| | It's a beautiful day, when your 8yr old decides that washing dishes is fun. She actually uttered these words as we were setting the table for dinner: "No, don't use PAPER plates. I want to wash the dishes." And she had already washed some this afternoon [by hand]. I hope this phase lasts for a long, long time. Papa Bear said to write down that quote and show it to her husband, when she gets married. ;)
Bananna also read a whole-chapter book in one day today. I was excited that she had even begun it, because we hadn't read the Felicity series together. So she has graduated from Kirsten books that she has had read to her to this new series. I would have been excited if she'd just read a few chapters, but she emerged from her room a little before lunch time and announced that she had finished it (Felicity Saves the Day --59pgs.). THEN this evening she read Changes for Felicity (62 pgs).  I cannot express how excited I am that she seems to have inherited her Dad's ability to read speedily, rather than my snail pace.
Today Buddy's excercises in delayed gratification came to fruition; he got extra time on the computer. He is allowed an hour a day on the computer, but he has wanted to try to "defeat" level 4 of some cartoon network game on-line for some time. So over the last week or so he saved up minutes. It was a real challenge at first. He'd say desperately, " I REALLY want to play computer." And I'd say, that's fine, but I thought you wanted to save your minutes. After a few days he figured out that he could play for 30 min or even 45, and compile his extra minutes -- a good lesson in time and fractions. "Now how many minutes are in a quarter of an hour?" he kept asking. I had a good laugh one day, when I tried to explain to him that he only had 2 hours saved up, but then he explained that he had saved a whole hour one day, plus "a half of a hour" the next day, and then "2 quarters of a hour" the next two days, which meant that if he played that day's hour, he had now saved up 3 HOURS. Oh my goodness, it's a little painful to be corrected by a 6yr old.
So he's been carrying his glorious three hour privelege with him for days, saying, "Today we have somewhere to go, so I'm gonna just play one hour and SAVE my 3 hours for another day." It seemed to make him feel rich to have such an option. Today, we had no plans, so he cashed in 2 of his hours. He still didn't defeat the highest level, so he paused and minimized it, in hopes that Papa Bear would help him tomorrow. After all, his timer still holds one extra hour on it.
So I've repeatedly explained that this concept cannot be applied at will. . .Like he couldn't refrain from using his computer time for 24 days, and then play for a solid day. But it was neat to see him take responsibility for "his minutes" (timing himself) and excercise some self-control. - |
) But it's really COOL when your kids WANT to wash the dishes....lol. 
