My kindergartner only recently has been making decent progress. She got stuck in the process for quite a while. She is probably currently at a late first grade almost second grade level. A month ago she was at the early first grade level and couldn't handle more than a sentence or two a page. Before that it was only phonics readers and Dr Seuss. She just recently has the stamina for longer stuff. She liked the Little Bear and the Bernstein leveled books she read recently and she read those really well. Sometimes words in other readers will trip her up though but it seems like others have that issue too as mentioned above which is good to know. This is new to me since she is my first. I can't figure out what she can read well by level. To me she seems to be on a late first grade level but what she can do more fluently varies sometimes. I also can't figure out what her teacher is trying to do. They get 2 or 3 books sent home daily that are returned the next day. This week she had this science book on dolphins on a 2 or 3 grade level with long paragraphs, a second grade leveled book, a lot of first grade stuff and these 2 really really early readers. One was an I See Sam book. She struggled a little on the harder books. It seems 1st grade is the sweet spot. I got a little worried when she sent those easy books home that maybe she isn't as far as I thought. She is 6 and reading has been hard work for her. At 5 she was doing funnix passages and easy phonics readers. In her class there is a huge variance at this point. I think dd is one of the better readers right now but there are kids doing chapter books fluently and kids doing the easiest readers. I started over a year ago when she was 5.

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I find genetics fascinating. I have 3 kids with red hair and I have dark brown hair. My husband has red hair. I don't have anyone in my family with red hair but there are signs of it. My sister was very auburn and I have red highlights, light skin and freckles. Freckles can be a sign of having one copy of the red hair gene and in my case it does show that. Although it is much more complicated than 1 gene for each color and one wins out. I have light brown eyes and my husband has green eyes. My mom has green eyes. Dh has a father with blue eyes and a mom with brown eyes. I have two kids with really dark brown eyes and one with green eyes. I think it is interesting I have 2 kids with eyes a much darker shade of brown than me when my husband has lighter eye genes to contribute. I'm sure there is some explanation for that. My guess is that maybe my mom contributed a blue gene to me and it combined with the brown to make a lighter shade and my kids got brown from me and green from dh.

I gave up cheese for environmental reasons and it hasn't been as hard as I thought. I just don't use it. I don't use replacements. I make pizza and I just make it with sauce and toppings. There are gluten free dough recipes. If I make Mexican I just use other stuff I like rather than cheese like pico de gallo. I make casseroles and just don't put cheese in them. The thing I miss the most is making the healthy mac and cheese I used to make. I'm not crazy about the vegan versions I tried.

I didn't have a big wedding but I been to weddings and I never heard of that being an expectation ever. You either invite kids or you don't. If they are invited they are your responsibility. What a sense of entitlement! I don't use that term very often. I'm guessing she got her way all the time growing up and had a hover parent. That takes audacity.

If a book is at dd's instructional level (not too many errors and needs work on fluency) I let her work through it. If it is just above her level and she wants to read it I take turns with her. I read a passage once or twice depending on how close to her level it is and then she reads it or we will read it together. For books that are a little long I will often take turns with her. She reads a page then I read a page. I would go by his interests but if he is really struggling in his reading and making lots of errors or reading really choppy then try shared reading. I don't have dd read stuff by herself when she is struggling through it.

Now that we are into February I will update what they are up to at this point in the year. Her class is now writing sentences. They do some copywork for that but she also does come up with some on her own. Any mistakes they make are corrected. For handwriting they are spelling words. Right now they are on words with blends from the worksheets but I think they do harder words in class. They are working on 70 phonograms now. In January they started sending home book bags. The teacher listens to the kids read and she picks books at their level. Each night dd gets 2 books and she brings them back the next day. The teacher listens to a page or two from every student and determines from that what books to send home. I like that system because they get books at their level every day. For math they have been working on skip counting 2, 5, and 10s and counting and writing numbers to 100. They work on counting a larger number of objects. They do word simple problems that they write out and draw. They have done patterns. They are currently working on telling time.

It took a while for this to click with dd. It just took time to work itself out by encountering the words over and over in reading. She remembered the rule about silent E but it took a while to transfer to her reading to where she recognize it right away. I did do exercises where we added silent E and it changed the sound but it didn't really help much. DS is now doing the same thing.

