"Do you understand?" I asked the little boy with a smile, leaning slightly forward so I could see his face properly.
He stared at the page for a moment like the numbers were personally offending him.
"Uhm…" he scratched the side of his head with the end of his pen, thinking hard. His eyebrows pulled together and he squinted at the workbook. Then suddenly his face brightened. "Yes!"
"Good," I replied, relaxing back into my chair. "But you can still ask questions even if you don't understand something."
"I want to give it a try," the boy said quickly, determination filling his voice. "On my own."
That made me smile wider.
"Sure," I said gently.
I watched as he bent back over the table, gripping the pen a little tighter as he started solving the problem again. The room was quiet except for the soft scratching sound of his pen moving across paper and the faint ticking of the clock on the wall.
