My Girl--Growing Up

Aliza. I haven't talked about her in a while. She reads well now so I have to be careful what I say! Actually she is very much enjoying reading. Currently she is reading a 300 page (junior fiction) book and she's halfway through. She says the book is at a "boring" part and she's having trouble getting to the next exciting part.

I picked up the Project Life app for free on St. Patrick's Day and just let it sit on my phone. Aliza opened it the other day and asked if she could make a layout. I told her to go for it and she did! She had absolutely no trouble figuring it out and making a page in minutes. Not that I was really surprised. The difference between Aliza and I with technology is that I rely heavily on Jeremy when I'm trying something "new" and Aliza is perfectly comfortable to play around with any app and figure it out. She wanted to do a layout about Isaiah...

Was learning long division a significant memory of elementary math for anyone else? It is for me because I didn't get it and missed just about every problem. I'm not sure what my hangup with math was--I think I missed getting some foundation stuff early. I think I bought in to some of my teacher's math anxieties and the effect of a few influential classmates who decided that they didn't like math. So, like every parent does, I've taken my own education experience and tried to make it better for my kids. As far as math...I make each new concept "no big deal." If they get it, they don't have to watch the 30 minute lesson. If I need help in teaching, say, long division, Aliza watches the new material segment and does the practice problems with the teacher.

Basic division was first introduced in October soon after Isaiah was born and it didn't go smoothly. We got through it, but I was dreading when it would come up again. I saw the long division unit coming and feared that it would be our "math wall". I took the no-big-deal approach. Aliza took the this-looks-outrageously-scary-so-I-will-whine approach. She watched the lesson and we sat down together and knocked it out. She gets it! A few days later when the concept of remainders was introduced, she watched the lesson again and sat down and did her work. No big deal. The truth of the matter is probably that my math anxiety is decreasing and I'll be ready for 4th grade math (except for anything in the area of geometry)!!! haha.

And, oh my, do I ever see myself in Aliza. It scares me and amazes me all at the same time. Sometimes it's hard to have patience with myself in her. It's not easy to come face to face my own weaknesses seemingly multiple times every day.