This is my bi-annual kid update. We recently had the boys parent/ teacher conferences for the end of the 9 weeks and they continue to set the bar pretty high. First, you will notice immediately that I have zero, none, nada pictures of Hunter and Ashton playing soccer. This is because I coach them and when you coach, the camera is an afterthought. I even brought my camera to their last game and forgot to even take it out of the bag. This is the first season that I have taken pics of Shep besides the three years ago when I didnt coach his team. Sorry guys! I promise to do better next season... and there is always basketball, right?
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| Love these boys! All five of them. |
Shepherd.
School
This kid blows me out of the water. We have always known his brain works at slightly higher level than other kids his age (even though he is quite goofy/ quirky/ odd). :) I never knew if that would translate into school smarts or if he just thought differently. Apparently, it means both.
Shepherd received the highest score on his MAP math test for the entire 1st grade in his school. He was in the 99%. We dont put a lot of weight into these standardized tests but it is nice when your kid does really well. His reading score was also really high at 89%.
He had all 3's on his report card which is the equals grade level. His teacher sang Shepherd's praises saying that he helps his classmates when they dont understand. He is well-behaved and obeys. He can be silly but it is at appropriate times and immediately knows when it is time to stop (this was a major worry... haha).
His writing is also far above grade level. He writes full, descriptive sentences with adjectives and correct punctuation. It is really amazing.
I posted a lot of his work because he is ALWAYS doodling, coloring, drawing, writing. My kitchen table is normally littered with Shep's work (with some of Bennett's scribbles scattered in there too).
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Just some of the stuff that was within my line of sight.
1- A folder with space things on it that is filled with drawings. 2- a chicken coloring page 3- angry bird sketches 4- a paper airplane with characters drawn in the plane. 4- an extensive landscape of a Minecraft scene 5- an original book called,Super Dog vs Evil Cat |
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| I took apart the Super Dog vs Evil Cat book to see the scope of his writing. He did this all on his own, no help from me. |
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| This was done at school. His Pokeon writing with picture. |
Sports
Shepherd had a unique opportunity this year. He decided to give baseball a try and take a season off from soccer. This also allowed for me to not coach U8 soccer (hooray!). Baseball was... different. I cant say I enjoyed it all. He played the minimum amount and was at the 10th spot on the batting order. It doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out that he was average at best. Unfortunately, Chad was not able to make it to any of Shepherd's baseball games. Since all the games were during the week, Chad's practices made it impossible to make it to any. Fortunately, Shepherd did not do anything all that impressive and Chad didnt miss much.... you gotta love a mom's brutal honesty.
He did get slightly better hitting by the end of the year but it normally went right to the first baseman. On a scale of 1 to 10, I think he would rate it about a 5. He was originally batting left handed, but he busted his nail and decided to switch to right.
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| His 3rd nail to lose in his almost 7 years of life. |
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| His first time making it to first- he also scored a run. He was so happy. |
Thankfully, the fall season was not a total bust for him though. About two weeks into baseball season, friends of ours from soccer were talking about not having enough kids to field their soccer team (3 kids on their roster never showed up). Since baseball had no weekend games, I offered Shepherd. They immediately took him and he did an amazing job. He hardly ever came out of the game and was either the 2nd or 3rd highest scorer on the team.
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| Ashton took this pic with his phone... I love it. |
There were no conflicts between baseball and soccer until the last week when he decided to finish the year off with the team that really needed him... soccer. His team came in 2nd place going into double shoot outs with a team that had killed everybody. So proud of his little team.
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| Getting his medal. |
Needless to say, he wants to stick with soccer next season. Praise da Lord!!!
Ashton
School
Ashton is my cool kid. He seems to just attract attention. He was voted by his class to be their student council representative. He loves going to his student council meetings. Ashton tested into Gifted and Talented. Ashton is smart but in a different way than Hunter and Shepherd. His math ability is super high. He can ready really well, but his comprehension is average. His teacher and I are both working on trying to get his inference skills a bit higher. I had never noticed, until testing, that he sometimes has a hard time connecting Point A to Point B. He is good with concrete facts. His MAP scores were a mixed bag this time. Math continues to soar with a 93%. Reading has been a continual decrease over the last year. He started last year at the 83% and has fallen to the 57%. His teacher this year is super tough, but really good. She and I both agree that this score is not a good reflection of his ability. Hopefully, he will be able to pull this up.
