I really like the definition of “pushiness” vs. “encouragement” in Mary Sheedy Kurcinka “How to raise a spirited child”: pushiness makes us feel bad and manipulated, while encouragement makes us feel good about ourselves and empowered. I do believe that a parent who is sensitive to the feelings and needs of his kid, can find the golden middle and often knows better then a kid.

My son refuses everything new and hates transitions: even if we are going to a birthday party or to some other exciting event, he would balk and refuse to go, refuse to participate, etc. He needs both – time to adjust, lots of control over the situation (that’s me describing him things in advance) and… lots of encouragement in the end. Not the type of “why can’t you be like the other kids? Just let my hand off and go!” No, that’s pushiness. I let him watch from sidelines, I let him try on his own terms, I let him transition into a new situation/activity smoothly. Yet, I still encourage him.

Same with knowledge: as my son is playing, he often refuses to give it up to start studding, no matter how much fun he can have. I usually ask him how much time he needs to finish and then we find a compromise – something that works for both of us. Then, our rule is – do your work first, and everything else afterwards. I offer lots of choices with in special constrains: which presentation would you like to watch? Do you want books or flashcards? Do you want tally sticks for your math or beads? Yet, I don’t ask “Do you want to read? Do you want to do math?” Not reading is not an option, unless I can see that he is tired, too energized, too excited; unless I can tell that the timing is wrong. But within these constrains – there multitude of things to chose from!

It’s puzzle time: which puzzle/block set/magnetics/brain teasers would you like to get off your shelf? Your pick! Fire truck is not an option, but fire truck puzzle or building one out of lego, knex or some special blocks that we have, and later trying to make a drawing of the result on paper (i.e. transferring 3D image on 2D medium!) – those are all valid options!

“I’ll read your sentence after you read mine,” – I often say to my son as we play with magnetic words on the fridge. Not reading is not an option, but reading from the fridge, from the cards, from the books or from the presentations – is!

I taught my son to say “I am tired”. Nevertheless, in our family it is not a signal to give up. I believe in Montessori principle – you always have to finish what you’ve started. So, leaving things undone is not an option. If we are in a rush or my son is really tired, we can put it aside and finish it after a nap, but before playing/going for a walk/ inviting friends over. Our work doesn’t run away from us. In English, the words my son reads jump out of his mouth, as a machine gun – snap, snap, snap, snap. In Russian, weather you start reading at 3 or at 10 – in the beginning it is a very painful process. I experienced similar feeling when I was learning ancient Greek – the words are endless and they require so much effort to figure out both how to read them, and what they mean!!! I remember myself at 4, at 5, at 7. In English – there are many kids who “crack the code”, who learn to ready by themselves. In Russian – I’ve never ever heard of one – every word looks different, sounds different and is different! As a child, I loved books but I was tired from reading even before I started. But the only way out of misery – was practice, practice and practice.

So, in most of the cases, we have to finish the sentence, that we started, and we can continue with our text after some change in activity – we do our math, we do our projects, our physical exercises and come back to our books later.

Is it too pushy? May be. But after my son overcomes the difficulties, he feels so proud!!! I find it encouraging. I feel it builds his sense of self-worth and his confidence. I usually say in the end: “It could be hard to read so many long and difficult words, but you managed to complete an entire sentence! You should feel so proud of yourself! “I am! I am good at reading!” – beaming with excitement, responds my boy.

Kids love options. And, I think, they absolutely love our healthy encouragement – not pushing.