Dom's Letter Game

So, even though Dominic is over 4 1/2, he STILL doesn't know all his letters.  Even ignoring that fact that I teach reading to young strugglers this is a serious 'Parenting FAIL'.


He went through an interested in letters phase, but lost interest before he knew them all.  I bought a workbook to do with him, but he isn't really wanting to do much with it, so it gets ignored often.

He'd rather fly planes and helicopters all day.  This is not an exaggeration. 

A few weeks ago, Dom started a game where he pretended to be working for an air patient emergency service company, like my husband dispatches for.  He wanted me to dispatch him and then pretended to fly helicopters to various pretend hospitals and airports.

Before I threw away a bunch of old boxes, I thought of him having airports for his planes and helicopters.  I let him play with the boxes on his own, then decided to turn this game educational.  After a quick gummy bear motivated pre-assessment, I found out which letters Dom didn't know.  I picked 5 of the ones that are most commonly used and wrote them in permanent marker on the tops.  If I was the kind who liked to make things cutesy instead of a functional minimalist, this would look a lot neater.  But it is a good game without any frills.

Yes, we gave our kid a wine box to play with - just keeping it classy.

Then I pretend to call Dom and tell him to take the helicopter/plane/bi-plane to "Airport/Hospital G-or whichever."  He has to drop off patients, pick up patients(I hide them under different boxes), and take them to other hospitals/airports.  He is starting to get the letters right.  Now the next step would be to have him hide the patient and tell me which letter to fly to.

Finding the patient hiding in Airport N

I see that we can extend this play with more imagination like ambulances and plot twists as well as move to letter sounds and other letters.  

Someday, if he's a pilot doing medical flights, I hope he does a few less barrel rolls.

What We're Reading

Linking up with Housewifespice

I am reading:

Both are for book clubs.

The Privilege of Being a Woman is starting out a little slow for a girl who doesn't really feel that oppressed as a woman.  The first few chapters set the groundwork for what may be an interesting read, but I hope it is also a moving and informative read.  I'm not just gaining tons of useful information through the beginning, but I feel it will get there.  The beginning lays out all the times women have been degraded and put second to men, I think to create a little empathy for a misguided feminist movement, but I feel it lingers on it too much.  But in different hands, this would be informative and moving, I would think.

I Capture the Castle is one I have read before - 2 times - so I am really just re-skimming it to freshen up for book club.  The fact that I have read it 2 times puts it in a category with 3 other books:  The Giver, The Scarlet Pimpernel, and Harry, the Dirty Dog.  (Okay, there were only 2 legit books, I've read a handful of children's books over and over again.)  What I'm saying is, this is a good book.  It is NOT a Hunger Games can't stop turning pages due to suspense type book.  It is more of a quirky, interesting, romantically located, well written, and believable book.  So go out and enjoy it!

Shawn is reading:

He loves the Ender's Game books and wants me to read them too.  Should I?  Anyone?

Sol is reading:
A bunch of Dear Dragon books he checked out at the library.

I think they are stupid, and well below his reading level, but he likes them.  They are also great books for sight word recognition, as they repeat lots of words like "come" and "hear".  As a reading teacher, I can say they are not great phonics books.

Dom just read:

Grandma read it to him.  Then, he saw a web in his firetruck toy in the backyard and said, "Look, mom, a web, a beautiful web."  Eric Carle is my hero, he and Mr. Rogers know where it's at.
I am also reading him a bunch of boring easy-readers and paraphrasing non-fiction books about flight, transportation, and planes to him.  I'm yawning, he's all over it.

Wilson just enjoyed looking at a board book version of this:

His newborn tastes are impeccable.  This book is hilarious.  And bright, and fun to read.  And rhyming, and super.  Which is why Sol just had to pick it up and read it to him.  It is riddled with gems like, "Hello Jack, Hello Jake, Shake hands, Shake hands, Shake, Shake Shake."

Go check out the others - get inspired to read for you and read to your kids, so so important.