Day 5: I don't know, look it up!

Tonight, while making dinner (spaghetti and meatballs - easiest, most accepted meal in the house which receives no complaints EVER!), I urged my children to do their homework. Even The Little has a small amount of homework each week and she already dreads it. In their attempt to put off multiplying decimals and cutting out words that start with "P" for an hour longer, one of my bright and curious children cries out in a screeching voice, "Who invented homework anyway!! I'd like tell him a thing or two!" I may have paraphrased that just a little there, but you get the idea. The screech was so high pitched and miserable sounding, even the dog covered her ears. So instead of responding, "I don't know, go look it up." I got out my computer and looked it up myself. I also wanted to see who I should seek out about having a one-on-one conversation with the lovely human being who did this to us.

According to this (click here), an Italian man invented homework back in 1095. Did I mention we're eating spaghetti and meatballs tonight.....I read the passage to the kids and it turns out, homework has been an on-again off-again kind of tradition that came back into fashion in the US when we were trying to keep up with those Soviets back in the 1940s. Oh, the humanity.....

I don't really mind homework, a little homework that is. I enjoy seeing the progress my kiddos are making in school. I really enjoy seeing how much they are learning and how they relate their school lessons to real life. I enjoy helping them understand why some of the math skills they are required to repeat over and over and over and over again will  help them in their career aspirations they may have at that moment. Homework, isn't as bad these days as it was "back in my day". 

But I love that I can say, "I don't know, look it up." And I'm not afraid at all to say "I don't know." I was trained that if I said I didn't know something, I should follow that with the action of going to find out the answer. We just didn't have the internet as a tool like our kids do these days. We had these:

As you might imagine, these were not as up-to-date as the internet. They were pretty archaic according to immediate supply of information we have now.   I was given the family set of our encyclopedias some time ago and they are displayed proudly in our "family library". I showed these to The Boy about a year ago, I think his jaw dropped to the floor. "That's crazy, Mom." He seemed to say as he stood their staring at the big dusty books. 

Like I said, I really enjoy telling the kids to go look something up. And since they LOVE LOVE LOVE technology and the internet, they see this as a treat, not a burden. Here's a perfect example, I think I've already told The Boy to look up who invented homework a long time ago; he already knew the answer and was basically reciting along with me as I read what I had found out just moments ago. That was so great!! Proud mom-moment!

I love learning along side my children. I may have to do a Google search on the new ways to calculate multiplication problems or to review what a compound sentence is before sitting down to help my children with their homework each night, but I have no complaints. The Hubby enjoys this too, probably more than me! But I love it even more being able to point at the sliver box plugged into the wall while saying, look it up and then seeing the children run to the wifi-powered contraption to, in fact, look it up. 

Try it some time, "I don't know, honey. Go look it up."