Delayed Gratification: The Benefits of Teaching Intentional Waiting
Dear Readers-
Even writing this post at 3am (because I can't sleep), I tried to put on the TV....
but. I. couldn't. concentrate.
So, I turned it off.
Are you living your life for pleasure or purpose?
As a parent or educator,
Are you teaching your kids to live for pleasure or purpose?
Hard. questions. huh.
Those questions were inspired by psychologytoday.com when Dr. Cohen wrote the article about the benefits of Delayed Gratification. *The article is linked at the end of the post if you want to read more.
According to the article, delayed gratification is "delaying pleasure for a bigger purpose." In essence, you don't give into bandaid fixes or immediate rewards to avoid immediate pain and discomfort. You teach patience and waiting in difficult times to work for a long-term goal.
In Kindergarten, I teach the foundational basics of reading, writing, and math.
To be able to do any of things well, they. are. all. long. term. goals.
To read- that means students have to memorize sight words, learn and apply the letter sounds to decode words; and understand/comprehend what they are reading at the same time.
To write- they have to form letters with writing tools other than a keyboard or touchscreen; they have to apply their sounds or memory to spell words, and order words in a way that makes sense grammatically (not just in talk). This is the first time students learn about mechanics of capitalization, punctuation, and spacing.
Lastly, for math, children have to learn the use and application of numbers in the real world. This is super foreign to them because we have many devices and machines that do this for them. They are not exposed to the mathematical processes behind those numbers.
Because of this fact, I am firmer with my expectations from this point of the year until the end of the year.
I've taught them the basics the last 18 weeks and I will wait on and encourage ONLY their best efforts in applying what has been taught.
It's my duty as a educator to instill and align appropriate habits of mindset and choices that will encourage my students to succeed even in discomfort or stress. In any grade level, third quarter is when the curriculum gets more challenging because it's all application.
When I start the year, I manage and develop my student's character to endure this very socio-emotional transitional time. Every year, I get a mix on how students react or cope with the added stress and pressure to be more accountable to their learning. I give extra time and instill rewards/rubrics that ask children to strive for a goal that they may not proficiently achieve until weeks or months down the road. My TA and I are diligent to check student work every time. all the time.- in the moment. We keep a lot of extra sentence strips, erasers, "boo boo tape", post it notes, and index cards, near us so our students can correct and try something again- the right way.
Sometimes, a student will be so stubborn that he/she will do it wrong over and over again. However, we just stay consistent and tell them calmly, "I need you to fix it and try again."
Writing is the hardest because of spacing. The most I've had to have a student "redo" a sentence to fix her spacing was seven times. Even with it modeled on a separate paper, she was always more concerned about doing it fast then doing it right. When she did it the seventh time, I praised her so much and asked her, "Who did the hard work?" She said "Me. I did!" I always leave our interactions with " Yes. I knew you could do it. See how smart and capable you are."
I'm such an advocate for delayed gratification because I want my students to overcome hard times and want more than what they think they want right in front of them.
I want them to know patience.
I want them to have grit.
I don't want them to coward in times they are asked to challenge themselves
Especially, because, I truly believe they ALL can do it.
So, I write this post to encourage others to fight the good fight and don't get too scared to make your kids work a little harder.
You don't have to "treat" them for every good thing.
They can wait for greater things in the future.
With Love. Always,
Crystal
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