Balance

I'm struggling with the idea of balance between challenge and discouragement. Haley is very perfectionistic, but also has a great need for challenge. She gets very upset when she doesn't do well and can't figure out an answer. However, on the flip side, she also gets upset if an activity is "too easy" for her.

I found a great book with Greek and Latin roots, along with vocabulary to follow each. Last week, they worked on the root ped = foot. Their words for the week were quadruped, biped, tripod, peddler, pedestrian, pedicure, millipede, impediment, centipede and pedal. They had a vocabulary quiz on Friday. The first half of the quiz was a bubble-in format. #1 said, "Cats and dogs are examples of these." They had to bubble in the correct answer. (Maddie only completed these 10 questions). For the second half of the quiz, you had to fill in the sentence with the word that fit. Haley immediately started sobbing when she got her quiz because she couldn't figure out one of the answers. The sentence was, "Tristan's speech ______ lessened every year, so people could hear his words more clearly when he gave his graduation speech." She ended up getting 14/15 correct, which I explained to her was still an "A" on the quiz. She just sobbed, "but I could have done better!" Maddie, on the other hand, was happy with her 7/10 score. :)

I think I just have to ask Haley what she really wants: easy work so she can get a perfect score, or challenging work in which she may occasionally miss some problems.