Week 32, day 1

Monday: Language Arts. Having reviewed all our memory verses last week, this week's review went more smoothly. After finishing our catechism review and hymn and updating the calendar (I let P write the time on the calendar today), I asked P to read her reader. She picked it up, flipped it over, and started reading the parent information on the back. The format of the books is that each features a different animal (in this case, a newt). It is often hard to tell from the illustration just which animal the main character is supposed to be, and its actions are rarely consistent with what such an animal can do in real life. On the back of the book, there is a paragraph giving details on the true lifestyle of the featured animal, using vocabulary and phonics rules the child has not yet encountered. However, P made it through the first sentence without any help. I told her that if she read the entire back, we'd switch and I'd read the story - previously, the deal has been that I refuse to read the reader itself, because that's P's job. She needed help with words like "poisonous", and because the letters and spaces were smaller than she's used to, she struggled with keeping track of where she was on the page, but she ended up reading the entire thing, figuring out phonics rules by herself. She has gained so much confidence this year! When she was done, I told her, "Now, you can read anything you want!" As promised, I read her the story about Ned the Newt.

Both P and E did their writing assignments happily. E traced his name (all capitals) pretty well, but he preferred to continue each "big line down" about twice as far as necessary, so that the E looked like an F with an extra small line near the top, for example. He thought this was funny, and I let him get away with it for now. P has gotten so good at writing, she did her copywork with no trouble at all. P then dictated a friendly letter to my mom (yes, Mom, you'll get it in a few days or so) about starting violin lessons. She copied the entire thing and drew a picture of herself. It's so neat to see how much she's learned this year.

This afternoon, we went to the optometrist because I had broken my glasses and needed new ones, and it had been about 4 years since my last eye exam. I scheduled an exam for P as well, and she turned out to have 20/20 vision. Hopefully it stays that way. E wanted an exam too, but he can't recognize the letters individually though he can say them in order, and the optometrist wasn't set up for kids who can't name their letters yet. He was disappointed until the optometrist gave him a pair of sunglasses to match P's (after having her eyes dilated). Who knows? Perhaps he'll suddenly want to learn all his letter names and sounds as a result.