The kids have picked up certain skills before I even expected them to such as Nadia walking when she was 9 months old and Ian learning the letters of the alphabet before I even worked on them with him. Other skills have taken longer than I expected them to such as Nadia learning to buckle her seatbelt and Ian learning how to eat. I am not sure why we as parents tend to get worked up when our child isn't on par with other children we know. Ian didn't crawl until he was 12 months old, and he didn't walk until he was 15 months old. Who cares? I realized after he started walking what a blessing it was (primarily when I carried him around at Nadia's gymnastics lesson) that he started walking a bit later than I expected he would, although the pediatrician told me he was still in the "normal" range. I think part of it really is pride. We want our children to be one of the first to accomplish a certain skill rather than one of the last. For example, I know many kids Nadia's age are much farther along in their reading skills than she is.
I really, really don't want to push my kids. Why rush childhood? I would have loved it if she was already ready to really take off with reading, but she hasn't been. She is great at memorizing words, but although she knows the sounds each letter makes, the concept of sounding out a word truly hasn't clicked for her yet, and that's okay. She'll be turning five next month. Years ago children weren't expected to learn how to read until first grade. Now that expectation has been shifted back to kindergarten in most schools. Yes, some preschoolers can read well, but that's not the norm. A couple of years from now I'm not going to care whether she started reading when she was four or five. I'll just care that she loves to read and is continuing to grow in her skills.
One skill that Nadia didn't grasp the first several times I tried to work with her on it over the last year was rhyming. She's very auditory so I thought it would be an easy skill for her to learn. Nope. Every once in a while I would test the waters, and if it was still going right over her head, I would drop it for a few weeks or months. While we were on vacation, I discovered (out of the blue) that she now knows how to rhyme. This certainly put a smile on my face, and it reassured me that my approach of just waiting until the time is right, is the way I want to go. I haven't pushed the kids At All with their self dressing skills. I waited until Nadia started expressing her independence that she wanted to do it herself. I think the only thing she has yet to learn is to tie her shoes, and for now I plan to continue buying shoes with velcro. As long as the kids express an interest at a reasonable age, I am going with the flow with many skills. The next time I hear about a child a similar age of one of my children doing something he or she is not yet doing, I am just going to remind myself that it isn't a race, and in a short while it won't matter to me how old my child was when he or she mastered that skill. One notable exception would be chewing and sleeping. I doubt I'll ever forget how long it took Ian to master those two very important skills!
The one I'm longing for Oliver to learn is to say my name. I told him a few weeks ago that would be the perfect Mother's Day present, but thus far he only says one word (dada). I remember asking Nadia the same thing in May 2009, but she didn't give me my wish either, haha. If I had to pick three things for Ian, I'd focus on continued improvement with self-feeding a wider variety of foods, greater independence with going to the bathroom, and less crying and whining in general. My mental list of goals for Nadia is the longest. Four of the ones I'm hoping she'll master in the coming weeks and months include learning how to pump her legs to keep the swing going (I've tried so many times to teach her that skill!), feeling brave enough to learn to ride her bike without training wheels, learning how to read by sounding words out, and realizing when she needs to blow her nose so the long strings of mucus will go in Kleenex rather than down her face, on her clothes, the floor, etc multiple times a day EVERY day. We also need to work on her soccer skills if she truly wants to play on a team again in the future. Last night she had soccer practice for the first time in five weeks.
Paul is very discouraged about the job search. He had been trying not to get his hopes up, but when he found out on Monday morning that he was one of the top two candidates, he got his hopes up again. On Wednesday his advisor said she had talked with the Dean. This school hadn't requested letters of reference with the application as most schools do. Yesterday another of Paul's references said the Dean hadn't contacted him yet. Paul has four references, and only two of these can speak to his experience as a teaching assistant, and his advisor isn't one of them. The community colleges don't care about research just teaching experience. I'm hoping God is closing this door because He's going to open one at West Liberty. An invitation to interview in-person there would do my hubby a world of good. He's made it to the top three twice and the top two once, but what he really needs is to be chosen as the top candidate somewhere. It's hard for me to see him so depressed. I keep telling him he has four cheerleaders at home who love him very much!
