Category Archives: Natasha

About our oldest

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Schooling Continues

I have a passel of pictures to upload once pictures are working again, but for now I wanted to say our approach to Kindergarten has morphed a few times now.

I’m glad I haven’t been saying each thing as we were doing it, but to recap, we began with the intent of hammering out the “3 Rs” during Nap-time so that it would be just me and Natasha, and got over with quickly so we could return to “regular life.”

The difficulty with that was we were neither of us in our best mental state during nap-time, and making school just the school work was too stark for Natasha.

So we’ve shifted to doing school in the morning, and we’re doing games during “school time.”

The kids have to be dressed before 9 a.m., but can play however they like until 9, when “Performance Today” starts on NPR.  I don’t usually have the radio going during the day (I like better the control the iPod offers) but so far I like the classical music (with the commentary/introductions) for the backdrop of our working time.

I have the younger two go off and play by themselves (all my children are *very* good at this) and we alternate the reluctant writer with games and other elements of learning that I’ve been given or am collecting from my reading.

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Not Ready to Go Away

School started today all across the district, so yesterday I told Natasha she’d be starting too.

This seemed to bother her quite a bit, and she said she wasn’t ready and didn’t really want to start Kindergarten.  She was so (quietly) intense about it, I was ready to say, You’re only 5, we can wait, before I got her talking more.

“I’m not ready to be away from you all day,” she said.  “I’m not big enough.”  Poor baby thought I was going to send her away to school (and with only one-day’s notice)!  I reassured her that I agreed she was too young to be gone, and that’s why we were homeschooling.

So we sat on the porch in the sunshine during nap yesterday and talked about what we would be studying today.

Today she excitedly told the mother of a friend that she was starting school today, and the fear seemed gone.  She wasn’t really interested in knuckling down to actual work when it was time (Can we play a game together first?) but since we’re doing such a focused (limited) time of work already, I didn’t feel a need (not yet anyway) to break up our school time with games.

So we had some “calendar time” where we practiced dates and the pattern of weeks; then I set a 15-minute timer and she worked on her letter tracers while I hand-wrote with her at the table, on a scene for my novel; then I had her pick which type of reading she wanted to do today and she chose to read aloud two stories from her sister’s “Beginner’s Bible.”

She wanted a nap after that (she ‘d been complaining of a tummy ache much of the morning) and now with all of them asleep after 3, I’m stuck again in my “mother’s quandary” of needing to actually wake a quiet house…so they’ll be ready to sleep at bedtime.

*sigh*

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More Growing Up

Natasha this afternoon, very carefully and polite:

“Now, when you’re done with the comics, instead of throwing them away, I would like you to give them to me, because I’m interested in comics now.  So many funny pictures.”

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Kids Being Mean

Natasha got her first taste of teasing and rejection yesterday, but (thankfully) I don’t think she fully realized that’s what was happening.

The back door was open and I heard the 5-year-old next-door protesting to his mom that the other kids were being mean to Natasha.  I went out then, but Natasha didn’t seem disturbed at all, only more serious-faced than usual.

I talked with her and she came inside with me.  Then she told my one of the girls in {neighbor-boy}’s yard was being unkind.

“She was making fun of {neighbor-boy}—saying he was in love.  And he’s not in love, he’s just a kid.”

I found the observation fascinating, and what I got out of the collective event was that the visiting children noticed the children’s friendship, tried to tease them about it, and like good friends, they noticed the intent-to-harm their friend over the attack on themselves.

Or at least expressed themselves that way.

I think there’s something precious in that sensitivity; I hope we’ll see it continue.

p.s.
Melody was coming out of our car  a couple of days ago when it was so sunny, panting for effect, “Wow, that car is freezing- Hot!”

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Quiet Time

As I write this Natasha is creating stories behind me, and telling them to and with the toys that are here in the living room.  I told the kids stories most of our (long) walk today, practicing concentration, volume and breath control as I pulled over 100# alongside an active road.

It just tickles me to see her feeding off shared experiences rather than the latest movie.

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Note to Self:

You don’t have to “win” the argument to be right: it’s like Natasha wigging out because Melody says the sky is green: just say it’s blue and move on.

End of the year note: The tables definately turn. Natasha knows how to push Melody’s buttons in just the same way.  I use the same line no matter who’s wigging.

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Leaning toward…

Suzuki.

Not really sure why other than I like knowing exactly what to do, and it comes highly recommended by several people whose experience I trust. Almost more than my misgivings.

It could be very expensive; we’re still figuring that part out. But the instruments at least (might) be taken care of.

