Reception year DS not interested in "learning" - is this a problem?

[choceyes]

He was 5 a couple of weeks ago, so one of the oldest in the class.

He enjoys school and the teacher says he is making good progress and is a joy to have around (not so much at home, but that's another thread).

I don't want to push him, but I find it frustrating his lack of enthusiasm with anything to do with phonics, numbers etc. I can never correct anything without him throwing a tantrum. If he writes something, i,e letter formation and he is not forming the letter correctly and is virtually unrecognisable, he does not like being corrected, ever. Throws a major strop and would throw the pencils and paper across the room. If when reading to him I point out sounds and how to blend and ask him if he can sound talk that word, he gets angry.
If I ask him about simple maths. i,e if he has 4 sweets and he gave me 2 sweets how many would he have left..etc. If he gets the answer wrong and I dare correct him, again he hates it.
He is like that when doing a board game too, he HAS to win. Any other outcome or any inkling that the game is not going his way he will start throwing stuff around.

He is very literate, in that he has an amazing vocabulary and speech is very clear from the day he started speaking, so it's not that that's holding him back.

Is it the way I'm doing things? but my 3yr old DD is not like this at all. She is very receptive to learning and she actually recognises sounds etc that DS can't (or doesn't want to rather).

Despite all this he is in the top sets for literacy and numeracy at school (but the school has a high intake of children with english as a second language...so a lot of them come in with not knowing much english at all). Should I just let him be? I thought I was doing things in a fun way and I harldy ever ask him to sit and do something, but on the odd occasion that I do, I find it frustrating that it more often than not ends with tears and frustration (mostly mine).

Any advice would be appreciated thanks.

I think I would just let him be in your shoes. It doesn't sound like there is a problem as he is doing well at school. Maybe by the time he comes home he has had enough and just needs some down time?

IMO you should let him be. He is obviously enjoying learning at school and is making good progress.
There are lots of reasons why he might not be interested in doing more of the same at home. Perhaps he is really tired after a busy day at school, perhaps he feels that it is OK for the teacher to say those things but not you, perhaps he is bored of it by the time he gets home.

I started a thread the other day about whether I should 'push' my DS by doing a bit of formal sit down work with him. I currently don't as he would react like your DS. Like your DS his teachers are happy with him and he is making good progress.

I think what you are asking him to do is quite hard. My DS hates being corrected too - he will argue until he is blue in the face that he hasn't written 'e' the wrong way round when he has. I just let it go. It really isn't worth the upset, tantrums or tears and I think all you will achieve is making him feel like he is failing.

You should probably continue playing board games making sure he loses sometimes and give him strategies to cope - e.g quietly going to play with a favourite toy, looking at a book, deep breaths.

He is interested in learning, just not quite ready for formal learning!

Typical (stereo-typical) boy. He enjoys learning through active play. Many, many children are like this and in most other countries they would not be expected to sit still and do formal stuff till 6 or 7.

FWIW, my DD was ready for formal learning before 4, DS not till 6+. He was/is very competitive and couldn't see the point of lots of the boring stuff they got as homework/in class. However, by KS2 he was perfectly able to do everything expected independently and was fine!

Just don't correct him! Leave him be and encourage and praise what he has done so if he spells bird burd day well done good writing/ what a nice pen etc rather than context the spelling as his will sort itself out once he reads more surely? I've found this best approach with mine as he's similar. Loves to write but will argue with me that things are spelt a certain way. In school they seem to be more cooperative!

I also think that Reception teachers are very tolerant about how letters are formed and how words are spelt, probably much more relaxed than most parents. Teachers seem to encourage confidence and getting ideas down on paper. It never ceases to amaze me that teachers can read what looks like a string of gibberish but is actually "What I did at the weekend".

Thanks for your replies!

Ok maybe I've been too hard on him then. It's reassuring to know that it this is normal. It is difficult to know when to step back and when to encourage though. My parents weren't pushy with me (they didn't have to be though, I would ask for endless amounts of homework, very eager to learn) and I don't want to start pushing DS as I know it'll only put him off.
It's good to know that other children also hates being corrected too. I'll just let him be and as lond as he is making progress I shouldn't be worrying.
Thanks again.

He may not be ready for formal work yet, but I would not tolerate the bad behaviour when playing a board game. He will not have many friends if he cannot bear to lose, so he does need to be able to accept others winning sometimes. Tolerating this will not do him any favours.

We don't play board games at all much in our house - DH and DS are waaaayyyy too competitive!

When they were small, I used to play games a lot with DS on his own to help him manage losing though.

Hi OP, I don't think you've been too hard on him, but my DS is like this too (he's 5 but in year 1, august birthday) so I know it's tricky. I agree with you that if progress is being made that's the main thing.

I talked to son's teacher and she emphasised not correcting too much in writing if the meaning was clear (ie he'd spelled it phonetically and you could tell what the word was - he wrote wuns for once for example), just gently correct if its on the list of high-frequency words. She said it was mainly about building confidence and not putting them off for life at this early stage. He's better than he was, I think he felt embarrassed about guessing or getting things wrong despite our trying to demonstrate that we're all learning stuff all the time. They gradually shift and things will get easier!

Dd was exactly like this for all of reception and y1. It was horrible trying to get her to do anything other than creative curriculum project work, including her reading book. If it is any consolation, suddenly she's decided to embrace it all in y2. So much easier!

My nearly 8 year old boy (year 3) "hates learning" (his own words). Always has done and I suspect always will. He is doing very well academically and his teachers laugh when I tell them that he doesn't like learning as apparently he does a very good job of hiding it.

Not liking learning is his way of saying that he'd rather be doing other things (i.e. playing, having fun).

So it may not get better! But it doesn't mean he won't succeed academically.