I Suddenly Totally Got It!
I sent an email to Dylan’s computer teacher.
I am trying to back off. I really am trying. But I felt so awful about Dylan disliking his class – and watching his grade plummet – that I sent a quick note:
“Dylan is struggling mightily in computer science class. He refuses to ask for help, so if you could just wander by and make sure he knows what he’s doing, it might help get him back on track.”
The next day, Dylan came home from school practically gleeful.
“Mom!” he squealed. “I suddenly totally got it and then I coded a whole website in one day!”
I swear, he was almost dancing. The light bulb was on and shining brightly in his brain. Thanks to something called Google Classroom, he even pulled up his work on the computer and showed me what he’d done.
I emailed the teacher again – of course – to thank him for checking in with my son. The email I got back from the teacher was rather unexpected, though:
“To be honest, Dylan was doing some things that may have put him behind a little in class (caught him playing video games a few times) and I think when I sat him down and walked him through an assignment a little bit…he found it wasn’t as difficult as he first thought.“
Hm. Video games.
I think when Dylan falls behind, he tends to kick himself a bit too hard, and maybe give up a bit too quickly. I think playing video games was his way of saying, I don’t know what I’m doing, so why even try?
This is a dangerous mindset that I recognize only too well from my own youth.
But now, hopefully, he’s on the right path again. Best of all, he’s really enjoying computers now!
And also, I’ve threatened to take away large chunks of time from his at-home video game time if he’s ever caught again playing video games in class.
Most interesting, though, is that both Dylan’s teacher and Dylan believe that the light bulb went off without any assistance – that Dylan discovered what he was doing, all on his own.
Which tells me, again, that I should really just stay out of it.