Test scores aside, his report card was great. A's in science and math and B's in ELA and social studies. He skipped a big section, by mistake, on a test in SS at the beginning of year. The teacher did not let him go back to fill it in... told you she was tough. If it wasnt for this, I am pretty sure he would have pulled an A in SS too.
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| Ashton's student council speech. |
Sports
This kid is a freak in soccer. After much consideration, we decided to move him up to U12 soccer with Hunter. I was the assistant for this team and the head coach assured me he thought Ashton could handle it... Sure enough, he did. He played stopper and had many goals and held up just fine with kids that were far bigger than him. He hardly ever came out of the game and was an anchor for the defense.
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| The older two doing their homework... Notice my social butterfly with his phone on right beside him (I think he is texting my parents). |
Hunter
School
Hunt is enjoying the little bit of freedom that 5th graders get. He rotates classes and was put back into GT classes. He also pulled 2 A's in Math and Science and 2 A's in ELA and Social Studies. Again, Social Studies was a shock for him. He has always excelled in SS pulling basically straight 100's. This teacher puts a lot of weight in the study guide. So when he did not study hard for the first test and there was info on the study guide that had not been taught during class, he bombed it. (He is my very auditory learner.) Thankfully, she gave a bit of extra credit, because the class as whole, did poorly and he started studying and was able to pull it up.
His MAP scores... were again, similar to Ashtons. Math was great at 85%. ELA was STRUGGLE. I was honestly, shocked. He dropped from the fall of last year from 85% to 45%. At first I didnt know if he just tested poorly or if he really dropped that low in the course of a year. Judging that two of my kids had very similar results in ELA MAP, I must admit a red flag has gone up with the school. I am hoping that the winter scores go up... way up.
I am thankful that I got back Hunt's spring scores from SC PASS as it eased my mind a bit. His math score was 86% and his ELA was 82% (which is where I think he is.). He scored exemplary in both SS and Science as well.
So, I am optimistically chalking up the low ELA MAP scores of both H and A to just a bad day. Rest assured, if it happens again with the winter scores, I will probably have a meeting with the principal and teachers because dropping 30-40% in one year is just not cool.
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| Couldnt find any cool school stuff... just the boring worksheets, quizzes, etc. But, this shows his continuing love for super heros. Hunt and I both love our super heros! He surprised me with these sketches as his art skills are not normally all that impressive. ha :) |
Sports.
Hunter did a really good job in soccer as well. We moved his position to striker about half way through the season and he did a great job there. Hunter has a slow twitch muscle so I constantly have to remind him to stay on his toes and to think ahead. He had a couple clutch goals this year and stepped up to be a pretty good leader on the team. Chad and I both agree that he is perhaps the most unflexible child on the earth and if we can get his flexibility better, he will become such a better athlete.
Bennett
School
Bennett and I have a daily school lesson for about 20-30 minutes a day. I am using Little Hands to Heaven by Heart of Dakota as our guide. I have used this with the other 3 and love the length and content... great preschool curriculum.
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| Things he has hung on his wall) |
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| Some other random things he has completed this year. My favorite is Bennett's Number Book (blue book in the center). Over a 10 week period, we learned a number a week and had a coordinating Bible Story. He then had to cut out and glue that number to the page. The picture on each page gives a clue to the Bible Story. |
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| An example page of Bennett's Number Book. Find 7 shoes in a magazine and glue them to page. This goes with the story of Moses removing his shoes because the ground was holy. It was a fun little project. |
Some things we are doing.
- A Bible story each day
- A letter a week
- Made a number book (the first ten weeks)
- Learning to use scissors/ cut
- Learning to dress ourselves
- Coloring/ painting... we do about 3 crafts a week.(we will begin Handwriting Without Tears in January.)
He doesnt do real well with remembering the letter names, he does a little better with the sounds which most professionals say is more important anyway. I hate to compare the boys, but he is picking it up a little slower than his brothers. haha. I do feel like he is right on the verge of it all clicking into place. He loves for me to read books to him and he "makes" books when Shepherd is making his books.
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| The silly pic |
Overall, I am so proud of these kids. We have things to do every night from practice to AWANA to games. They get their homework done without complaints (except for Ashton, he will
sometimes often complain.) They never get in trouble at school, they are leaders at school and on the sports field. and are making good grades. Proud of them!
Keep it up kiddos!
