Going back to school - with your Children!

We received a letter from my eldest twos school the other day stating an Adult Education Course was to begin this Monday.

The course was a Family Learning Science course, the idea is a simple one, children and a family member, be it mum, dad or grandparent, go along and learn together.

So Yesterday I dutifully attended with my eldest two, crouching down onto a smaller than average chair, and sitting in the classroom instantly brought back memories of my youth, the teacher started talking, I sat their like an attentive student, listening to the instructions whilst glancing back and forth to my two children.

You may remember I said in a recent post, that if I was invisible for a day, I'd love to watch my children at school, see how they interacted with the children and the teachers, well sitting there in this Family Learning course is probably as close as I'll get to doing just that.

Jake, my eldest, sat attentively listening to the teacher, Chloe sat fiddling with her hair starring aimlessly out the window, when I gave her dagger looks she put her arms up and mouthed 'what?' 

The teacher continued to talk, Chloe looked less and less interested as every passing second went by, then after what seemed much longer than it actually was, the teacher was quiet and we were left to get on with a series of experiments set out for us, I had words with Chloe about listening and paying attention, and we set about our business, I did my up most to make it sound fun, and engage the children (Although the course is definitely set out to be teaching us adults as well,). So I start asking them questions about what we were doing, telling them the science behind the experiments and then asking them again what we were doing, being more and more perplexed by Chloes lack of interest and randomness of her answers to my question, with more dagger looks and mumbled words, she eventually decided to give up her 'it's boring' attitude and join in wholeheartedly, which meant the experiments finished with us all enjoying ourselves.

The end of the session we were all sat around and the teacher asked a series of questions,  I was pleasantly surprised when both Chloe and Jake raised their hands and answered correctly.

It was a real eye opener to see their behaviour in a school setting, although what confuses me most is their behaviour was the opposite of what the teacher described to me on the last parents evening where I was told Jake was the day dreamer and Chloe was a very hard worker!! I guess knowing how they truly act without me there will always be one of mystery, but maybe its best being that way?!