I asked him what he wanted to learn. He mentioned cursive and multiplying. We'd just talked about cursive being a fancy way to write stuff because I saw this piece of school work that had come home.
He thought it'd be fun to see what cursive was and try to learn it. So he stayed home one Friday and worked on learning the two things he wanted to learn about. Of course he did get a bit frustrated with the cursive at one point and told me "i'm not learning anything, i'm just writing. Writing isn't learning". Oh boy. But then he started getting it (being left handed he was having trouble starting the letters in the right places). He spent most of the day trying it and he quickly mastered his own name and a few other words. It went a lot better when he traced my copy and then he'd try it on his own.
Then he wanted to do some multiplying. He said he already knew how to do it. I wasn't sure if they've started teaching that in school yet or not, but I was surprised when he knew most of his times tables (1-5 and 10 times tables). WOW. He was giggling and telling me I couldn't stump him. He even wanted to figure out a few of his own math problems he thought up: like a googleplex times a googleplex.
After Lunch he and I took a trip to the bookstore to see if we could find a cursive book and a multiplication workbook. We found a few and he picked out which ones he thought looked best. We spent a bit of time in the children's book section too. When we got home he spent even more time working in his cursive writing book and reading. We even did a times table chart thingy together.
I'm surprised by how much he already knows. I love that he loves to learn new things and be challenged. I just hope I'm able to work with his teacher to help bring that same passion for learning into his classroom.
