Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Monopoly

Monday night we played Jr. Monopoly with the boys.

Monday night Roman won (again).

Monday night we talked about how

Roman always wins

And he panics if he thinks he is going to lose

And about how Deacon is a good sport.

Monday night we talked about how Roman likes big bills.

And he doesn't like to spend them.

And he likes to tell other people what bills they need to pay him.

After the boys went to bed on Monday night Noah and I talked about

locker rooms.

And Monopoly.

And how we are tired of nagging them and constantly saying "now it's his turn," "Pay this now", "wash your hair", "ok now put your other sock on".

I said that sometimes I wonder if we are too busy. We are always instructing and instructing because we have to get here or there or pick up so and so or put someone to bed.

And I said that I had been thinking about what it would be like if there wasn't a deadline for getting out of the locker room. And what would it look like if there was nothing following Monopoly so there was no reason to hurry.

And we thought for a minute.

And Noah laughed. We both did. We both had tried it in the locker room.

What happens?
They surf on the benches.
They climb in the lockers.
They have a water fight with the shower nozzle.
They experiment with the hair dryers.

They would stay in the locker room for a very long time.
They have no agenda.
They have no watches.
They are so in the moment, my boys.

And Monopoly? What if we didn't coach them along?
They would take breaks.
No one would remember who's turn it is.
Someone would bump the board while cutting a swath with a light saber.

That was Monday night.
It is now Wednesday and I am still pondering how to keep order while minimizing instruction.

Any ideas?

3 comments:

Thia said...

I think it's taking a moment to ask what is most important at the moment. For instance, at meal times, there's more order than not. At school time, more order than not. Chore time is more relaxed and sometimes there's a lot less order. Children need both I think. Games are difficult, to go back to Monopoly. If it's just the kids playing, I guess it doesn't matter much, but if you are playing, eventually you need to move on to cooking dinner or getting some laundry done. Like I said, it's moment by moment.

gma pam said...

Try having short practice sessions...tell them for x #of minutes you will see what happens...make sure they know what to do first. Tell me if it works...!

Auntie Kendy said...

I like the practice session... kind of a "dry run". See if they can do all that need need to get ready in 5 minutes. You could call it something related to Star Wars and they'd love it!