Help me out here.

We use Spelling Power for our spelling program.  We love Spelling Power.  I absolutely hated spelling lists at the beginning of the week as a kid...and the concept of having 20 words handed to a child on Monday, with a test scheduled on Friday and then they write the words 10 times, write them in a sentence, and study them at home Thursday night...to be tested on Friday...and after that, more than likely never dealing with that word again even if they got it wrong on the test...just seems pointless to me.  As the kid who generally got the spelling words right on the pre-test on Monday...half the time, I didn't even learn new spellings in a week.  How silly!!  Spelling power introduces new words each day...if the child knows how to spell the word, you move on to the next.  If the child spells the word incorrectly, they cross it out, spell it correctly in the next column, and that becomes a study word.  For Reasa and Lainie, we'll go until we get to as many as 4 or 5 study words for that day, and then you stop giving new words, and they go through a 10-step study process (where they spell it, say it, write it, close their eyes and spell it and say it, and so on), then they write each word in a sentence.  Sometimes we follow this up with other practice techniques--making the words out of play doh, writing them in rice trays, making pancakes with the letter shapes...etc.  Basically, the kids get 15-20 new words a week.  This is wonderful!  Here's the rub:  my children turn into whimpering puddles of ridiculousness when they spell a word wrong.  The first missed word, it's a mild pout. The second word, they start fussing. The third word?  Oh, my gosh...it's like their little worlds came tumbling down and they feel like hopeless idiots who have been sentenced to a life of stupidity.  And I've made the girls go to 4 or 5 a day.  Just imagine the result.  This may sound strong to you.  Let me assure you...it's worse than that.  And it's every day.  Every day that they get words wrong (and the lists are getting harder, which is good!!  But it means more words wrong than they're used to).  Every single day, I assure their precious little heads that they have to get words wrong occasionally, otherwise there is absolutely no point in doing a spelling lesson.  They have to get words wrong in order to learn new spellings. If they already knew how to spell every word in the English language, as their teacher, I would not be a necessary part of their lives.  Now...if they want to learn the spellings of every single word in the English language on their own time and impress me with their knowledge when we do Spelling lessons...hey, have at it.  But I can guarantee you, this is not going to happen.

Today, I put my foot down.  I told them (Lainie specifically) that I would never again have this conversation with them.  They would get words wrong daily, that was the point, and I would never listen to them whine or fuss about it again.  If they did whine or fuss again, I would assign them the ominous task of writing 25 times, "I will not whine or fuss or pout about spelling words ever again. I need to learn to spell new words."  If it happened after that, I would increase that number by 10 each time it happened.  Or maybe more.  For Lainie, this would be a punishment pretty much worse than death.  And I told her it would happen during free time...that she would not hold the rest of us up while she pouted and whined about having to write sentences.  Plus, if she did that I would give her more.

It was not a good mommy moment.  That Homeschooling Mommy of the Year Award?  Yeah, I wasn't in the running for that anyway.

I want to believe that the reason they get so upset is because they just can't stand getting things wrong.  They want so desperately to do everything with excellence that the thought of missing a spelling word rocks their worlds.  I'm pretty sure this is not the reason most of the time.  With each misspelled word, the work load becomes greater.  Another word with which they must work through those 10 steps.  Another sentence to write.  More school to do.  For Lainie, this is definitely the case.  For Reasa...however...I think it's pride.  She hates the thought of being wrong.  I know this is true for her because it transfers to other areas of her life.  This is just another area where we need to deal with this.  These are the parts of parenting nobody tells you about.  And absolutely nobody tells you how to actually deal with them.

Time to bust out Making Children Mind Without Losing Yours again.  Maybe Kevin Leman mentioned something in there about this issue...I didn't read through to these ages...

So, tell me...how do you deal with pride issues or laziness in your child's schoolwork?  Other areas?  I wish I could tell you that I handle these things beautifully.  My reaction above would indicate...otherwise.