I did read Alfie Kohn. His research is very cherry picked and does not prove anything. I read it starting using some of it felt guilty when it didn't work and went back to really think about things and analyze them. He picked things to prove his point. He picked a few studies many of which didn't even fir the right age group. There are plenty of studies out there that contradict his view that were ignored.

Thank you. That one sounds like a book I would find interesting.

This is our first year at my house. I want to turn my entire back and side yard into a garden and to have a few things in the front too but I know it is going to take several years to get there. I am going to start seeds early indoors with a grow light and I don't feel quite ready yet but it is almost time. I want to do a few sheet mulching and hugelkulture beds. I hope I can find all the materials I need. I might do a raised bed too since that is what I am more used to. I will have a week to get my garden planted without the kids around but I am worried it won't be enough time.

Am I the only one who wasn't impressed by the War on Kids. The clips the chose were the most sensationalized. I went to school with a zero tolerance policy and it we never had instances like the ones they described. I know they happen but it isn't super common. Also the ADHD section wasn't that impressive either. We do over prescribe but it isn't made up. The fact they said that the UK doesn't do Ritalin prescriptions isn't even true. They don't for children under 5. I know adults who went on medication as adults and the difference in their ability to function improved dramatically. My dh has been realizing he is having trouble at certain tasks at work and is thinking of going to see someone about ADHD.I know there are too many people getting diagnosed but it isn't made up to keep kids in control at school. Then they have Alfie Kohn do a lot of speaking. He distorts statistics to fit his ideas like with unconditional parenting. It was OK but I rather focus on facts and a closer look at issues than the way this documentary was. John Gatto is the guy behind the unschooling movement right? So I'm not sure I would love his books either.

I am using the SOTW audio book in the car. I am only on volume 1 but so far I actually don't find it to be a problem especially since they started with multi Gods and other myths and fables. I am ok with them knowing the bible stories and to me it seems similar to the other stories with some historical basis but the story has mythical elements to it too that are not true.

I know they play up on fear. The whole apocalypse and signs from above is a very convenient way to keep people in line. It is hard to fathom certain things when you think strictly rationally and so it is very hard to grapple how people can feel so negatively towards certain things that are actually neutral as far as morality goes. I have become much more accepting as time goes on but there are aspects of religion that are very intolerant. The parts that bother me are the feelings towards people that are not heterosexual, patriarchy, the feelings towards those that don't share the same religious beliefs and the selfish aspects. If you realize that there are explanations for the bad things that happen then you can do something about them. If it is all related to some vengeful God punishing the people who don't follow the right rules then you can't see the root cause. People are not going to go in droves to atheism and that is fine. I don't mind religion. It is just when it interferes with rationality with regards to moral issues it becomes a problem. I grew up where people had all kinds of beliefs and it was ok. I love going to a UU church where my kids can hear about everything in a non biased way. I like accepting people for who they are and accepting that we all have different beliefs. The problem comes with the groups that are intolerant.

I just read the boy scouts thread. It is hard to hear what people think of atheists and people who are not heterosexual. It is hard to understand why they want a organization to not be accepting of all people even though it wouldn't affect the ability of their group to be non inclusive. I always to take the you attract more flies with sugar than vinegar approach but in some venues I just don't debate. I am always polite and kind and don't do personal attacks on either people or groups. I usually do speak my mind. I think most people will not be persuaded. Most people do not like information that goes against something they hold as a value either due to religion or personal experience or whatever. I put information out there knowing most people will not really come around to it. There may be some people who were on the fence or who are ready to really hear something and that all you can hope. My daughter is a girl scout. In my area there is nothing comparable for boys except boy scouts. We have camp fire but it is an after school program for working parents and they aren't even that outdoorsy. I want my son to be able to do boy scouts either through the school or it would be cool if the UU church sponsored a troop. I wish they would change the stance on atheists too. We are the most un liked group out there. People have told me I am doomed for the hell fires for not believing. I know people believe that but still. I wish people were more tolerant. I hate not knowing how people will react when they find out or how they assume we have no morals. Atheists actually make up a smaller population of prisoners than the numbers in real life. There is nothing to be afraid of. I can see how people want to be in a group of people who have similar beliefs but why do they care what people in other groups do.

