19 March, 2009

16 March, 2009

Chickie did it!!


Woohoo! My little boy is officially a yellow belt! We're so proud of him.

He concentrated pretty well during the grading (his concentration is not normally great so I was a bit worried about that). He did get a little over-excited at times and had to be reminded to wait for the count, but overall I was very impressed.

We went out to dinner to celebrate last night and had a Viennetta (ice cream 'cake') for dessert. He's very pleased about it all (well that and the various ships he's made out of Lego). He seems to be a little excited about learning some new moves.

So we're all yellow belts now... though J and I are halfway to our orange belts (but we have a lot of work ahead of us!).

12 March, 2009

Oh my aching back...

I have spent ages on the floor, with Chickie, putting together a Lego Star Wars Hyena Droid Bomber ship. I'm really not Lego oriented. Really really not...

Chickie's earned it as part of our push to work on his reading. We had a parent - teacher conference a week or so back and Chickie's reading is really not where it should be. I figured he wasn't great at it but I thought it was ok. Turns out... no.

We were doing his readers and his 'word walls' but good grief, it was a struggle some days. Focus is really not an area he excels in sometimes. So we worked out a reward system. The Lego ship was an immediate reward to get to the next level. He'll have smaller rewards for each level and then another larger one when he gets up to where he should be.

I'm hoping that focusing on his reading might also help with his focusing at karate. He's actually going to try for his yellow belt this weekend. I have no idea if he'll get it or not, but I have to say I'm very proud that he's prepared to try. He could have actually tried when J and I got our yellow belts last year, but I think he was afraid to give it a go. He's often reluctant to try new things. Believe it or not, he finally tried jam for the first time last week - and decided he loves strawberry jam sandwiches!

Wish us luck for Sunday. I really don't care if he gets his belt or not, but I have to say it would be a huge boost to his confidence if he does.