Halfway

 Today marks the halfway point of our school year. This milestone is marked by lesson number not by the calendar day. I feel productive when I see progress so pulling out the part 2 teacher's edition of phonics was very exciting for me.

Aliza has learned to write and read every letter of the alphabet and now they are quickly moving on to blends--as in a new blend every day! We'll see how this goes. Aliza may need to pay closer attention to her teachers than she has been.

This project was an alphabet book. The curriculum expected the student to complete letters A through E and so supplied those pages with pictures to color. Aliza, of course, wanted to do the whole alphabet. I cannot draw so there was no way I was going to fake my way through drawing pictures for that many letters. We needed a magazine full of pictures in a bad way. I said a prayer and told Aliza I would check the mailbox for a magazine. Sure enough, there was a Harriet Davis magazine and we found a picture for every single letter of the alphabet! I was super excited!!

I learned that Aliza is a better listener if her hands are busy. This bugged me for a while since school in my mind is sitting at a desk with your hands folded and feet flat on the floor. Sometimes it is play-doh, other times it is coloring books and at other times it is popcorn for a snack.

 We just finished a unit on all kinds of animals that God created. Aliza made a book of animals and we learned a catchy song with a verse for each animal. On the elephant day we made elephant biscuits.

I think it was on the elephant day that I had the distinct thought of "oh my goodness, in 2 years I'll have another kindergartener and will be doing all of this again!"

My thinking is that if I'm thriving and the children are thriving we will keep on doing what we are doing. So far that is true!