We're still here and doing fine!

I have been away (to Russia no less) and the modem has been giving us some problems, so I have not blogged about Tamerin for a long time.


She has been tested and is currently doing ACE English and Math. For math we are currently reviewing some Grade 2 work like place value and adding and subtracting multiples of hundred and reviewing ordinal numbers. For English we are revising punctuation: full stops (periods) and question marks and starting sentences with capital letters. Tammy has always struggled with this, and the book has helped a little, but I had to type extra work sheets in this regard. Today she seems to have really grasped it! Praise the Lord. Right now she is busy with her self test.

She also struggles with the exercises where she has to chose between "is /are" and "was/ were". Tammy has never said "She were" or "The children was", but when she has to chose she gets confused and makes mistakes. I hate these exercises: to my mind they are not helpful and only confuse children. For the same reason I never teach similar words like "there and their" or "bear and bare" at the same time! We have always dealt with them separately and there has hardly ever been a mistake. But along comes these workbooks and.....! Generally these books are helpful, but sometimes I do not agree with the method at all!


There are often little cartoons in her books and we spend a lot of time reading these and adding words to the wordless pictures e.g there was one cartoon of two little girls waking and one said "We are going on a picnic today." (The other did not say anything). In the next picture they were watching rain through the window (no words) and in the last picture the mother brought in a tray of food and the one girl said "A picnic like this is fun too."


Tammy had to say how the other girl would respond to "We are going on a picnic today" and what they would say while watching the rain. ("Oh no, it is raining!" "That's too bad, now we can't go outside.) She also put words in the mother's mouth: "Look what I've got for you! Here are your snacks."


Expanding vocabulary and speaking fluently remain our highest priority and these cartoons have been very helpful in this regard.

Other feedback:
We finished "My body" prematurely because the family planned to go to the Kruger Park, so we quickly switched to "Wild Animals" as a theme. She thoroughly enjoyed this and loved telling her family interesting bits and pieces e.g. how long a giraffe's tongue was (53cm) and why thorns do not bother them when they browse the Acasia trees.
We still practice to count money nearly every day: it is a slow, but promising process. There has been significant progress.
Tammy still keeps record of her gym progress on Excel. With the advent of the workbooks, time for life skills has dimished somewhat, however.

I've got to run. We have a short break and then it is off to swimming lesson.

The 3 R's: progress this week

Yesterday Amy suddenly grasped that 8+2 = 10, 2+8=10, 10 -2=8, 10-8=2 is the same combination, just in different forms. I let her write out all the bonds of 10 (i.e. 5 bonds) in this way and since doing that she's been her old self again. She loves it if I ask her sums. We walked to the shops and back (more than 5km all in all) and she never complained. We discussed many things we saw along the way, but also spent much time asking and answering sums. The "new" sums of the day were 8 + 3 and 9+3. She still remembered them today, and answered without hesitation. She has known all her doubles e.g. 8+8 and the uneven bonds between the doubles: 3+2, 4+3, 5+4 etc. for some time, and she knows how to work out 9+ (work out what is 10 +...and then go one less.) For a child who could not grasp how to add +1 without counting blocks last year, this has been a major achievement. I am so, so encouraged by her.

This morning I could see that she was not in bright spirits and when we started. It turned out she was angry with her Mom... Why? Because she did not like school! I was rather taken aback, but I realised, it is not that she does not like school, it is just that she likes watching T.V. more! We talked about have idols again and what God wanted of us. We read 1John1: 8-9. If we tell God about our sins, He forgives us. What a relief to be able to confess these things. After Bible and prayer, she was much happier and we had a very good day of hard work.

Amy's reading and writing ability is progressing well. I do not bother any more with phonics and spelling - we just do our sight reading routine and comprehension routines, but I am amazed at how much she remembers - also when she writes or types. She types her diary a few times a week. In the beginning I had to spell out letter for letter for her to type. Now she types many words without me having to spell them for her. I just have to remind her not to leave out the little words e.g when she wants to write "I like computer", she is inclined to want to simply write "computer" without the "I like".

She enjoys typing her diary and e-mails her updates to her Mom. It still takes a very long time to complete her diary or a short e-mail, but I have seen tremendous progress here. (I still dictate most, but her own input in what to write is increasing steadily.) I think it is because the diary and e-mails are about what she does every day. The words used, are the important ones in her life. The copying of Bible verses have had the same effect - she can now write a word like "forgive" without my help.

Tomorrow we are going to cook and hopefully read the road map to the coast, where her family is going the end of the month. I hope there will also be time to surf the web. I hope we can make a blog of her diary.