One advantage of being very like my mother is the opportunity to “borrow” that perfect line.
Approaching a pair of women debating something she heard one of them say, “Well, let’s ask Florie, she knows everything.”
To which my mom replied, “Florie has an opinion about everything.”
A line from a story kept repeating through my mind Thursday:
“Be bold, be bold, but not too bold, lest your blood run cold.”
It’s from the story Mr. Fox that runs along the lines of Bluebeard but is slightly less creepy to me.
In my mind the line is a reminder of mortality; in this case of my own, very human, limitations. I found it an effective warning and was careful not to bite off more than I could chew.
This began as a comment on Karen’s My Two Cents on Learning to Read, but quickly grew into a story, so I moved it here.
I find this topic interesting because my oldest (the only one truly reading yet) falls squarely between the “whole language” and “phonics” models. (Jay proposed a theory on that, which I’ll get to in a minute.)
I bought the “Teach your child to Read” book when Natasha was almost 4, because she was expressing an interest in learning and I felt the method/approach made sense (certainly the research did). Her first reading “lesson” was part of her birthday celebration.
Yes, I realize this could make us look like nerds. I’m over it.
She tried to follow directions at first, but as soon as she saw there were “real” stories further back that she had to work up to, she lost interest in the early stuff. We shortly gave up on formal reading lessons (she was only four, after all) and returned to our picture books and fairy tales.
She began asking me to keep my finger under the words (always disliked it as a distraction before), and soon had the 1-to-1 correlation down.
She memorized the look of words (a thing decried by some phonics proponents) recognizing them in new contexts and stories.
We got to phonics backwards from there: once she knew words we would sound them out and apply what she knew to a new word. Homophones became a wonderful game.
At this stage “this is a dress” (to reference Karen’s post again) was quite enough, even preferred. She wasn’t interested in the deep or why (how to get to the components and sounds) of the language, she wanted the *story*.
At some point Jay pointed out that she had been our prolific signer. Owned at least 75 signs by the age of two. She didn’t talk (much) until she was almost three, but then sky-rocketed. The theory he proposed was that she was wired toward whole-concept.
I’ve seen this as I dink around with leaching her music: she has much more patience to repeat (say) a cord pattern that she can recognize as a song than in a drilling in fundamentals that will lead to meaning later on.
Yes, I’ve thought about the “solid foundation” approach, but for the age she is I think simple delight is all I care about. Disciplined knuckling down (Jay and I agreed while they were babies) will wait until they are 8-years-old.
Thinking of these indicators, I’m very curious to see how Melody’s reading personality will develop. She wasn’t interested in signing at all: more in babbling and being frustrated when no one understood her on her terms. I finally insisted on a few basic signs until her speech was more intelligible.
Elisha was solidly between these two extremes, so we’ll get to test the correlation between signing and reading from several angles.
To return to the original idea, I would argue (based on the “all children are different” model), that “This is a dress” is perfectly adequate for a child who wants nothing more than to play princess. When she matures enough to desire a *particular* dress she will learn This is a sleeve and this is the left bodice. Until that point those details are only a delay or distraction from her true purpose.
I will note again here that I am no longer in a hurry to see my little ones into chapter books.
Knowing how much age and available material can be out of alignment I feel no sense of urgency to move quickly. And while I can see a tendency in Natasha to lean more toward visual than phonetic (she insisted hoppyness was happiness until I made her break down the word and pointed out the joke), she also has a very teachable spirit that I expect to balance anything that may be out of place.
Unlike many Alaskans I equate “wintertime” with “indoor time.” So with that as a theme here’s a look at my extreme indoor week (season). Figuring largely is the classic case of knowing what you ought to do, if not necessarily how.
~ ~ 1. Meals ~ ~
We’ve gone through 3 gallons of milk this week. Jay told me that is normal, but this is the first time in recent memory it’s been three fresh gallons. I hadn’t really noticed if this was our rate before.
I’ve been trying to use stuff off our shelves– canned, dried and frozen stuff– so meal-planning has taken longer. I’ve twice this week fallen back to “stand-bys” like sandwiches and frozen foods. Since these don’t have left-overs I used our huge supply of beans to make a chili for Jay’s lunches.
