It has been fun to watch reading start to make sense to Emry. We started working on putting letter sounds together last October or November. With the move, we were sidetracked for a little while, but we started again in earnest in January. Last week as we sat in church, Emry was busy studying the children’s bulletin. When she crawled into my lap for help with the Word Search (her first), she simply started reading the first few words. It was one of those joyous moments with being a parent is truly worthwhile: Emry can read!
Emry can read. She’s really good about looking at the words in her reading books, sounding out each letter as she puts the word together. She doesn’t understand all the rules and, naturally, there are words that defy every rule any of us understand (like two, comb or pterodactyl). But she still plows her way through with my help and speeds through her site words so well I need to find some other lists. She has also nearly finished the Kindergarten phonics book we started about the same time. With these thoughts in mind, I started considering what else I need to start with her. Math came to mind. For while she can count to twenty and even sometimes add (by accident), we haven’t really worked with number much. And there is penmanship. She can write her letters awkwardly since she often has to in her phonics work, and while I don’t intend to be overly strict with proper form (my 4thgrade teacher was and it has made me a bit defiant since), I also don’t want her to pick up terrible habits. So, I needed a math book, penmanship, another phonics book, more reading lists…
If I’m going to do all this, we might as well just start Kindergarten.
With those thoughts in mind, I discussed it with Ed. He didn’t care either way. All he’s adamant about is his children will be homeschooled. I talked with my mom a little and a friend at church about the laws in Indiana. Since there’s not much required, there’s no reason not to start her in Kindergarten at the age of 4. And so we will.
Research done, a math book has been ordered, a penmanship book, her next phonics book, and a set of Biscuit reading books. She is excited, I still have books to go through and plan and, well…we’ll just see how it goes!
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