Tieing shoes

I will admit it, I am a bad mommy!! The boys are 6 and they have never had a pair of tie up shoes to learn how to tie until now. The new Tennis shoes we bought are tie up shoes. So, I guess I should get with the program and teach them. When I was learning how to tie, I remember my mom teaching me a rabbit thing that went a long with tieing. You made the first loop and that was the rabbit and I can't remember the rest. Anyone out there know what the heck I am talking about?

 

Thank you for taking the initiative to try to teach your kids to tie their own shoes. Many parents have decided that's the job of those of us teaching. I'm a music teacher and it about makes me crazy.

Here's a Spongebob shoe tying song.

Here's another song that describes it. This one is better IMO. You can listen to a listen to most of it on their website, or can buy the whole song and download it for .99. Actually, just about every song from these people (Plank Road Publishing) is a great choice for kids' songs.

 

My niece also does not know how to tie her shoes and she's in kindergarten but like your boys she has never owned shoes that had to be tied they were either velcro or just pull ons. My girls have almost always had tie shoes because I wanted them to learn to tie their own shoes.

I thought it went here's a tree (that's the loop) the bunny goes around the tree and through the hole and then you pull.
OR
you make two bunny ears. Cross the ears and one goes through and pull.

Not sure just how they go but that's about what I remember them being. I learned the tree way but my dh does it the bunny ears way. One of my girls does the bunny ears the other does it the tree.

 

My boys are in first, and one can tie and the other just gets frustrated by it. Once Jon was ready to learn, he learned in a day or so. He does it with one loop, wraps around, and pulls through.

 

Annie is in K, and she somehow taught herself last summer while watching Caillou with the little girls. One episode has him learning to tie shoes and she latched onto the rhyme he used. Fortunately they are off the Caillou kick now.

 

All three of mine learned in Kindergarten. H & B learned at school -- their teachers had practice boards and worked with the kids purposefully, and they just came home and knew how to do it!

Jackson had more trouble. I taught him to make two loops (two bunny ears) and tie them together in a double knot. I kind of wish I hadn't done that. He's 11 now, and to this day, he is HORRIBLE at tying shoes. He can't get them tight enough. Usually, he leaves them tied and just slips them on and off, or he tucks the ends into his shoes and doesn't tie them at all.

 

Oh, I'm MOST DEFINITELY not getting the mommy of the year award.
When DS was in first grade, his shoes always came untied. So much that the janitor asked me to teach him how to tie his shoes one afternoon, when I came to pick him up. I didn't know how much of an impression that made on DS -- I guess he was more embarrassed than I thought. I've always looked for Velcro for him since then.
So I took out each of the twins and bought them tie shoes in second grade and taught them (I use the bunny around the tree method, BTW).
Fast Forward to this year -- DS is now in 5th grade. We were in a shoe store, b/c all their shoes had holes in them and we all needed new ones. DS told me he LOVED this one pair of shoes. I looked, and they were too small (not much, but enough to be snug). So I got him measured and found a pair that was the right size, and INSISTED he buy them instead.
On the way home, he told me IN CONFIDENCE that he didn't like the bigger shoes b/c they had laces and the others didn't!!!
He'd never learned how to tie his shoes!!!
I felt awful, and his father had to teach him how to tie shoes. (He used the two bunny loop method, BTW.)

 

DS1 learned from XH, so he ties his like a left-handed person even though he's right-handed.

DS2 had fine motor issues (so does DD1, actually). Anyway, although we *had* to learn by age 5 when I was a kid, I figure we have velcro now, and I can wait until they're 7 or 8 (my kids have small feet) and it's just easier and quicker. DD1 has spent most of this year mastering a pencil grip well enough to write halfway legibly, so I know she isn't ready to tie her shoes. But, I figure, it doesn't matter because she has velcro shoes, so it never inconveniences the teacher. My attitude drives my mom crazy, but I think: why have her struggle and get stressed out now, when she can learn in a year and it will probably be a breeze? This worked great with my boys and I plan to do it again with my girls.

etc: punctuation

 

My 5-year-old hasn't gotten it yet. Her fine motor skills are definitely not her strength. She had one pair of tie shoes a few months ago, but it ended up being a bigger pain for us -- so we went back to velcro.

Beth, thanks for posting those songs! I'll check them out. I was hoping to tackle shoe-tying and proper post-poop wiping this summer, before she starts K. :lol:

 

Mine learned around 5 or so. My 7 1/2 year old niece spent the night a few weeks ago, and asked me to tie her shoes. She said she didn't know how to. I was blown away that someone in second grade had no idea how to tie her shoes. I kept saying "really?" because I thought she was teasing me. Nope, not teasing.

 

Thanks for the link to the songs, they are great. The bunny around the tree was what I was thinking about, so thanks for that. See I totally had it messed up, I thought the loops where the bunny. Thanks guys.

 

QUOTE(my2boys @ May 1 2009, 04:44 PM) [snapback]1296408[/snapback]
Thanks for the link to the songs, they are great. The bunny around the tree was what I was thinking about, so thanks for that. See I totally had it messed up, I thought the loops where the bunny. Thanks guys.

You were kind of right in that the two loops are the bunny's ears in the one way of doing it and there was a tree in the other.

 

We haven't worried about it. It's often part of their homework but they don't get it at all. They'll understand eventually so I'm not worried and they don't have any shoes with shoelaces anyway.

 

Maddie knows how to tie her shoes and does it just about every day, she learned at the beginning of the school year. Connor has problems with that skill and has been working on it at the Y in the Kinderkids program. I think part of the issue is because of him having the DAFO's on under his shoes so it makes it a bit more difficult for him to position his foot the way he wants to.

 

Bethany has been able to tie her shoes for since right after she turned 5 Nicholas just learned to do his right before he turned 6 and is still so proud of himself. It took him a little longer due to the fine motor skills that some little guys take longer to get down. I have told them they could not get velco shoes if they did not know how to tie regular shoes. I have a friend with a 10 year old boy, who does not know how to tie shoes. I asked him to tie Nicks one day and he said he did not know how. I thought he was kidding but his dad said no he always has velcro shoes and did not think it was a problem. Just keep working with them and they will get it with nick I used the two ear one with Bethany we used the one loop and wrap it around.