Making Learning Fun

Occasionally when I have time I search the internet looking for ideas for learning activities to do with my kids. There seems to be a really common perception that learning should always be fun or kids will hate learning.

I have been thinking about this idea lately. Now, I'm not really opposed to coming up with fun things to do to help kids learn. But I think as they mature, kids need to develop an understanding that learning is not always fun, but it is worth it. I think it's dangerous when this perception (i.e. that learning should be fun at all costs) spills into the older ages when kids are learning more advanced concepts. Looking back on a lot of the math and science classes I've taken, they were honestly not very fun. A lot of it was drudgery. Sometimes I really hated it. Sometimes I cried over difficult homework assignments. But I'm still glad I took the classes. I have a better understanding of how the world works and I have a more refined mind as a result of challenging my mind. The worksheets and practice problems were a necessary part of learning the material. Games would never have been enough.

What really gets me is when I hear fellow college students complaining that a class is not fun or entertaining. It is not a professor's job to entertain. I feel like we're building up this perception that if we go somewhere and it wasn't fun, there must be something wrong. It may not be fun to memorize multiplication tables, or practice doing integrals, or write a ten-page research paper, but does that mean that the teacher who assigned those things is doing a bad job? No! Just because learning isn't always fun or entertaining doesn't mean it's not worth it. Have you ever noticed how satisfying it is to look back at a semester of school and realize how much more you know now than you did at the beginning? Doesn't it feel great to remember all of the hard things you worked so hard to accomplish? Personally, when I look back at the easy classes, I often feel gypped when I think about all of the things I would have understood better if the teacher had expected more of us. The best teachers are the ones who know how to present material in an organized and coherent manner and give meaningful and reasonably challenging assignments to their students. And a class can be engaging and meaningful without necessarily being fun.

Besides, this is a principle that applies to pretty much everything in life. If you don't put a lot of work into your garden, you won't get as much food out of it. If you never practice the piano (yes, that includes scales) you won't get very good. Housework is not fun, but it needs to be done, and it's satisfying to have clean dishes and a sparkling bathroom counter. And when it comes to applying for jobs, the truth is that while it's good to look for a job where you will be happy, most jobs aren't fun. If they were fun then people would do the job themselves instead of paying you to do it. At some point our children need to be helped to understand that they will have to work hard for the things that are worthwhile.