Push Back

This past week I got a fair amount of push back from L so I backed off a little bit. L is very bright but she tends to get frustrated very easily. I can always tell when her brain shuts off and she gets into "I can't do it" mode. It can be very challenging to pull her out of that funk, and one of my major goals with her is to teach her to persevere in spite of frustration and difficulty because she CAN do it, most of the time, even if she needs to try more than once, try different things, or ask for help.

Anyway, she's been pushing back particularly about math lately. She's still working through Math U See alpha. We were doing +2's and she has trouble if she starts with the smaller number (2+7 instead of 7+2). If she starts with 7, she easily adds two more to get 9, but if she starts with 2, she keeps counting from 2 up to 7 and stops there. She tends to forget that she can turn it around if she needs to, and she doesn't usually get the blocks herself. If I pull the blocks out and direct her she can do it just fine, but I have to be vigilant to make sure she doesn't flip the "turn off brain" switch before I can help her because if she does, it's hopeless for now (and the worst is that, even if she's beyond frustrated and won't try at all she FREAKS OUT if I put it away for a few minutes and take a break!). We pushed through the +2's and are almost done with the first solving for unknown - again she does really well with the blocks, or if I make it into a story problem, but she struggles a little when it's abstract - just numbers. I know she'll get there and I'm not in a rush so we are taking it pretty easy.

We've also been doing classes at the Y. L, H, and P are all in swim, H does tumbling, and L is taking a sports class. I'm also taking swim lessons and adult beginner rock climbing, which have both been super fun. :) All the classes do take up some time, but I think it's worth it. I'm determined that my kids will be comfortable in the water and proficient swimmers BEFORE they're teenagers! This session is just ending and it's almost time to sign up again. I'm going to try to keep the same classes.

Today I pulled out the acrylic craft paints and let the kids go wild with paper for a little while. L really loves to paint, and I think H does too, though he doesn't try to paint specific figures yet, he makes very nice lines :) L is learning to use a compass to make circles to paint in because she saw me do that with a painting one day.

We finished the Boxcar Children (she wants to read ALL the boxcar children books now!) and this week Sonlight sent out a letter with the missing schedule for the two books that we got that weren't included in the IG, The Llama Who Had No Pajama (which we already read... twice... since it got here a few weeks ago), and Least of All. I'm glad they send out corrections, but it is a little annoying to write the info into the IG myself.

Playing Boxcar Children in the yard. L is behind the boys, and the pool is the Boxcar.