Monday, June 5, 2023

 Monday, June 5, 2023

     I ran into Tammy this morning on my walk.  I hadn't seen her for two months. I knew she would be gone; she and her husband rented an apartment in Paris. I was concerned about her. She tended to be an "is that all kind of person," always expressing disappointment.  But no! She had a wonderful time and was glad to be back. Two months was a long time to be away from home. 

I had Mama K's crew at 8:15 this morning. They signed in on time, but Mama K had to call me this morning to say they were ready. Usually, I have to follow up to ask what's going on.

I started with Twin E. OMG! This was a bad day. She couldn't remember the most familiar words. She decoded everything. I tried to push the automatic processing, but it went nowhere. I backed up. When she missed a word, I sounded the phonemes and had her figure out the word as I had done with Kindergarten Steven. She had trouble with that, too. How am I going to get this girl off the dime?

Then, I worked with Twin A. These girls are identical. I asked their mom how she told them apart. She didn't say it was easy. She listed some features that were slightly different. If I haven't told you already, they're both gorgeous in unassuming ways.

With Twin A, I worked at a third-grade level. She's moving along slowly. Slowly is good; we'll get there. We finished reading the whole passage today. Her only serious glitch was decoding ci as /ic/. I even gave her the sounds. When she heard the /i/ was long, she tried ice. Holding letters in the correct order is still a challenge.

Fourth-grade K was still asleep. I made arrangements to work with him at 10 a.m. and spent the hour meditating. However rattled I am, meditation calms me. It helps me find workable solutions to thorny problems and gives me the courage to take the necessary risks to make things better. Of course, those risks sometimes turn into miserable failures.  

K came to the session. I had prepared fifth-grade material for him because of his improvement and his declaration that he found thinking fun. Reading comprehension demands thinking. It is fun. 

He asked if we could work on math; it had been a while since we'd done any. I asked him what he wanted to work on. He said times table. I wondered if he was having trouble with them. Nothing. Then I asked if he wanted to work on math because he liked it, had trouble with it, or didn't want to work on the reading. He wanted to avoid the reading. It was too hard; it wasn't fun. I roared.

Getting information as to the exact problem was maddening. If K had been an adult, I would have concluded he had a mental illness. But kids are often that way. They can't identify the problem, so they throw something at the wall and see what sticks. He kept talking about not liking reading in front of the rest of the class. Did he feel that way reading with me? No. Then what was the problem doing the work with me? You get the idea. We went round and round and round again.  

He was afraid of making a mistake. Was he afraid of making mistakes when he played video games? No. Why? He can try again. What was the difference between making a mistake in class and making a mistake in a video game? I was thinking of the difference between doing it with an indifferent machine versus other people who pass judgment; it's not a single mistake. The difference is enormous. I understand the difference better through this encounter. The video game only judges that single action- not your ability to perform it. That is a huge difference. I would like to know if there is something I can do to help students see their interaction with me that way. I wonder if it's possible. It's not just my input that counts. They know I'm a person and not a machine. Their nervous systems are designed to respond to that difference.

  I called the church to thank them for posting the ad and to pay. They said they needed to determine the price and would get back to me.

I tried to call Judy or Paulette to see how Paulette was. No answer. Elsa and I walked up there. Paulette sat in her easy chair, and Judy was on the sofa. Judy looked so much better than she had been. She'd been looking frazzled. When I said that, she said, "You think?" While she claims to never feel fear, she does admit to worrying. She has a mental outlook that everything is going to be okay. She had colon cancer. It never occurred to her that she wouldn't be alright, even when she needed a second surgery because of an infection. It didn't occur to her that she could have died until a doctor flew in from Oahu to tell her personally that she was one of God's chosen. She was completely cancer-free. That rarely happens. Judy also nearly died of sepsis. Never gave it a thought until afterward. These two girls have been entertaining me with their medical mishaps. Fortunately, they are God's chosen and recover.

I visited with them for a while. Elsa spent the whole time looking for a toy mouse. She found a tennis ball and tried it but gave up soon. It wasn't as much fun as the mouse,

I walked up there because I wanted to make sure Judy knew that the dispatcher at the fire department said to definitely call 911 if Paulette had trouble breathing as she did the other night. Judy said she would drive her to the hospital if she had difficulty but hadn't been specific. When I asked her, she said, "Oh, no. if Paulette had trouble breathing like the other night, I would have called 911." It was a great relief to see Paulette looking okay, knowing the worst of her ordeal was behind her. She was no longer in danger. However, total recovery will take a while. Sandor said it took him two months to recover from a similar experience. Judy said it took her six weeks to recover from her sepsis. Paulette was only borderline sepsis. She got medical care in time.

I finally texted one of the teachers who expressed interest in my reading method. I recommended that she watch my YouTube videos on The Phonics Discovery System Phases I &II and then speak to me so I can help her figure out how to use them in her class. She texted back that she was on the mainland till mid-June. She would watch the videos and contact me when she got back. We'll see. I've learned not to hold my breath. It's too easy for us to let life activities get in the way.

I watched something called Dirty Grandpa with Robert DeNiro for five minutes. OMG! Who wrote this script, an eleven-year-old? I have heard DeNiro is hard up for money and will do anything. This was humiliating.