them in his head and is excited by the social opportunities school affords. It's a difference in personality.
I do think some people are better at living inside their head than others. I love to daydream when bored and have to be careful not to do it when driving.
I was counseled to teach DS to daydream. I did my best. I really tried to teach this. His response was "I can't do that in class. I'm supposed to listen to everything the teacher says." I think he had gotten in trouble in K from daydreaming and then would miss some direction or question b/c at that time, he was the kid making up math word problems in his head and trying to answer them. I know b/c he'd tell me about the problem but he wasn't sure he had the right answer. But I thought the teacher was giving those problems and asked the teacher about it. Of course the teacher wasn't asking those kinds of questions of 5yr olds. Turns out it was all in my son's head, after furthering questioning. He learned that that was bad and turned that off completely. Now he can't rely on that as a tool. Sigh..... he's a weird kid.
So I'll end this long diatribe w/ as parents we have to decipher what "boring" means. For my son boring is for things that are both too easy and too hard or simply disinteresting. We're working on expanding his vocabulary so he can describe his feelings better.
