Stepping Back?

So I've been delving into the SRA reading system with Arianna through this book.

I'm really encouraged by her willingness to learn. All the time, everywhere we are, she asks me "What does that say Mama?", "Can you read that to me Mama?". She loves to sit down and 'read' books to her sister and loves nothing more than to have her face buried in a book. She's so proud of herself for knowing all of her letters and what sounds they make.

So I got this book and we started in on it but I'm wondering if we shouldn't take a step back. This is yet another system that works letter writing into its program and expresses why it is so important to the 'learning to read' experience.

Problem is that Arianna doesn't have enough fine motor control to do any of the exercises necessary to learn to write her own letters - she can barely do a straight line for that matter and that's perfectly fine for her actual age let alone her adjusted age.

I'm discouraged but at the same time I could use the next few months to just work on her pre-writing skills and spend some more time working on her math skills. But she is so eager to read and I'm really at a loss of how to teach her.

If anyone knows of anything, please let me know. Arianna will love you for it!

Phonics!

A few weeks ago Arianna really surprised me. We were sitting down reading one of her many books and focused on an alphabet book. She's known her ABCs for a long time now so reading these books is a bit boring for me...

Until she started telling me what the letters were AND the sounds they make (including doubles, like G - Gah and Jah sounds)! I was floored... really. We didn't teach her this - she got it from her leapfrog fridge phonics magnets.

I was so very excited I started looking into phonics programs. She knows her ABCs and the sounds all the letters make - she's well on her way to reading now! But... the phonics programs I've found are over her head - one of them actually wants the kids to draw the letters. She can barely draw a circle let alone letters.

I got this book from the library and will try it out to see if it works for her. We'll be getting the hooked on phonics program for christmas and hope she does well with that too.

But boy oh boy was this a pleasant surprise. She continues to amaze me every day!

Homeschooling surprise...

Today my father came to the house to use our computer to check a few things online. He stayed much longer than I thought he would and we talked about lots of things. Somehow the subject got to homeschooling and he surprised me with his support of the concept. I was so excited I immediately started talking about what we're doing with Arianna and how we were thinking about continuing it past preschool if all goes well.

I was very pleased that he thought it was a great idea. I've been so reluctant to mention anything to my parents because of what I thought their reaction would be. I'm glad to learn I was wrong about them...

Arianna Update

This week we are starting our homeschool preschool again after taking the summer off. This poster shows what we are learning about this week - the letter E, counting and the number 5, the shape Octagon, the nursery rhyme "Bobby Shaftoe" and lighthouses and beacons. We'll be taking a trip down to Beavertail Lighthouse near Newport, RI later this week or this weekend as the special trip associated with this weeks theme.

Arianna knows all her letters, upper and lower case, can count items to 10 but knows all her numbers up to 16 (20 if you don't ask her to say them in order), all of her colors and most of the shapes that are covered in this curriculum - so the majority of this is more for fun than anything else. We're still working on counting but she's vastly improved.

I'm trying my best to keep learning fun even though I want to run a million miles toward reading and writing - she's just not ready and is still too young. I've invested in some 'hooked on phonics' workbooks and visited the parent/teacher store for some books on learning to write so we'll start there. She still doesn't know alot of the items pictured in some of these books, so we'll start working on that first.

Arianna has hit a big brick wall as far as speech is concerned. My husband tells me not to worry but its not going away. Arianna has developed a severe stutter - especially when asking a question or requesting something. Her EI caseworker was at the house this morning and is finally going to set up an appointment with a speech therapist because we both feel she's regressed with her speech. It's almost like her mouth is going to fast for her brain. When we tell her to slow down she'll enunciate much better (all the while pointing her finger at us in rhythm) but overall she's harder to understand. She has a very vast vocabulary and I think her language explosion has happened too fast for her. I hope its something she will soon outgrow but its affected her all summer and now I'm worried. Monday she stuttered with nearly every sentence - it's taught me alot about patience...

Weight wise she is sitting in at 24 lbs. 4 oz. She has taken, what I hope is, a temporary dive in her eating habits because we pulled her from daycare (where she would eat awesomely around the other kids) but she's also been battling several colds since we pulled her down to one day a week. Ironic she would get a cold every week she's there though...

This puts her at the 5th percentile for her actual age - this is the curve she's been on all year and I'm not going to fret about it too much. Even when she was in daycare full time and eating like a horse around the other kids she hadn't gained much weight so this must just be her personal curve. She's lanky and I'm just going to have to live with it. This is hard for me as I've battled weight issues my entire life - I'm not used to the idea of having a kid that doesn't has the same problems.

Nap time and bed time are a real struggle for us. She insists on someone holding her hand until she falls asleep. This can take anywhere between 10 - 90 minutes every night. When Daria's room is finished she is getting all new furniture and we hope to start a new bedtime/nap routine with that change... we need to - I'm not going to keep holding this girls hand when Daria starts getting into things.

Otherwise my being home full time has been a really good change for her. We can focus on potty training, which is going well again, and on her eating habits (which are more consistant again). We're now getting back into her preschool stuff and hope to start working on alot of other stuff associated with learning too.

This fall/winter promises to be challenging for me, but I'm up to the task!

For Abby...

Saw that you guys were looking to homeschool pre-school which we are also doing with Arianna.

Wanted to give you the link to a curriculum we're using (free too!) that has worked really well for us and even allows us to set up unit studies every week. I order all the books from the library 2 weeks in advance to ensure we get them in time. Arianna's idea of 'playing toys' is reading books, so this curriculum is great. We leave out all the religion based items and found no problems with the curriculum at all.

http://www.letteroftheweek.com/

Good Luck!

I thought this was cute...

Most of the comments I hear from people when we talk about homeschooling involve socialization. It seems everyone knows 'someone' who is or was homeschooled and they are social misfits and don't fit in etc. People hold onto this one person as the shining example of the result of homeschooling. Have you ever met a public/private schooled person who would fit that same description of social misfit who doesn't fit it. I've met many more of them than the homeschooling kind.

Truth of it is that socialization and outreach to the community needs to be a priority of the homeschooling parent and its not as hard as you think it is...

As a homeschooling parent you need to be prepared for the critisism and understand that the majority of it comes from ignorance. Don't let anyone else's ignorance dictate how you choose to raise your kids - stand tall and stand up for your kids :)