The Good Stuff

I wanted to make sure that I write about the good as well as the difficult.  Jubilee was trudging through her homework tonight, she was trying to convince me that it was too much.  I told her if she sat down and did it it would take five minutes.  She asked me to time her.  I did, and what do you know?  It took 5 minutes and two seconds.  I told her I was really proud of how well she was handling school.  I asked her if I could blog about it, and she said yes.

I fully expected her to come home the first day in a funk and need a little time to process the day.  I was way off.  She came home smiling and wanted food just like everyone else.  She asked some questions about assignments that were particularly hard.  She asked me about some of the boys and their eating habits.  I told her that she was welcome to ask the person on lunch duty if they could ask them to eat like gentlemen.  She has asked some questions about behavior and how to handle different situations.  It has been really good.  I have encouraged her to look for the good in people instead of always seeing what is wrong with them.  She will catch herself criticizing someone and then tell me one good thing about them.  She seems to be making an effort to play with people that she doesn't know, and not the one or two people that she is comfortable with.

She listens well and remembers what she has heard.  The first day of school they have a welcome assembly where they explain the expectations for the students.  She picked right up on the fact that the boys are supposed to open the doors for the girls and the girls are to thank them.  She watches the other students and knows when they are keeping the standards and when they are not.  I can trust her to know what the teacher has told her and what the assignment is.

Today she had several things to do after school.  I had to find shoes for a couple of the kids so I didn't get home right away.  We ended up doing homework after dinner.  She was dragging her feet and telling me how tired she was.  I told her we needed to do it, and that if we got to it, it wouldn't take that long.  She really does have a big challenge in learning English at a fourth grade level.  She didn't know how to do cursive, which seems like a  whole new language to her.  We are plugging away and I know that she is catching on very quickly.  I am just so proud of how hard she is working and how diligent she is being in pressing on.  I told her that I wanted to let people know how well she is doing.  She loves to get praise, don't we all?