Beast Academy + Perfectionist = ?

Most of my kids are perfectionists. Learning comes fairly easily to them so they tend to be very reluctant to try new things that they might not be really good at from the get go. I don't want them growing up fearing things they perceive as difficult so I try to give them little bites of challenging topics. The most recent thing that I've found to torture, um, challenge Sam is Beast Academy, by the same people that wrote The Art of Problem Solving.

I knew he would love the comic book format and that the work would not be easy for him. He has been steadily working through Math-U-See since first grade and is really good at the straight-forward format. I also know that Sam, more than any of my other kids, shuts down if things get too hard. I need to be aware of all of these potential pitfalls and help Sam work around them without making things too easy. So how do I do it?

1. We do Beast Academy first. That way I know he's just had breakfast, a break, and sleep so any grumpiness is not from external factors. Although I have been known to send a truly struggling child to get a quick drink of water or to wash his face just to get away for a minute or two.

2. I work with Sam, or whoever is being challenged. They each have their own spots at the desk but for hard stuff they sit across from me so I can watch. Is Sam reaching the end of his rope? Is Harry fidgeting more than normal? I monitor it and either end the session or send him for a drink.

3. I give hints as appropriate. I won't give answers but after I see the child working for a few minutes (exactly how many changes with who or what they're doing) without making progress I'll ask them if they want a little hint. And I'll make sure that the hint is enough to get them going again.

4. We keep the sessions relatively short. Where I might be inclined to have the child do the entire section, I'll keep it to three or four problems. We might come back to it later in the day, but most likely the next day.

5. We keep it light. I use a lot of humor to pull Sam away from the edge if things are going bad. This goes for all of my kids and a lot of different situations we find ourselves in. If I'm trying to get them to tell me a narration on Black Beauty and I want to know where the Black rode to, I might say, "He rode to the moon, right?" It breaks the tension and helps him get the real answer out a little bit easier.

I want to challenge my kids, not torment them (although if you ask them I don't think they'd see the difference). So I set them up to succeed. It's not that different than what any parent would do, these are just things I've noticed after working with Sam for years and watching how he thinks. If I were to tell him to sit at his desk and work on the section by himself he'd sit there crying for an hour never asking for help and just thinking about how he can't do the work he needs to. This gives him a chance to grow in knowledge and confidence and really, it doesn't get much better than that.