Living 2008

As a baby Ms R never met her milestones slow and steady, a graph of her progress wouldn’t have shown a smooth upward incline. No. She’d do nothing of any interest for weeks at a time and then suddenly, three new things all on the same day. Her graph of progress would have shown big chunky uneven steps. She is still like that now and it still surprises me when so many new things happen at once. We discovered the first new thing this morning when I brushed her teeth. I don’t brush her teeth every time but try to do it most days. Today in the back of her mouth she had great big white shiny new teeth. Two at the bottom still partially covered in gum and one at the top, it was quite a shock for both of us as there had been no warning signs and I didn’t even realise six year olds grew new ones. So now she has five of her permanent adult teeth .

Later we visited my Mum and took advantage of her having a Wii Fit. I played first and at one point Ms R said I had a personal best. I asked her how she knew that and she pointed to those words on the screen next to my name which did indeed say ‘Personal Best’. Given that my part in her learning to read seemed to involve little more than me sounding out cvc words like ‘cat’ and ‘Dad’ and more recently, randomly telling her that the letters P and H make a ph sound as in photo (I get these wobbles you see) it is pretty amazing that she should be telling me what words like ‘personal’ say. The whole reading things seem to be happening in a rather snowball effect way, I guess each new word shows a bigger part of the puzzle and eventually you can see enough of the puzzle to know what every word says. But as if that wasn’t enough later she knew that she had scored one hundred and four. She must have read my look of disbelief as me not believing her so she explained how fifty two and fifty two make a hundred and four in a way that was almost challenging me to try and prove her wrong. And there was me worrying whether she could add two numbers up to make twenty or not, maybe I underestimate her . I’d really like to stop now but I can’t because there really is more. This evening she was riding her scooter with Master R up and down the pavement outside when she decided she wanted to put her skates on. I didn’t like to remind her that last time she wore them she needed to cling to me for balance but I did explain that I wasn’t planning on walking up and down with her right now. So she did it herself, just skated off.

Master R has also been coming on in leaps and bounds. He can all of a sudden pronounce the letter ’s’ at the beginning of words. Sometimes he gives a very slight pause before saying particular words so I’m thinking that it is a fairly conscious thing. He has also very recently started to recognise that words are made up of different sounds and can tell me the first sound of any word. It doesn’t sound like a big step because it is something that is so obvious to most of us but it wasn’t to him. Just a few weeks ago I was getting quite frustrated because while playing eye-spy his choice always started with ‘err’ and he just didn’t get that ‘car’ or ‘grass’ or ’sky’ doesn’t start with ‘err’. He has also taken to being completely independant in the bathroom. I don’t know if it’s because I wasn’t available one time and he realised he could do it himself or if he just decided but I’m very happy and quite relieved that he didn’t need constant coaching and support like Ms R. He even flushes when he’s finished.

I’ve talked to Ms R about possibly going to school next September, it’s a nice long way away and I like having a boundary, the idea that home education could go on forever and ever is too scary. She believes and has told me on many occasions that there is a missing number between six and seven. Apparently when you are six you are still a young child but when you are seven you are on your way to being a grown-up. Maybe she is feeling herself become more independant, I’ve noticed it. She needs me less during the day and reports back to me less often, when I’m away she doesn’t seem to miss me so much. She still struggles to fall asleep without me though and while it is tiresome that she needs to smother me at a time of day that I’d rather be left alone I’m aware that it might not go on for much longer and that I’ll sorely miss it when it stops. Ms R, please stop growing up so fast.