The bonus with this system is that I don’t have to eat beans– or make my kids eat something I’m not interested in eating myself. Definitely going to remember this.
~ ~ 2. Dog ~ ~
With a high-energy dog like my Lab, being stuck indoors can be a little tense. I was thankful to see that she’s not the type to beg for walks at -40°, but even without wanting to be outside her spring is still tightly wound.
She’s been gaining weight for about a month and a half now (short-hand for “no-exercise”) and while she’s done well up till now I feel she might be reaching her limit.
Fortunately I just got re-motivated to focus on her training, and I’m told that should help.
~ ~ 3. Children ~ ~
The kids are actually easier to keep entertained than the dog, especially when you add movies to the mix. Jay has a T.V. tuner in his computer and a series of programs he combines to record certain Saturday morning cartoons and remove the comercials.
The delightful result is a collection of sweet and fun options without the discontent- and consumer-training interruptions. Other activities:
~ ~ 4. Exercise ~ ~
The running is some of the only activity I’ve done in the last week. Despite all my options… (here comes the YBH: yes but how) finding other elements of my day more important and engaging just crowds this out.
I find once I start I enjoy all sorts of things that work well in my living room:
~ ~ 5. Housekeeping ~ ~
Being confined to house makes maintaining the home a higher priority. We’ve been working at this since Christmas and I’ve been relieved at how we’ve been doing.
Having a solid half of our clothes outdoors has helped with this, along with the rearranging that gave the kids an area to play, and (more important) a place for everything to go.
Vacuuming is remarkably easier with floors kept clear… but yesterday I began bringing in bags of things and putting them away. Having the drawers full again makes me realize how *much* we have, and what we were able to (almost comfortably) live without.
If things get harder to keep up with we might have to think about thining back again.
~ ~ 6. Writing ~ ~
Writing has simply got to be the easiest hobby for mothers, and I’m so glad to have it.
~ ~ 7. Other fun indoor things we’ve done ~ ~
More 7 Quick Takes At Jen’s blog.
7 Quick Takes on Untangling Tales
I am learning a new way of reading: simply pressing on.
If something doesn’t line up with my memory I’m continuing anyway rather than going back for more clarity.
I see only two possibilities: it will be cleared up later, or the author made a mistake. Neither option changes my main my goal of consuming the story, and going back hinders it.
Thinking on this epiphany (the fact that is was an epiphany) it really is curious to observe the contradiction of my thoughts; the working of my brain.
First, I want to have everything *just* so, to understand everything neatly in its place. Simultaneously I delight in finding un-obvious connections; in exercising my story-sense. Stopping and back-tracking for names or obscure references feeds the first tendency, and pressing on makes use of the second.
It involves “trusting myself;” a belief system I’ve kept at arm’s length due to the near-sacred position it has gained in our modern world (despite its true followers being as rare, perhaps, as true Believers). Even so it is a confidence-builder to have a type of working partnership with an author: reading carefully, but once, and trusting she’ll give me enough to keep me afloat.
~ ~ ~
I’ve told myself I want to finish this novel before I pick up another book.
Too often I’m a “read the one you’re with” type, which results in much pleasurable and varied reading but less a sense of accomplishment.
And when that’s done I want to finish reading windows. I dearly wish to apply this pressing-on method of reading to an instructional book.
I’ve kept putting it down, wondering how in the world to take notes on the myriad of … everything the author is pouring into the book, and I want for a change to just consume it and trust, for a while, the partnership of my brain and the Holy Spirit.
I believe and have frequently said:
I don’t think the brain really forgets anything: Once it has something it just needs the right trigger to bring it back.
Incidentally, this is why I think simply reading scripture has value– even if you don’t feel you can memorize well. At 17 I had an experience where God used a passage I *never* spent the time to memorize (and trust me, I didn’t read it a lot– it wasn’t that sort of passage) to encourage a baby believer. It was one of those things that feels ordinary at the time, and you look back later realizing you were in the midst of a miracle.
I want to test my theory a bit and see if just consuming the information can be enough.
