It has been so nice around here these last few weeks! Jeremiah has been so pleasant and easy-going. He seems so much more peaceful and seems to have so much more joy as a result. We do too, of course! Anyway, we did school EVERY day this week. It was awesome! He even asked some days to do school! I found this neat curriculum from Christian Light Education. It's for kindergartners and the whole set of books is under $20! I bought it figuring I didn't have much to lose and Jerry absolutely loves the books. There is copywork, cutting and pasting, coloring, matching...it never gets repetitive. With his meds. back on track now, he seems to be picking things up a lot quicker too. Because the county will not provide me with another IEP since we homeschool, I came up with my own and am realizing just how many of the goals Jerry has already met. It's so encouraging. Here is a picture of the curriculum...
We also had our annual Imagination Fair with our homeschool group. It's sort of like a science fair, except that you don't have to display only science projects. You can bring collections, hobbies, favorite toys...whatever. Jeremiah has been obsessed with Legos lately. He especially loves the little Lego guys. He's constantly dressing them, accessorizing them, and then lining them up against each other (or in a circle). That was his display at the fair and he was very proud of it. He got a certificate of participation too. The snacks for the fair were hands-on as well and the kids had fun using yummy foods to make their own imaginative, edible creations.
Making a Froot Loop Necklace
The other benefit to Jerry's meds. working well is that he plays much better with his friends and actually enjoys them. Today he went with his friend Joseph to MOSI, McDonald's, and then to a park. Then he went back to Joseph's for dinner and to play some more at his house. Joseph's dad said he was wonderful and that the boys played and got along famously. He has another play date with his friend Sammy tomorrow morning before t-ball practice. Here is Jerry with Joseph at a party recently that a friend of ours had for all of the children at church. It was fabulous. She had games and food, and prizes, and goodie bags for all of the kids. Jerry did really well behavior-wise and even handled losing well.
We went on a field trip yesterday to Wycliffe WordSpring Discovery Center, a hands-on museum that teaches the kids about Bible translation and missionaries that serve in that field. Jerry participated in a scavenger hunt, used a play blow dart gun to shoot pretend "food" in the jungle, played musical instruments from other countries, learned about Peru, dressed in clothes from other countries, and made a necklace to remind him to pray for a certain Bibleless people group in another part of the world. It was a great field trip.
Last, but oh so certainly not least, I have to share what happened at Pioneer Clubs this last week. Miss Kim was teaching the kids about the wages of sin being death and the awesome gift that God gives us in Christ Jesus so that we can have eternal life. She illustrated the verse on the dry-erase board and explained it in as simple a terms as she could so that each child could understand it. Now Jerry has heard the salvation message before, but never understood it really.
When asked to choose one of three responses as a prayer to what they learned, Jerry said, "I don't have Jesus in my heart....I want Jesus in my heart!" He then bowed his little head, closed his eyes, folded his hands together, and prayed after Miss Kim to receive Jesus as his Savior. PRAISE God!! I'd often wondered if God made exceptions for kids like Jerry who don't understand things the way other kids do, but now I don't have to even wonder. Of course, when I told him to tell daddy what he prayed and asked Jesus to do while we were on the way home from club, he said, "I don't remember." That's typical for Jerry though and I am confident that God's Word did not return void and that Jeremiah David Bertic is now written in the Lamb's Book of Life!!
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