Last night JediBoy asked me, “Mom, do you know any boys who are married to boys, or girls who are married to girls?” We’ve already talked about the existence of gay couples (Heather Has Two Mommies, and all) but he was asking who we know who is gay. Where has all my diversity gone?? When I started college, at least half of my close circle of friends was L/G/B. Today, we live in white bread suburbia where none of the parents of his friends or the friends of his parents are L/G couples. How sad is that? We had to make do with “Do you remember the ladies from the arts festival?” and “Do you remember the lady from Dad’s office?” but no one he knows personally is in a same-sex relationship. But then - there’s not much diversity in the Disney movies and Scholastic books he peruses, either. Any good suggestions for L/G/B diverse kids’ materials?
**
JediBoy and I had another happy day at home. We played with Math-U-See a bit; he enjoys watching the DVD and asked to watch some today. We worked with the Hooked on Phonics set, where he surprised me by reading up to the point in the workbook where he “could” read the big reader #15 and then grabbing #16 and #17 and read those successfully with help on just a few words each too. Since the orange workbook only has 4 readers, this means he’s functionally 3/4 of the way through it, and could certainly finish the workbook within a week or so if he’s interested.
I’ve loved his reading journey. Several months ago (around April?) he asked us to buy him this set from the clearance racks. We did, and he was very motivated to read and earn stickers and master books. We finished the first level (marked Kindergarten) before Memorial Day, and he did the first few pages of the next book, but then his interest petered out. We’ve let it sit on the shelf all summer, and yesterday he expressed a renewed interest in it. Since he’s ready, and he’s motivated, he’s flying through it now. He was SCREAMING for excitement at being able to read the three books today. I can’t wait to see how far he’ll go.
We played with a marble run, a pirate ship, and his Playmobil soccer set. He watched Robots while I worked on the computer. He played in the rain while I read on the couch and watched him.
We made him a helmet from a water jug and painted it with ALL our colors of paint. (It’s still drying, so you’ll have to wait until tomorrow to see the finished product.) It was a good day.