This all began, seriously, back on the 6th, when the Suzuki-learning family in our church did a song as a family. It was lovely. Their 6-year-old began alone on the cello, was joined by his 4-year-old sister on the viola then joined in turn by their mom and dad on violin and mandolin.

Natasha was sitting in my lap absolutely absorbed. When it was done she snuggled her “sad” face into me and when I asked her what was wrong she said quietly in her sad voice, “I want to play violin.”

So I went to the other mom in church who did Suzuki with her kids, and asked how it was for someone utterly new to the system (the mom of the Suzuki family grew up with it, so I imagined it would be different for them than me).

This lady said that she hung on to most of her kids’ instruments and offered to loan them to me.

Actually having instruments available for use has opened this up to a real possibility, so I’ve been nosing about for more details.

As soon as she heard Natasha say it at home, Melody (Jay called her the echo machine) said almost at once that she, too, wants to learn violin.

This friend from church also has a 1/8-size cello (from when her boy started) so I mentioned this to Natasha and by the end of bed-time ritual tonight she said she’ll do cello and Melody can do violin.

We’ll see if this sticks. Or even if it goes anywhere.

Naturally I’m as intrigued by this as every new idea and it’s probably a good thing that nothing “real” or useful for beginners like us seems to be available before the fall.

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Back into Chapter Books

“So we’ve got the witch and the wardrobe, but we still haven’t seen the lion.”

— Natasha’s observation when we put the book away at the end of chapter 5 tonight.

We started this book back before Grandma died, when Melody was barely two and Natasha was 3 1/2.

They listened well, especially considering their ages, but it seems with all the turmoil I myself didn’t have the attention-span to stick with one book to the end.

I was exceedingly proud of them, for their attentiveness and their willingness to sit and listen, even as I questioned their maturity of comprehension.

Mentioning it to Grandma one of the mornings I was with her in the hospital she said, “Well, it’s probably because of the way you read it. You know, since you’re…”

“A storyteller?”

“Yes.”

It was the first reference she’d made to that skill set since she came to my performance of The Rumor of Pavel and Paali the summer before. I felt highly acknowledged and complemented.

A few months later we started to play the movie (I’d gotten it for Jay’s birthday that spring and we still hadn’t finished it).  For the first few minutes we let them watch it with us then thought better of it.

Natasha required no explanation of the movie, and went on talking about events that happen after the point we stopped the movie. It was obvious she remembered what we had read (and felt remembering part of a novel was no big deal) and made the connection herself between the book and movie.

Whether that was from the title, content or some combination of the two we were never sure.

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General Update

Let’s see, I don’t have dates for these, but they weren’t happening before, so we’ll get them on-record.

Elisha is jumping now.

It started with jerky one-steps off a low stair and has progressed to a full-grown hurling of himself from any permissible hight to the next-lowest point.

Permissible is defined as anything Mom or dad has not prohibited— whether or not it’s been noticed yet.

I twisted my ankle last month (most readers know this already).  I am mostly recovered and  would be functioning normally (I believe) except I just got slammed with this nasty viral sinus infection.

I still couldn’t move quickly– because of the ankle– and now I’m in a state of thickness and near-confusion as my senses struggle to function normally through inches of displaced fluid.

Had a nice visit with a new friend a couple days ago (I hope she doesn’t get what I got– two littles of her own).  She enjoys writing and talking about ideas, so we had a grand time.  Definately pushed the kids to the edge of their napless abilities.

I know this because Melody put herself to nap as they were leaving, and Elisha had difficulty going down, which was abnormal.

Have I already said that Natasha reads?  She can read both silently and aloud, and her inflection is wonderful.  The first time she reads something aloud it usually sounds as I read it to her, but once she owns a story and grows in confidence the inflection becomes uniquely hers.

It is really fun.

She’s even able to read the Bible aloud, but she doesn’t like much to do it.  Which is  a little disappointing because our current Sunday school set-up has lots of opportunities for children to read aloud, and we brought her out of the 4/5-y-o class to participate and she’s not been very interested.

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Can you tell what we’ve been talking about today?

Background: I’d just brought the kids in from playing outside (before they wanted to), and even hot chocolate didn’t quite counter the blow.

“Coco!” is definitely an established word for Elisha now, though.

Natasha to Melody [bossy, not frightened]:

No! You can’t go outside without a grown-up. There are people who will come into the yard. If there’s not a grown-up there, they might think you’re theirs and take you away with them.

That’s why there always has to be a grown-up around when you’re playing outside so anybody walking by will know you belong to someone.

Not quite the way I explained it, but it works on an (apparently) un-frightening kid-level.

I always like to know how their thought-processes are working, and hearing her explain it in kid-language to her sister both allowed that and saved me a conversation with Melody that might have been frightening before it was understood.