What a different creature my almost 5yo is from my almost 7yo. My K'er wants to avoid manipulative practice and skip right to the workbook! She's not happy unless she can write something. This is quite a change from my write-o-phobic 1stborn.

This week she learned 12!!! This was a huge accomplishment. Before this week, counting went something like this: 10, 11, 32, 34, 35, 36... Then it slowly morphed into: 10, 11, 32, firteen, firteen, 16, 17, 18, 19... Now it is a very solid 10, 11, 12, firteen, firteen, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. With help (and some skipped numbers) she can count to 100. The other day she counted 15 schoolbuses as we passed by. With 12 under her belt, nothing can hold her back! She can count anything:)

We're just sort of going with the flow for reading, using ideas and books from Teach A Child to Read With Children's Books. We sometimes make little books with simple words, "I can...(fill in the blank)". She would much rather make a great big story than making a simple story that she can read, so we just go with the flow. I start with an "I can" statement, and it usually turns into a great long detailed story about a baby that went to live with grandpa and got everything she wanted. If we do phonics and build words with tiles, she usually brushes the tiles aside and wants to write. She just isn't happy unless she can write something.

On the other hand, she hasn't been real thrilled with Handwriting Without Tears practice and gets easily frustrated with making the letters in her workbook. She'd much rather come up with her own method for making the letters, or tracing my letters. Of course, she's little and has big directional problems. 2s and 3s are backwards. Most things are backwards. I know we have the next 3 years to work out a sense of direction.

I'm curious to see what her reading is like at the end of this year. I'm not in a hurry or pressured. But I've already noticed a big difference in how my 2nd one perceives reading. She loves it! She is always trying to figure out what a word says, or trying to write words, or handing me a book that she wants to read to me. I think I killed that love of reading in my 1st dd by beating her over the head with phonics. Fortunately, she overcame that dread of reading and likes it now. Live and learn.