Early Education Musings - Tot School Edition!

I mentioned Little Man's learning style in a previous post, but since it has become pretty blazingly apparent in the past few months, I wanted to chat about it a little more in detail.

Ever since he was a baby, Little Man has had the tendency of really hanging back and observing a situation before jumping in. That habit became very clear when we began to take music, sports, swimming, and science classes in recent months. When he does this, he isn't always participating in a group, playing the game that everyone else is, or even really watching what other children/instructors are doing at times.

As a parent - I have to tell you - it's a little frustrating. While in some classes {like Kindermusik} he just needed some time to warm up and then he would be having an absolute blast a few minutes later, in some other classes {like soccer or t-ball}, he would observe for a while and then completely disengage from any participation with the activity.

I spent a ton of time wondering and thinking about if we were wasting our money sending him to classes, if I should just give up for now, if I should continue paying for some of the classes {like sports-ing, not my favorite either!} that he totally disconnected from.

An then I spent a little more time thinking about who Little Man is.

After a few internet searches {like here & here}, I'm realizing further and further the type of learner that is my beautiful, sweet son. {I've looked a bit for Little Lady as well, but it's still really early for her patterns to imagine just yet!}

Above all, Little Man is a verbal/linguistic/auditory learner for sure.

No matter what we're doing, he always wants an explanation about it. Little Man goes beyond the toddler curiosity and straight into an interest to really understand each topic and concept we discuss. Instead of throwing himself into activities and learning as he goes, Little Man really delves into the who, what, where, when, how, and why of each tiny point.

We basically don't stop speaking the entire day long.

Don't get me wrong, though - it's an awesome thing. It's both awesome in the fact that I'm an incredibly verbal person and can relate easily to his learning style but also because it's already so apparent that this is the way Little Man learns.

As a parent who plans to homeschool in the future, my job and my teaching style are already becoming very clear in regards to my child even at the very ripe age of three years old. Obviously, children go through phases and I'll continue to adjust accordingly, but for now this is really working for us. And I am for sure using that knowledge to help facilitate the most beneficial toddler learning as well as seamless toddler living right now!

Have you looked into the learning style of your children? How do your children prefer to learn?