A Martyr No More

We were sitting at the dinner table, starting to plan the week. The Ex asked our youngest (8th grade) what they were learning in Math. Our son explained that they’ve been doing reviews for the last little while and that they were having a test soon.

His dad said, “That’s not what I asked you.” Our son looked confused.

“I asked what you were learning. You haven’t told me anything,” said his dad in a condescending tone.

Our son was more confused. I started to worry, “oh dear, he’s about to treat him like he’s stupid and make him feel bad.”

His dad persisted, “What are you learning? You told me what you’re doing.” Our son was still confused.

“Are you learning addition?” His dad asked with a sneer.

Our son said, “no.”

“Have you learned how to add?” his dad continued.

“Yes,” Our son said.

“Do you know how to do division?” His dad asked again.

“Yes,” Our son answered again.

“What about quantum physics?” His dad said.

“Yes,” said our son.

His dad retorted, “No. I don’t think you learned quantum physics.”

This was getting ridiculous. It seemed like he was trying to make our son feel dumb for not answering the question the way he wanted, and he wasn’t clear about what he wanted. I jumped in, “Son, he wants to know if you’ve been working on fractions, or division, or graphing, or what?”

“Oh!” our son said, finally realizing what his dad was asking. “We’ve already done graphing, and x, y, z. Right now we are just reviewing all of that.”

That finally satisfied his dad and he stopped the ridicule.