What to Do When Your Child Is Bored with Learning? Transform Exhaustion into Fun with the Power of “Just-Right Learning”
When a child is bored with learning, it’s not just about laziness it may be a sign of accumulated stress or a mismatch between the “difficulty level of learning” and the “child’s abilities.” Mental health surveys have found that academic stress is the number one factor affecting Thai children. Understanding the root causes is therefore the most important first step.
Have you ever seen your child sigh in front of a large pile of worksheets, or heard phrases that weigh heavily on a parent’s heart like “I don’t want to go to school anymore” or “Why do I have to do so many worksheets?” From a parent’s perspective, the main concern is often the fear that their child will fall behind their peers, or worrying that this boredom will become a habit of laziness in the long term. But from the children’s perspective, “learning boredom” often doesn’t stem from laziness but is actually a warning sign that their brain is experiencing a “short circuit.”
According to educational psychology research from the University of Oxford, boredom often occurs when children are forced to do things that are “too difficult for their abilities,” leading to discouragement, or “too easy and boring,” leading to a lack of motivation. This condition is called a lack of balance between challenge and skill.
The problem of children not wanting to learn is therefore not about forcing them to do more, but about going back to understand the Just right Level for each individual child, which is the key principle by which Kumon transforms children who used to shake their heads and run from worksheets into children who are confident and enjoy pushing beyond their own limits every day.
Why Do Children Get Bored with Learning?
- Content too difficult, leading to burnout: When children have to learn things beyond their ability, stress and resistance occur. But Kumon can transform fear into confidence with the “Just-right Level” through the Kumon Method.
- Lack of focus and discipline to get started: Not having a good and clear “Routine” means children don’t have a consistent time or pattern for learning. Picking up worksheets to complete each time feels like “coercion” and becomes a heavy burden on their mind.
How to Fix Learning Boredom According to the Kumon Method
The Kumon Method is a learning system designed to bring out the maximum potential of each individual child.
- Learning at the Just-Right Level: Kumon’s concept is not to stick to learning according to age criteria, but to find the just-right point where children can complete work independently and smoothly not so difficult as to be discouraging, and not so easy as to be boring. When they work on worksheets at the Just-Right Level, they can focus on completing the worksheets for longer because the enjoyment from “being able to do it” results in concentration developing automatically.
- The Power of Self-Learning: Kumon worksheets have clear examples and guidance, helping children practice observation, analysis, and trial and error on their own.
Kumon wants to say…
Progress in small steps: Worksheets are designed to gradually increase in difficulty step by step, so that children barely notice the lessons getting harder, but instead feel themselves getting better every day.
Learning Beyond Grade Level: The ultimate goal of the Kumon Method is to enable children to have learning skills beyond their school grade level. Kumon builds a strong foundation, and when children have math and language skills that are more advanced than their current grade level, they will have confidence at school, reduced anxiety, and free time beyond reviewing lessons to develop other life skills.
Most importantly, let children… Practice consistently, a little each day: Doing worksheets for just 15-30 minutes per day helps build discipline without making children feel pressured.
Benefits of Learning with the Kumon Way
- Reduces pressure from comparison: In regular classrooms, children are often compared to the group average. But at Kumon, children only compete with themselves. Learning at the Just-right Level makes them feel relaxed and able to focus fully on their own development.
- Plugs the gaps in understanding: Self-paced learning allows children time to review content they haven’t yet mastered until they’re ready to advance to the next content, which aligns with the concept of building a solid foundation in the long term.
And the ultimate goal of the Kumon Method is to promote children having learning skills beyond their school grade level, which provides value beyond just test scores.
- Builds confidence beyond level: When children go to school and find that the content is something they’ve “already done” at Kumon, their confidence increases and they become happier with learning.
- Better time management: When core subjects (math/language) become easy for them, children have time left to do activities they enjoy or develop other skills (Soft Skills), reducing accumulated stress.
- Practice complex problem-solving skills: Learning beyond grade level challenges children to use higher levels of analytical and observational skills according to Self-Determination Theory (SDT), which prepares them for university-level learning and future work.
Real value, Beyond scores.
Boredom is not a sign of laziness, but a warning signal that tells you your child needs a learning method that’s right for them.
Building a strong foundation and learning happily is the best gift parents can give.
Let your child start fresh at the right point with Kumon!
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FAQ
You should check whether the worksheets are too difficult. In the Kumon Method of learning, we conduct a Diagnostic Test to find the starting point where your child can work comfortably, to reduce resistance and create a positive attitude toward learning. The principle is “Don’t force yet, but try taking one step back” to check on our child.
Yes, it can. Because Kumon helps change attitudes from “I can’t do it” to “I can do it” through practice over an appropriate period of time (Just-right level) matched to the child’s attention span. And there’s adjustment of difficulty levels to provide just the right amount of challenge, so children don’t feel bored and can concentrate for longer.