As many of you already know, my daughter started the KUMON Program this past spring.
When at first we noticed a boost in confidence and then improvements in the flow of her reading, we weren’t sure if it was a coincidence or not. By the time her report card came at the end of the year we were convinced that there is a correlation between the work that she is doing in the program and her progress.
For those of you who read my original post which described some of the hesitations we had about joining Kumon, you may remember that one of our concerns was time commitment. Not only does my daughter have attend Kumon twice weekly but on the days that she does not go to the centre, she has work. I don’t need to tell you that the thought of ‘managing’ this in a family with 4 kids and two working parents was quite daunting.
Well, that’s what I want to focus on today-Although in a perfect world, my daughter would be at Kumon twice weekly and get to her work everyday, sometimes “life happens’. And when that happens, there always seems to be a solution 🙂
Over the last few months my daughter has missed a few classes for various reasons. When this happened, the Kumon instructors leave her her ‘homework’ in a mailbox outside the centre and we go pick it up at our convenience-at any time! It’s actually great.
Over the summer, my daughter started to struggle a little bit and seemed a little less motivated with regards to doing her work. Truthfully who can blame her? It was gorgeous outside and as she put it ” My friends aren’t doing homework”. We encouraged her as the work was not rigorous and did not take her long to do, but the Kumon instructors noticed that something was up as well. They adjusted the number of pages my daughter would have to do daily downwards, and like magic, the motivation came back! She was back to getting up earlier than the rest of the family and independently completing her Kumon in the morning.
I didn’t even realize that adjusting pages downwards was an option…but there it was again FLEXIBILITY. And that flexibility is benefitting my child 🙂
I wanted to share this with you because truthfully, we were so concerned about the schedule and the load, that at first we were not sure we wanted to embark upon this journey. How glad we are today that we took the chance. I want you all to know that if this is your hesitation, you should hesitate less. Yes, you must adhere to the program , but the staff at KUMON understand that things come up and they have implemented systems to help your child stay on track 🙂
Now..before I end this post, I wanted to share with you an anecdote about her progress…
Some of you may remember that our family bought & installed a Gazebo this summer. Well, at one point during bad weather, the Gazebo fell down.
My daughter piped up: You know you’re supposed to take it down in heavy wind & rain
Me: Really? ( II am dumfounded at the way she’s expressing herself). You’re probably right, but where did you get that from?
Daughter: I read it in the book ( meaning the pamphlet ) .
I almost cried.
My daughter has not ever really been the kid who reads everything in sight, but lately, she has started with things like that. She tells us the name of the server at the restaurant. “How did you know?” we ask… “It was on their tag!” she’ll say.
The other day she used a word in a sentence ( I wish I could remember what it was) and within seconds turned to me and said “I learned that word in Kumon”.
So proud of my girl and all that she is accomplishing through her work in this program.
Back to School is a time when families are choosing where they will register their kids for various activities. It’s a natural time to consider the Kumon program. If you are considering it, I hope that our experiences will help you in your decision 🙂
Tanya
Disclosure: I am often offered to try products or services free of charge for the purpose of reviewing them, as was the case here. I will only ever share with you products and/or services that I believe in (some things I try out never make it onto the blog). All opinions contained within are my own and cannot be bought 
