I *think* I’ve done quite well today. I got my work done, I spent ages on the phone to a friend musing over all sorts of things and came away feeling very energised, my inbox remains empty, I did some reading with Davies, I fulfilled the childrens’ request to play with them with the geomags and I’ve started the next book for book group and by the end of chapter one I’m enjoying it rather than it feeling like home work so that’s all good. 🙂
The children have played with lego (although the game seemed more about scattering it to the furthest corners of the lounge than about creating and building to be fair! But I guess there might be educational value in volume covered by x amount of lego or something 😉 ), they entertained themselves for well over an hour while I was on the phone (infact 😳 it was closer to two!) without actually making too much mess through the house, they’ve watched Nightmare Before Christmas (where I impressed D beyond belief by having got the words to the Oogie Boogie man’s song up on google and singing along :-D) and W&G, they played a long and convoluted game with various soft toys and we all made geomag creations together. At Davies’ instigation we all had to make ‘something’ from W&G and then guess what each other had made. Tarly made triangles – not strictly adhering to the rules really but educational just the same, I made the van and D made the were rabbit and some construction from one of the previous films. As I have never actually managed to sit through any of the W&G films I have no idea how accurate it was or indeed really what it was but he certainly appeared to have a very clear idea of what he was aiming for and was pleased with it so that was good. I also showed them how to make tables and chairs as displayed once on Sarah’s blog so we left a little geomag ensemble for Ady to admire when he got home.
When the planned reading all got too much for Davies (and in fairness he probably managed the equivalent of 2 or 3 Bob books words wise but with less than good grace) I broke out a tub of magnetic tiles with words on and set them both up playing with them. I think they needed slightly more input than I gave in order to do anything constructive with them but they were enough of a hit just in being magnetic and therefore sticking to the fireguard so I think tomorrow we might get them out again and have more of a play.
I have been possibly a bit neglectful of the fact that Scarlett is showing lots of pre-reader / early reader skills. If she was my first or only child she’d be a prime candidate for hot housing 😉 She loves her art and is already really into copying letters although her copying is by no means hugely accurate she has on several occassions copied ‘Scarlett’ very recognisably. She probably shows more inclination to learn to read than Davies does in many ways and today she was scrambling onto my lap while he was having a bash at reading Hop On Pop and saying all sorts of letters. She even said to me at one point ‘I can read Mummy, listen d, e, h, m, five, six, seven, eight!’ which made me laugh lots. I’m thinking of getting 100 Easy Lessons out for her tomorrow and just seeing what she makes of it as aside from anything else Davies seemed very interested in the idea that Scarlett would be able to read soon and as much as that offends all sorts of weird and crazy ideas in me I guess there is nothing wrong with two children two years apart learning to read side by side really – I don’t expect Ady to have a reading age ten years older than mine 😉 I also forgot to blog the other day when we made the snickerdoodles that I sent Tarly in the kitchen to ‘go and get four cookies and bring them in on a plate’ without really considering whether it was beyond her and she then reappeared with the four cookies on a plate without seeming to have thought much about it either. Clearly we are right about her Ali 😉 I’m going through one of those phases of being utterly in love with my daughter right now, which takes nothing away from Davies but as it is generally more the other way it is nice 🙂 Coupled with her cheekiness and general independance she is also capable of being utterly adorable and somehow an ‘I love you Mummy’ from a child who really really means it as an expression of having thought it through and is stating it as fact rather than in a clingy needy way is a real delight to hear 🙂
And in order to test that she just appeared and has snuggled on the sofa with me while watching the hugely inappropriate for a 3yo Desperate Housewives! I’ve just deposited her back in bed… let’s see if she stays there.
I reckon this is the stage 100EL is for, when they really don’t know anything (or hardly anything). I was thinking about it yesterday for Buttercup actually, lol! She’s so much more into books, and pretending she’s reading them, than E was at this age, I thought she might get a kick out of it 🙂
Writing-wise she’s probably the most ‘backward’ of mine, lol – at this age (nearly 3.5) Violet was writing her own name independently (ok, it’s not a very hard name, only 3 letters to learn, but still!) and even E who I thought was slower than the older girls could copy his name by 3 1/4. Buttercup’s not interested in that at all, although she will now copy her name by typing (e.g. for CBeebies website game certificates!). But Scarlett has far superior pen control etc, so you could probably do lots of early writing skills stuff very successfully with her.
First/only child thing gets me sometimes. 99% of the time I can see that Buttercup has a fucking brilliant life, but every now and again I’ll remember some of the things I used to do for Violet and feel a bit bad that I don’t do them now. I used to make her loads of little worksheet-y things, pages of odd-ones-out, numerals and dots, matching word and picture puzzles later … ah well. Would probably have more time for all that if I wasn’t here! 😉
Anyway, I’m rambling 🙂
I think the same for Buzz all the time!
Yes, clearly we are right about Scarlett, and clearly I spotted it way back ages ago, what with the pen control and such.
Alison – I think the second (and third, fourth) children actually get some benefit from not being under intense interest of obsessive parent, which is what can happen with only child or older child with large age gap. I make up for this personally by contriving other reasons for benign neglect, of course (usually involving laptop). Seriously I think there are pros and cons to all the different age-gaps/configurations and they balance each other out pretty well.
yeah I think I probably tried 100EL after that window had closed with Davies actually. So I’ll seize the day with Tarly and see what she thinks tomorrow, well later today actually 🙄
The other thing I think about with Tarly is that whilst it’s good being the youngest in as much as she gets the benefit of me not being totally clueless about children like I was with D as a baby but it was not until she was about 9 months old that I ever raised my voice to either child. Now I spend most of my day shouting (or so it feels on a bad day) so she never got quite so much of the cheerleading, every development is amazing type stuff from me that D did.
I think Buttercup, Buzz and S are lucky to be where they are in their families though really – they all get the benefit of mostly being doted on by older siblings and all 3 pull off the cute ‘baby’ of the family with great success! 😉
I’m going to start using these books we have with Amelie – she is by far the brightest of them all i think, but also the most keen to learn – and she gets terribly ignored 🙁 Fran was a dreadful candidate for 1st child, i had all that time and enthusiasm and she was too busy being a headstand loon to notice me! if only Maddy or Amelie had come first 😆
100EL does my head in, Studydog less nuthouse inducing. Max and i laughed the other night when Ams was sat on his lap watching a flickr slideshow; he wanted to look longer at a photo that had gone by and she just leaned over and did it for him. I don’t think she’s even seen flickr before! Techo-babe.
I’ve been rambling in my head about reading stages; i’ll have to blog it sometime so i can laugh at how wrong i was in 2 more childrens time.
Oh Ali, sure, it always makes me laugh when you see people ask on parenting boards what the ideal number of children, or ideal age gap is, because there is no mythical ideal. You could argue for absolutely every combination at great length. You just have to aim for what feels right to you, and enjoy what you are fortunate enough to end up with.
I used to do that sort of stuff with Violet because (a) she loved it, and (b) there was no one else here for her to play with! Buttercup has willing playmates all the time, including big sisters to read her stories and so on, I’m hardly needed 🙂