Those with ones turning 5...

Ok so Hannah will be 5 at Christmas. I think she has all her consonants now and most of her doubles. There's only one that comes to mind... but I've forgotten which one *rolls eyes*.

She also hates to write. I'm trying to leave it until next year so she doesn't feel pressured to. I'm guessing it is a fine motor skills kind of thing because she mostly just hates the proper pen-hold, rather than writing itself. Anyhow she can write Hannah and Bria and things like To Mum I love you... but since she doesn't like doing the pen-hold I haven't taught her how to form her letters properly. So it's H, o with a stick upwards, N with the diagonal the opposite way, and yes the last letter of her name is H not h Other letters are a mix of capitals and lowercase but what she writes is readable. (She learned "I love you" from copying a Barney book.)

She is very good at reading though, and will try to sound out words. Stream would end up as something like seat-im because she splits up double consonants when sounding. But right after learning "wait" she figured out "wailing" so she has a good grasp on how the letters work, generally speaking.

Hannah can also count well past 100, I don't actually know what up to anymore because 100 is a lot to listen to LOL

Charlotte is 5 in March. Shes been at Nursery from quite a young age and they do quite structured learning with low teacher to child ratios (was 4:1 now its 6:1)- she can recognise and write all the letters in the alphabet in lower case in what they call 'curly' writing (so with the joining links on each letter). They taught them the pincher grip during first term last year and once she had that her writing came along in leaps and bounds. She can write anything as long as she knows what letters to use- as well as the usual stuff off the top of her head, Mum, Dad, Charlotte, Kate, Grammy, Poppa, Love etc plus Space and Dog for some reason

Language is really good- no problems at all.

Shes at reading level 2 now so can read things along the lines of "Kipper ran. Kipper got a banana. Mum ran. She got an apple. Biff and Chip ran. They got an orange. Dad ran. Oh no! Dad fell. Dad got a rubber duck." They have 10 minutes one on one reading time with a teacher each day- plus they bring home word lists and reading books. They learn 2 styles- one sounding out the words and the other is recognising a word on sight (for words like 'one' which you can't sound out).

They haven't had a huge focus on numbers really- she can count upwards of 100. Can do simple addition and subtraction and and write 1-20 on her own- still needs a bit of help above that though.

She can also count to 10 in french, say quite a few simple phrases like hello, good bye, my name is... and sing a few songs. She knows the life cycle of a frog, butterfly etc and all these random little facts about the world- she constantly amazes me with the things she knows.

To be honest shes a clever wee thing but alot of it is down to the excellent teachers at the school she goes to. I mean we pay ALOT of money to send her but its amazing how much she is learning there.

jack will be 5 in august

his speech is brilliant, no worries there. can't seem to get him to shut up sometimes

he knows the alphabet and can recognise letters when he sees them, but he can't write them yet. he can count to 15 (i think) and also knows numbers to look at, but not to write.

he loves outdoors, mostly zooming around on his ride on or playing on the swings, sandpit etc   we've been trying to get him to ride his bike properly, but he pedals forwards until the other foot gets to the top, then he pedals backwards to start again.......if that makes sense! his bike doesn't have brakes on the pedals so it kinda 'free-spins' when you pedal backwards

he loves 'reading' books which is really looking at them and making the story up   loves to sing songs to himself, but goes all silly when you ask him to sing it to you   it's so cute

his latest fave thing to do is play games on the computer. mostly at mickeymouse clubhouse website. we got him some reading/phonics computer disks for his birthday and he likes to have a go. but they are abit advanced for him at the moment.

i have his name down at one school for next year, have to wait and see how that goes by ballot. have 2 other schools for backup which i'm in the process of getting info from such a horrible thought!!!

Brae will be 5 on 24th Dec 09 so starting school Jan 2010

His speech is getting better by the week, pronouciation of L still isnt clear. Knows how to sing the alphabet, can recognise most letters individually. Can recognise some lower/upper case sets. Can recognise & write his name, mum dad etc. Lovesto draw cut & glue
Likes to make up stories, play pretend & sing & dance
Can count to 15, knows shapes, colours & basic time concepts ie the hour & half past.
Loves transport & can name machinery better than i can
Loves outdoors, water, growth, birds, insects- science i guess. Knws what nocternal means, names of different birds/ insects knows about their habitats, knows the water cycle & weather patterens