I know someone could say we’re supposed to be doers, not merely hearers but I’ll remind anyone who cares that it all starts by hearing. So that’s where I’m starting.
And I love how this quote from Joyce Carol Oates’s essay Notes on Failure succinctly articulates why.
How to attain a destination is always more intriguing (involving as it does, both ingenuity and labor) than what the destination finally is.
As we push into our… 3rd week, is it(?) of -40° here’s a picture from my bedroom.
That was solid frost on the left corner, but I broke the hole there in getting the curtain loose for the picture.
I agree with whoever it was that said “People who complain about the cold are really just bragging they survived it.”
And as part of my brag I wanted to point out the ways in which this cold snap (that may be record-making– I’ll know in a week or two) really isn’t as horrible as it could be.
So after reading this post I remembered how every reminder (vague or specific) of the Arthurian stories makes me less interested in reading them.
I had three books from this lay on my shelf, and I picked up the first to briefly peruse before setting it on the “leaving” shelf in the garage. Here’s what I read:
Some people there are who, being grown, forget the horrible task of learning to read. It is perhaps the greatest single effort that the human spirit undertakes, and he must do it as a child.
Those were the first words I’ve ever read of John Steinbeck’s.
I opened to the middle and realized at once why people will spend time in the depression with this man, or listen to a story that they know will end badly. As much as I despised the tale, even as I was reading it, I knew I could keep reading– and go back to the beginning, even; simply because it was so well written.
It really makes all the difference. This one is still sitting on my shelf.
I will leave names out, but a while back my husband suggested we join the boycott of a particular business because of some issues they were supporting.
The next time my girls asked to visit the place, I told them we wouldn’t be going for a while. They of course asked why, and this was what I came up with.
When you spend money some place, that is how the business earns the money they use. Some of it is used to keep the business running, and some is used for whatever the owner wants to use it for.
If we give our money to (Business), the owners are going to use our money to support things we disagree with. Things we believe are wrong. Mother and Dad won’t use our money to support those choices, so we can’t give our money to the people who will use it in that way.
Not giving them our money, choosing to spend it elsewhere, is our way of saying we disagree.
No, I don’t know if the 4- and 5-year-old got it. But they did start asking different questions.
Instead of saying “Can we go (there)” they’d ask, “Are they still using their money wrong?”
Natasha said more than once, “It makes me sad they use their money that way.”
Melody asked, “Can we stop and tell the people there to stop spending their money wrong?” Which led to other talk about how the local employees shouldn’t be scolded for decisions they don’t make.
When the word came that the boycott was ended, Jay e-mailed the news from work and I mentioned it the next time we were out.
Nearly effervescing in their excitement, the girls jumped at my suggestion to go, and Natasha said, “We really should spend our money there now, because there will be other people who won’t be happy (the business) changed how they used their money, and now they won’t go there.
That convinced me she, at least, understood the concept, because she was able to turn it back around and reapply it.
Of course, it could also be a sly bid for more visits, but it was also well-reasoned, and worth admiring.
Over the last year and a half I have been collecting books written for “young adults.”
This is the year I am spending a lot of effort working through as many of them as possible. In some cases I was able to pick up several early books in a series, in other cases just the first, but I hope to read as many first books (*) as possible, because I’m trying to decide how I feel about series.
(And because I’d love to find new favorites for myself…)
On my shelf:
My “high goal” and aspiration is to shift into a sort of reading zone while working through this. Not only for the sake of speed, but with that confirmed speed I’ll be more willing to pick up books (like #26) that appear to be a cliche of poor, brave/feisty little girl shows all those stupid, mentally confined adults/males that she’s just as good (or better!!!) doggone it! And give it an actual chance to be better than its cover-copy.
Soapbox:
I’ve never understood why so many women who want to prove women can do *anything* do it by trying to be like men.
Lets go for a little more originality here, ladies!
And, for the record, just being “better” is not that original; any more than blue becoming dark green is much different than becoming medium green. Can we have more purple in our world? Or what’s wrong with blue, anyway? I *like* blue…
This is the kind of “girl power” I most enjoy reading (and find the most believable, even).