Another story, with no pictures for today, this one about Norah. We've been, ahem, challenged, at times with Norah and her strong opinions, but with all things parenting, it's a constantly evolving process. Sometimes it's a matter of understanding how things in her world are affecting her, like things at school, or our work stress, and sometimes it's matter of realizing that she's gone and grown up a little more on us while we weren't looking! I have one of each type of story about Norah today.
Going back a month or two ago, Norah was having a really hard time with drop off's at school. I couldn't figure out why, other than just a phase - I hadn't been traveling much, we had a great summer with lots of time together. She had transitioned into a new class (her last before 'real' school!!) but that had gone really well, from what I could tell. I made an effort to get some frequent quiet time together with her to see if I could get her talking about what was at the root of it.
Turns out she finally admits that she was having trouble at school with reading. Wha....??? She is 4, no one expects that she's able to READ! Anyway, I pushed some more over a period of time and she said she was having trouble with books at 'reading' time. I wondered if the other kids could read and she was feeling left behind... possible, but not likely, I didn't think. Plus, she does great with sounding out words, and I think could probably sorta 'read' some beginning reader books. We have some, but she and I took a trip to the library and got a couple to get started with. It was then I realized she didn't know all her lower case letters - which of course would make it hard to read!
I asked her teacher about the other kids reading (only one) and the lower case letters (not really covered yet) and had my ah-ha moment! So, we haven't been working on reading yet, but we have been working on learning the lower case letters - and problem solved!
The second story is less academic in nature. We've recently recognized that we tended to treat Norah and Roddie very similarly - as if they were the same age, instead of 2.5 years apart. Sometimes this is ok, and even necessary but if we expect Norah to act like the almost 5 year old she is, we really shouldn't treat her like a barely 2 year old. I was getting a little frustrated with her refusal to put her own clothing on, brush her own teeth at times, etc. and it occurred to me that we encourage her to be a 'big kid' but never really differentiated what that meant or highlighted and of the privileges of being a big kid. A\few little adjustments on our part, and things are going much more smoothly - and have started to pay dividends!
Today after Matt headed outside to start the last of the fall clean up, I told the kids the TV would be shut off after Curious George was over, and we'd do our chores. Rod was not particuarly, helpful, although he did push the Swiffer around for a while. Norah, on the other hand, was awesome! I asked her to dust the living room, and tidy up the boot tray by the back door, putting away all the sandals (finally!) She did that, and then offered to go and tidy up her room, which she did in fine style, before sweeping the floor! I was so impressed with not only how well she completed the tasks at hand, but how willingly and cheerfully she did so! It was fun working together and I got the bulk of the day's housework done before we joined Matt outside! Yay Norah!
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