Oh and I thought of another thing it could be. Maybe he is a gifted underachiever?

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I did reading bear with my ds who is now 4 and it taught him to blend cvc words. If I could do it again I would use reading bear but I do let me sound it out and model blending without pauses instead of sound it out slow. He learned blending with pauses and I am trying to correct it so he doesn't pause between sounds. I recently started using AAR and AAS with him but very slowly one at a time. He still isn't fluently sounding out words so I am taking it slow. He does know his first 26 phonograms already. It seems like he is on the verge. He has been having instances where he sounds things out much more smoothly or recognizes words faster but then he will go back to the gappy non fluent sounding out. He reads great on starfall but I think he is using the pictures and guessing well by context. He loves doing that though so I let him after we do a lesson. I also use I See Sam books. He doesn't like bob books. Funnix was a fail with him. 30 minutes on a lesson was not happening.

Last time I took it I was an INTJ. I have taken it and have been and INTP before the P and J are my weaker score. My I and N are very strong.

Reading bear and the Don Potter website is a good source. If that doesn't work try AAR.

This movie made me really sad that there are schools that perform so poorly in these bad neighborhoods. I think it was a little tough on teachers and teachers unions but I do get some of the points they were making with that. I do not think teachers shoulder most of the blame of this problem but I agree it should not be impossible to fire a bad teacher. It just isn't right that these kids are not graduating high school and if they do graduate they are barely literate. I don't know how to fix it but there has got to be something that can be done. Other industrialized countries manage to educate most of their citizens and they all beat us on test scores. We throw money at the problem but it isn't working. I do think finding ways for parents who may be single parents who work a lot a way to get involved in their schools and their kid's education. If we tell them how to help their kids and why maybe they will find ways. I think we need more solid curriculum going back to what was used in the old days. I know charter schools are not the answer but we can look at the successful ones and see what they are doing and find what works and use it in the brick and mortar schools. It breaks my heart those kids who were in dismal school that led to drop out factories as they were called in the movies and that school was a way out but there wasn't many spots. I am lucky that my area has an abundance of charter options and zone exemptions for failing schools. I was zoned for a pretty bad school but I had lots of good scoring charters and homeschooling as options. I do like the point they made about tracking. I never thought of that much. My high school had tracking but we shouldn't lump kids like that anymore. There are late bloomers who blossom later in life. Times are different then when that was started and not that many went to college and the ones that didn't could get really good factory jobs. I am still mulling over the movie but it was really hard to see those neighborhoods and the schooling options. We need to invest in our kids because like they movie said prison is a lot more expensive.

Haha I actually watched both documentaries on the same day and I immediately thought of that too. It actually didn't make much difference though. They were expecting great results and the change was very small. It wasn't really much of a success. The conclusion was that it could be motivating for kids that were just maybe a grade value in a subject or two away from the goal but I don't know the cost expenditure was worth it. To me the conclusion was it didn't really work.

DD's teacher wants the kids to correct their mistakes and send them back in. I am ok with that because I think that helps them learn from their mistakes. Most of dd's mistakes are careless mistakes. She doesn't pay attention then doesn't know what she is supposed to be doing or she procrastinates and doesn't finish. I just have her correct them and move on but so far it hasn't been anything she can easily fix or doesn't understand. Once she gets older and we run into that I am not sure.

I'm thinking of having dd evaluated for visual processing disorder. I don't know if she has it or not but she does display some of the symptoms and I figured it doesn't hurt to get it checked out even if she doesn't have it. She definitely not strong in the visual aspect of learning especially when it comes to reading. In my area vision therapy is really expensive. The evaluation itself is really really expensive. We cannot afford regular therapy but I was wondering if an evaluation is worth it anyway. I was hoping they could give me some homework to work on and I can find some sort of book or reference material to work with her on. I suspect it could be just visual memory related. Is that something that vision therapy addresses? What does an evaluation involve? I know there is controversy behind it but if you did an evaluation did you feel it was worth it.