I would like to start out by congratulating my cousin Matt and his wife Maggie on the birth of daughter Lia Brynne yesterday. We are so thankful that God allowed Maggie to have a full term pregnancy, since we all thought that she would be born premature like her brother. The LORD deserves all the praise!
We are currently looking for a new place to live since our lease is up at the end of February and we don't want to sign another year lease because we could be heading back to Minnesota any time. I sent my resume to the neurology clinic that I used to work for and the girl that took my desk when I left is pushing hard for them to hire me back, so we will see what happens.
I was reading an article in Parents magazine about kids being ready for kindergarten and it dawned on me that Curtis will be starting kindergarten this year and I'm going to have to get him registered soon! I started freaking out...would he be ready by September because there is still much for him to learn. He is good with numbers, but letters just aren't clicking with him. How is he going to react being in a classroom setting and having to sit for long periods of time. I almost gave myself an anxiety attack! Then I started crying because my baby was going to be starting school. I am going to be a mess on his first day of school. He has grown up so fast, my little man. Okay, I better stop before I start crying again. :) Have a good week!
3 comments:
I was so worried about Jeremiah not knowing what he should for school. I started pushing him in his reading, and he became quite frustrated. I'm learning to relax and make learning more play based by doing games, crafts, and reading fun picture books to him.
Our district website said that they would like the kids to know their letters, but I discovered that it was all taught in kindergarten anyway. Each week, the teacher introduces one letter.
Curtis will get plenty of practice with letters in kindergarten. I've even noticed that some kids who have had 2 or more years of preschool don't always know their letters. Some are just not quite ready to read until they are closer to age 6. I think that the best thing that a parent of young kids can do is read lots of books to their children. Drilling them on letters and words can wait until they are ready and show more interest.
Sue
I agree with Sue. When Curtis is ready, he'll pick it up, just like that!
Our district also encourages knowing the upper case letters, but in all actuality, a letter is introduced each week.
If you are really concerned, try introducing letters with high-interest items. You don't even have to drill him. You could do something like, "Buzzlight year starts with the letter B."
In all honestly, only a HANDFUL of kids know all their letters before kindergarten.
I just wanted to add, that I was worried when I heard from some parents in our district that they expect kids to be reading books by the end of kindergarten. I discovered that the "reading" is memorizing a list of sight words and then using pictures as clues to read the other words. Blending sounds and word families are often not taught until first grade in many schools (sometimes these concepts are introduced, but mastery is seldom expected in kindergarten).
As a parent volunteer at Jeremiah's school, I have been helping small groups of students with skills such as counting to 31,
writing their names, and rhyming words.
-Sue
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