At first, Rebekah wasn't very interested. She wouldn't even follow a dotted line! But... I still haven't decided if that was because she just didn't want to follow the line, or she wasn't sure what I meant (because I know she's capable of drawing a straight line). It's irrelevant now, since she's getting pretty great with her work. We practiced some of the "follow the dotted line" worksheets a couple of times before I had her move on.
Then she decided she knew better than me what she was supposed to do on each page and mostly just wanted to color. This wouldn't have been too bad, except that most of her coloring is still scribbling, so I didn't want the page completely scribbled on. We took a break from the books for a few months, since I figured she wasn't really ready.
NOW, though, with the new books from my MIL, Rebekah has a renewed interest in school (she really calls it that) and she even did an entire booklet (like, 30 pages!) in less than 24 hours. Granted, it was the "Colors" book, and she's known her colors for a while, but it was just right to get her interested in other activities. The colors book started with a page dedicated to a color and it went through red, blue, yellow, green, purple, orange, black, brown, gray, pink and white.
If you look at the pictures she colored, you can see that Rebekah isn't terribly concerned about coloring inside the lines. I asked her if she would try to stay in the lines, and she told me that she didn't know how, but when I tried to show her she shut down and didn't want to watch. I was a little concerned about this - I couldn't tell if she just didn't care or if she really couldn't or if she didn't understand, but then I saw her "coloring" a picture on the computer using the finger pad to control the crayon and she did very well at filling in the entire picture and only going outside the lines a little bit, so it's not a concept problem - more just an issue focus and physical development, which will come in time. In fact, when she CARES and is focused, she does pretty well!
Something I absolutely love about Rebekah is her sense of humor. On the pages where 2 colors were being addressed, Rebekah purposefully switched the colors, and wouldn't stop sticking the book in my face until I laughed at it and told her how silly she was for switching the colors. I think I managed to convince her to do it "right" on ONE page like that. That's okay though, because it's clear she understands the concept AND she's still asserting her independence and that's certainly not something I want to squash!
The progression of skills was really great, and I loved that it had a place for Bekah to trace the letters. I showed her how and she took to it very well! I was surprised and pleased - it means I can work more on letters with her!
Way better than before, isn't it?! :)
That last picture is from the "counting" workbook. I'm not super worried about her ability to write, but I know that giving her opportunities to try will only be beneficial. We're working on recognizing the numbers 1-10, so I decided to make flash cards for her. One side has the number, and the other has that number of little apples, so if she doesn't have the number memorized we flip the card over and count the apples to help identify the number. While I was at it I made a card of capital letters and lower case. I might have her match upper and lower case as well as have her identify different letters. Sometimes she watches a few Leap Frog movies that go over letters (upper and lower case) and a few of them go over their sounds, too, so there are endless possibilities in the future of those cards! Depending on how well they work for her, I might have them laminated. I think I'm going to buy a box to start filing away things like these to use with my other kids. :)
I love Rebekah so much. As much as this post is about how much SHE is learning right now, you can imagine that I'm learning a lot too. With academics going smoothly right now, Rebekah is certainly challenging me emotionally right now. My sister, Amy, seems to have fabulous timing when it comes to posting things on Facebook, and this one actually came to my mind today:
http://abundantlifechildren.com/2012/04/18/honoring-the-emotional-child/
See, lately Rebekah has been having meltdowns like Cuh-RAZY. ANY tiny disappointment is the end of the world for her and she bursts into tears and yells and often collapses into a heap onto the floor. Other times she'll be literally hopping mad (and still have tears and screaming). Depending on the time of day, my personal mood, and the importance (or lack thereof) of the event upsetting her, I might just giver her what she wants, try to bribe her with something else or flick her mouth (for yelling at me) and send her to her room. With the room thing, sometimes she falls asleep (we're in the middle of napping/not napping) or scream for a while before quieting down - at which point I go talk to her - or sometimes she starts playing with her toys and gets distracted.
So at lunch today, I only had the heels of bread left with which to make a sandwich. Rebekah did NOT like that and started yelling at me about it, so I flicked her in the mouth for yelling, at which point she screamed more, so I turned off her TV show and put her in her bedroom. She yelled and screamed about how I was a bad mommy for at least 30 minutes. Every time I had decided she'd calmed down and I could go in and talk to her, she'd start yelling at me again, so eventually I knocked on the door (she stopped yelling immediately) and asked if I could come in her room. She said yes, and I came in and said hi, and told her I loved her. Then I told her that I could tell she was unhappy about the sandwich I made her, and that I had turned off her show, and I was sorry for making her so sad. Then I explained to her that I was sad that she was yelling at me and telling me I was a bad mommy, and could she please apologize. She did, and gave me a big hug. I told her that I didn't have any more bread for the sandwiches, but if she would eat the one I made -even though it wasn't the best sandwich - I would turn her show back on. It was all very sweet and polite and we haven't had any more issues today. :)
What I need to work on is consistency. I know that sometimes I can't forsee that she'll make a big deal about something (at which point, I might capitulate because I don't feel the fight is worth it) BUT she she throws a tantrum, I have to make sure I don't give in at that point because she needs to know that tantrums are NOT okay, and they don't give you what you want. Putting her in her room until she's ready to talk nicely is working for me, and I need to commit to that, and not try to bribe or distract her.
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