June was a month full of busy fun days! Okay, fun for me might not fit the description of fun for others, so let me tell you about some of the events from my June.
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| OG Trainees |
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| Myles and I working |
Shortly after returning from our trip to DC, I attended a 9 day workshop on Multi-sensory reading instruction in mid-June. Although I was really exhausted by the end of the session, I truly enjoyed attending each day. For 2 hours each morning my friend Myles (who is going into 1st grade) came to help me learn new things about teaching young kids to read. He worked hard, learned quickly, and kept me laughing with his comments! I really get high on figuring out what is keeping a kid from learning and then showing them how to get past it. For Myles, he had gotten the idea that he needed to "sound out" all words rather than just know some. (He told me right away that he was a good sounder! He also said, "My brother has lots of words in his head, but me only one or two." ) So try to sound out "THE" and see where it gets you!
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| Note the squirmy worm, also a gift from Myles |
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| Myles brought me an audio thank you | card that cracked us both up! |
He went from 4 words on his pretest to 23 on his post-test after 5 days of tutoring, so we were both pretty proud of that! He even commented that he had learned more in our 2 weeks than he did in all of kindergarten! Not true, but his feeling of success changed just that much. I don't think reading is going to give him any trouble once school starts.
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| yep, that would be Myles with the weapon! |
I didn't spend all my time in workshops though. The gals that I teach with at IXL gathered for a pool party, so I was able to finagle my schedule to get there for a couple of hours.
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| The twins were there but I played with my older buddies! |
I enjoyed visiting with everyone (especially Pam who moved to Ohio in December but came back to host the party at her parent's home) and playing with the kids in the pool.
Then I made it to a few sports activities for some of my little buddies. Babysitting for Amy's twins helped her out and gave me a peaceful way to spend an evening or two!
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| Miss Gracie, aka Miss Spit! |
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| Amy's Brody is headed for home! |
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| Megan's Chloe is a competitive swimmer! |
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| Reading Addison' birthday book with her as we wait for Chloe to swim |
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| Miss Maleigh smiling so big at 10 weeks! |
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| Meg's Addison entertains wherever she goes! |
Alyssa & family moved to a new house, so that gave me the opportunity to spend time with her kids + Jen G's Hunter, while others helped with the heavy lifting.
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| Ayden and I tired out before the big boys did. |
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| It was cooler on the trail than the playground. |
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Throw in a family gathering at the lake for a bonus (see prior post)! June 2011- busy but grand!
Government buildings at Victoria
Each year we try to take at least one trip with our good friends, Dwight and Jeanie Shoup. July 2011 found us on Vancouver Island, B.C. We visited Victoria, taking in the government buildings and the history museum. We also visited Butchart Gardens and took in some mellow music in the cool of the evening.
Two whaling trips gave us several whale sightings, gray whales on the west side and killer whales off of the east side. 
