School days – flashcards and VIP

This week’s been an uneventful week at school as far as I can tell.  N ended off the week on Friday with a headache that came on at lunch time and lasted until Sunday morning, so he was very quiet on coming home.  That meant very little chit chat about what he got up to at school, and an excuse that evening about not being able to read his book.

VIP

Finally for the first time since way before Easter N was made VIP earlier in the week.  He tells me it was because he was the only one who did all the tidying, but given both he and his best friend seem a little vague every time they explain why they were made VIP, really I’ve no idea if that’s right.

I was very proud of him though because they’ve got a big year group to be competing with for it (I’d love him to get another learner of the week but I don’t think he shows what he can do enough – obviously takes after me and my school days, or star of the week – no chance if he can’t be bothered to be friends with other children who’re the ones who vote for the star award) compared with other classes.  He’s always pleased with VIP because he gets to eat lunch first and sit on the VIP table.

Phonics Flashcards

N’s school like so many others, do the Read Write Inc / Oxford Reading Tree phonics system (along with some other earlier books which were phonics bugs I think.  Early on I bought some of the Read Write Inc flashcards – both stage one and the ‘more’ flashcards boxes and we’ve looked at them a bit during this year’s reading journey.  But this week N had a list of all the phonics they’ve already learnt and all those they’ll be learning by the end of the year which will complete the set.  So he decided he wanted to get the second box out and test himself.

N was spot on.  There were a couple he needed to think about, but there’s a lot to be said for learning by a mix of rote and verse/phrases.  I’m going to have to read up on the split digraphs (at least I know what they are) and how to explain those because we’re finding he’s now getting a lot of words coming up in his reading books that aren’t in his word envelope for this year, and include the phonic sounds that they’ve not yet done.

Reading Books

N’s reading really is coming on. This week he only had to sound out 2 words in one book, and the book at the end of the week I read to him first because of his headache. But then his first reading of it was pretty smooth despite all the words he’s not learned.  Yes he guesses a lot, but understanding story flow, using the visuals and his memory, and understanding how pages and sentences fit into the wider context of the story and repetition, means he’s much more able to work out the words he needs to read rather than always having to sound and blend.  Maybe he’s going to be a bit of a reader after all.  Fingers crossed.

Friendships

I’ve often said about my concern that N only really seems to play with one friend at school (although one more has been mentioned recently).  He doesn’t seem to have the same issue out of school as there’s several friends he’s close to and talks about.

One of those is a boy who used to be at his school in the year above but recently moved school.  They’re still at after school club together, and they’ve continued the vague friendship they had at nursery before the other boy went up to school.  They just seem to get on really well, even though they only see each other once or twice a week for a couple of hours.  We really need to get them sorted with a playdate out of school, as we’re close enough to cycle across to the village or vice versa.

When I mentioned about the possibility of a playdate to N he got so excited as he does with all playdates.  ‘Mummy, that would be good because H and me love each other’.  Aw, not sure he’ll be saying that next year when he’s in Year 1, but sweet how innocent he is now and how he’ll say exactly what he’s thinking.