The Importance of Following Your Child’s Interests

“My child is so disinterested in school, but he can play games for hours!”

“I share my interests with my child, but she just wants to draw all the time.”

“All of my child’s friends participate in team sports, but my child only wants to build legos.”

Fill in the blanks any way you like, it is indicative of the same reality: your child is their own unique person with interests specific to them.

These interests begin to manifest when a child is very young: the toy your child always chooses to play with, a favorite stuffed animal, a preferred color, textures that are sought after or avoided, music preferences, and so on.  And these interests may change depending on the age, the season, or the self-perfecting tendency of the child.  

Let’s take a step back and examine briefly why a child may behave in a repetitive manner.

Perhaps you noticed your child repeating an activity ad nauseam as a toddler or preschooler.  Great!  Your child was working on the act of self-perfection.  If a child tries over and over to tie a shoelace, wash a dish, fold a towel, use a spoon, brush their hair, make the bed, these are moments for adults to step back, observe, take note.  Is the child able to accomplish this task?  What seems difficult for the child?  What does the child need to see again to make this skill attainable and useful?

In these cases, the child imitates the adult in order to perfect skills and gain autonomy in movement and care of self and of the environment.  This means the child is able to maneuver through their environment providing independent and nourishing hygiene for proper growth and development.

From here, we see the difference between the repetitious actions of a child for the sake of independent movement or hygiene to the repetitious actions of a child for the sake of pursuing interests innate to that child.  

Think back on your life.  What were the hobbies, the skills, the sports, the activities you loved to pursue as a child?  Were these the same hobbies, skills, sports, activities your parents or older siblings liked to pursue?  Perhaps they were, and your family members became your mentors.  Perhaps they were not, and you found a mentor outside of your family.  Do you still pursue these interests?  How did they support your growth and development?  

Now think about your child.  What does your child naturally enjoy doing?  What does your child think about, talk about?  Observe your child.  What activities does your child pursue that will assist them in their intellectual, social, and occupational growth and development?  Can you assist your child directly from your wheelhouse of knowledge and skills?  Can you assist indirectly by finding polished mentors who can keep these interests alive through ever expanding experiences?

While this is important for all children, for a struggling reader, finding and supporting personal interests may be the only solution for finding topics a child will choose to read about independently and with joy.  This may still be a struggle, but choice is key.  A child who chooses to read rather than is forced to read will more easily pick up reading because the desire to understand overpowers the effort to read.  A child who struggles to read will often pick up material that is interesting.