E is a year post bar mitzva and he's been learning shemona esrei on his own time. That means that when he is fluent with a bracha, he moves on to the next bracha. On the regular day shemona esrei he is up to birkas haminim.
He wants a phone because he's getting to the age where people are exchanging phone numbers and he can't keep up with them without a number. I said earn it by learning weekday, shabbos shacharis and mincha shemona esrei, yomtov shacharis and mincha shemona esrei, and shabbos musaf shemona esrei. He said no thank you.
I said right now we are working on your reading 3x a week for 4 minutes a time. How about we work on shemona esrei. And how about making it 8 minutes. He agreed.
Right now it takes him 8 minutes to read from V'lamalshinim to Modim.
He said he's tempted to take medication and learn how to read it all in a couple of months. I said if he wants to, that's an option.
He said Nah.
