Conferences and other news

I had Emma's conference today. We have about a bajillion reasons to be proud of her.

Her report card is "graded" by developmental level: 1- area of concern, 2- needs more time & experience, 3- making progress & 4- meeting outcomes

We were told at conference #1 that 3's are what they are hoping for, most kids won't have 4's across the board. She had some 4's in her work/study skills and her personal/social skills area for the first marking period. (December)

Today, she had almost all 4's and a couple 3+, which is pretty darn good. She has jumped to the top of the class in most of the areas of math and language arts. The teachers (her teacher and her student teacher) couldn't say enough about what a great kid she is. She is kind to everyone she interacts with, she is compassionate with other kids, she loves to help others, and her listening skills are wonderful. She is never in trouble, and seems to be really loving school. All wonderful compliments to hear when you are parent. At one point they told me to keep doing whatever it is that I am doing, it is working wonders. If that isn't a parental ego boost I don't know what is.

I was beaming, I couldn't have been prouder. Well, I was wrong.

The teachers then told me that Emma has jumped 4 (!!!!!!!!!) reading levels in the past 2 months. They are beyond impressed with her. In fact she has already met or exceeded all the expectations they have for kindergarteners before they go to first grade. (She still has 3 months of school left!)

She has graduated from an emergent reader to a beginning reader. She also went from being an experimenting writer to an emerging writer. The reading and writing stages are for kindergarteners - 2nd grade. She is on step 2 of each, which is really good considering she couldn't read AT ALL and couldn't write anything but her name in September.

Her writing vocabulary is around 30 words (up from 6 in December). In fact I saw some of the testing they did with her. The teacher says the sentence, "I see a big cat playing in the sun with a red ball." The kids then write that down. Emma's first testing looked like this : I C A B C P I F S F R B - basically using the first letters. This time... she wrote every word like they sounded, she almost spelled playing right (she missed the L). It was mind blowing to see all that she has learned in the past few months.

Basically, I left the room beaming. The teachers are so happy with her amazing progress and attentiveness to lessons.

Arabel is still conquering potty training. :) She even went to take her nap today with underwear on rather than a diaper. (More thanks to daddy forgetting to put her in a diaper.) She woke up dry! One more step is down!!

The girls have their first dentist appointments on Thursday. Fingers are crossed that everything goes well. I am kind of nervous. Emma is normally a kind of nervous kid when it comes to new things. She assures me that she is going to go in and NOT be scared. We chose a dental practice that is called a dental spa, they use aromatherapy (no yucky dentist office smell), music or dvd's to watch/listen to during your exam and cleaning, paraffin wax dips for your hands, a massage therapist to massage your neck/shoulders is you get tense, and a massage chair in the waiting room. One of the dentists even worked in a pediatric practice for over a year. After we get the girls through their appointments, we will be getting ourselves appointments. Here's to hoping for no cavities.