November 2010

I am rocking and rolling now!  Not a lot of detail, but I'm at least posting the highlights and remembering a few things.  November brought one significant change for us as we decided to move Christopher to another school.  It's difficult to explain without sounding snobby, but he wasn't learning anything new.  He was so far ahead of most of the class in reading that he was being singled out to work on something else while the other class groups learned their alphabet and what sounds the letters make.  When he started choosing easier work so that he wouldn't have to sit by himself, that really concerned us.  When the teacher told us her biggest challenge was keeping him challenged - and then did not provide any kind of plan for how she was going to do that - we knew it was time for a change.  We moved him from Zaharis Elementary which is northeast of us, to Franklin Elementary which is just about as far southwest of us.  But there is a big difference in the curriculum: Franklin works about a year ahead of grade level academically.  He was able to be with the same age of kids and still be challenged and learning new skills.  This school uses the Spalding method and does phonograms to help with reading.  They are also really big on penmanship and within just a few weeks Christopher's handwriting had noticeably improved.  He was much happier at the new school and made new friends quickly. 

A slightly out of focus picture.  Christopher's old class was sad to see him go and gave him a cute going away party at the end of their "Harvest Festival."  We moved him to the new school the week of Thanksgiving.  His old class sent him home with the costumes they had made for their Thanksgiving lunch and also gave him a cute book where each of his classmates had designed a special page.

He also got to bring home his math book from the first kindergarten class.  He was very excited about these items and wanted to make sure I took two separate pictures of him with each thing - oh, and also the sucker.

Thanksgiving Day - We gathered the boy cousins together for a picture in the backyard following their after-lunch soccer game.  Dara's boys are so wonderful with Christopher.  From left to right, looking at the picture, are Adam (12), Arch IV (15 at the time, now 16), little Christopher in the middle (5), tall Aaron in the back (14), and Austin in front of him (7, now 8).

Matt's dad, Darrell, in the plaid with his sister Susie next to him, his brother Rob in front with the glasses, and his dad Herman.  Herman and his wife Joy always make it out for either Christmas or Thanksgiving each year.