The kids have picked up certain skills before I even expected them to such as Nadia walking when she was 9 months old and Ian learning the letters of the alphabet before I even worked on them with him. Other skills have taken longer than I expected them to such as Nadia learning to buckle her seatbelt and Ian learning how to eat. I am not sure why we as parents tend to get worked up when our child isn't on par with other children we know. Ian didn't crawl until he was 12 months old, and he didn't walk until he was 15 months old. Who cares? I realized after he started walking what a blessing it was (primarily when I carried him around at Nadia's gymnastics lesson) that he started walking a bit later than I expected he would, although the pediatrician told me he was still in the "normal" range. I think part of it really is pride. We want our children to be one of the first to accomplish a certain skill rather than one of the last. For example, I know many kids Nadia's age are much farther along in their reading skills than she is. 
I really, really don't want to push my kids. Why rush childhood? I would have loved it if she was already ready to really take off with reading, but she hasn't been. She is great at memorizing words, but although she knows the sounds each letter makes, the concept of sounding out a word truly hasn't clicked for her yet, and that's okay. She'll be turning five next month. Years ago children weren't expected to learn how to read until first grade. Now that expectation has been shifted back to kindergarten in most schools. Yes, some preschoolers can read well, but that's not the norm. A couple of years from now I'm not going to care whether she started reading when she was four or five. I'll just care that she loves to read and is continuing to grow in her skills.
One skill that Nadia didn't grasp the first several times I tried to work with her on it over the last year was rhyming. She's very auditory so I thought it would be an easy skill for her to learn. Nope. Every once in a while I would test the waters, and if it was still going right over her head, I would drop it for a few weeks or months. While we were on vacation, I discovered (out of the blue) that she now knows how to rhyme. This certainly put a smile on my face, and it reassured me that my approach of just waiting until the time is right, is the way I want to go. I haven't pushed the kids At All with their self dressing skills. I waited until Nadia started expressing her independence that she wanted to do it herself. I think the only thing she has yet to learn is to tie her shoes, and for now I plan to continue buying shoes with velcro. As long as the kids express an interest at a reasonable age, I am going with the flow with many skills. The next time I hear about a child a similar age of one of my children doing something he or she is not yet doing, I am just going to remind myself that it isn't a race, and in a short while it won't matter to me how old my child was when he or she mastered that skill. One notable exception would be chewing and sleeping. I doubt I'll ever forget how long it took Ian to master those two very important skills!
The one I'm longing for Oliver to learn is to say my name. I told him a few weeks ago that would be the perfect Mother's Day present, but thus far he only says one word (dada). I remember asking Nadia the same thing in May 2009, but she didn't give me my wish either, haha. If I had to pick three things for Ian, I'd focus on continued improvement with self-feeding a wider variety of foods, greater independence with going to the bathroom, and less crying and whining in general. My mental list of goals for Nadia is the longest. Four of the ones I'm hoping she'll master in the coming weeks and months include learning how to pump her legs to keep the swing going (I've tried so many times to teach her that skill!), feeling brave enough to learn to ride her bike without training wheels, learning how to read by sounding words out, and realizing when she needs to blow her nose so the long strings of mucus will go in Kleenex rather than down her face, on her clothes, the floor, etc multiple times a day EVERY day. We also need to work on her soccer skills if she truly wants to play on a team again in the future. Last night she had soccer practice for the first time in five weeks.
Paul is very discouraged about the job search. He had been trying not to get his hopes up, but when he found out on Monday morning that he was one of the top two candidates, he got his hopes up again. On Wednesday his advisor said she had talked with the Dean. This school hadn't requested letters of reference with the application as most schools do. Yesterday another of Paul's references said the Dean hadn't contacted him yet. Paul has four references, and only two of these can speak to his experience as a teaching assistant, and his advisor isn't one of them. The community colleges don't care about research just teaching experience. I'm hoping God is closing this door because He's going to open one at West Liberty. An invitation to interview in-person there would do my hubby a world of good. He's made it to the top three twice and the top two once, but what he really needs is to be chosen as the top candidate somewhere. It's hard for me to see him so depressed. I keep telling him he has four cheerleaders at home who love him very much!
1 comment:
I totally kwym about comparing our children against everybody else. Though I tend to do it more with character issues than developmental ones. I think you're doing a great job with ALL your kids! :)
Post a Comment