Schedules

Raccoon has never liked adhering to a schedule, even as a newborn he was all over the place with sleeping and eating. Recently I've been trying to do create some regular times for learning. Things go well for a week or so, then it stops working. My major discovery awhile ago was to connect our learning with a physical activity. The only problem is that as soon as Raccoon can do something, he completely loses interest in it and rages on to master the next skill. He really liked running for awhile, but now that he's got that down he wants to run up and down hills with some hopping and rolling thrown in. I love that he works at something until he gets it (even though at the beginning he gets really frustrated). But the constant changes in our routine makes it hard for me to be ready with what he wants to do at the exact moment he wants it. So I just gave up trying to do anything, but then he started asking me for our learning activities and I could tell he missed it. His behavior tends to deteriorate, seemingly from boredom, if I don't constantly introduce new things.

I need to figure out how to keep up. For the first week of the cycle, I have to come up with new ideas and materials. Then we have a good week or two before things stop working and I think, here we go again! So for the next few days I'm going to rethink my approach and see if I can figure out a way to anticipate his need for change and a new routine every few weeks. Hopefully this way I'll be able to stay ahead instead of constantly trying to catch up. We'll see how it goes.