Dec 08 Mums - happy new year, happy new thread and soon some happy new babies!

[sybilfaulty]

Happy new year!

Sorry for the rubbish title but wanted to get the new thread underway. Let's close the door on some of the sad events of 2011 and look forward to a better year in 2012.

Oh blimey, at least it wasn't my wedding day, that would have been infinitely worse! Although having snooped at both your wedding photos in fb, you both looked beautiful and it was alright on the night

Vaj DH tells me there is lots of snow forecast for the Netherlands (at least the sprout growing part of it) this weekend - he rang me with the 'good news' that because the Dutch can't harvest this weekend, he will be working 12+ hour days for the next 5 days to fill the gap in the market, so great for his sales. My response was along the lines of 'sod your bloody sales, I want to spend time with you, your daughter wants to spend time with you and I am sick of your bloody work'. Oops, having a shrieking harpy for a wife is hardly going to encourage him to spend more time with me

Thinking of your sis and her baby, Spot. Good news on the poo.

ZJ: how rude of your hairdresser! I'm pleased you went somewhere else. And that your DH has realised the error of his ways (despite his strange talk of sprouts and swedes).

No snow here, just cold. NO FAIR. I want snow! Although DS2 thinks that Santa will come back once it starts snowing and has been wrapping presents in anticipation.

Gosh, I haven't been on for ages! I think most of you know I spent last Friday in A&E after my GP sent me there...anyway, the ribs are a bit less sore but this chest infection has laid me quite low. DD1 is much better now but DD2 still has awful cough.

Spot, I was v sorry to hear about your sister and her baby. Sometimes miracles can and do happen. Keep us posted.

ZJ, thank heavens your DH came to his senses about the trip! I had him pegged as quite sensible! And how crummy of your hairdressers to give you the flick at such an important time - so glad you managed to get it done anyway. Heavens, I need a cut! And DD1's hair is down to her waist. Even DD2 has something approaching a bob.

DD2 is coming out with the odd two word sentence. She is such a sweetie. We've had "Where's Octavia?" and "more cheese" and "another yoghurt". You can sense the trend here

And DD1 MAY have cracked the potty thing though she won't go on the loo except the tiddly one at school. She has been wearing pants for the last few days, even at school. It's a miracle!

Rubes, how are you lot - over your ills, and enjoying DH's time off?

And how are you, Jolly - feeling better?

Beans - great news on the exchange, when's the completion date? Is it a bigger house? I have forgotten where it is in comparison to where you are now, remind me. As for DD2 dropping her nap - eek! DD2 still has two naps a day and by hecky, I need them more than she does.

Effie - was so sorry and so cross to hear about your DS1 having a rough time at school at the hands of bullying oiks. I hope you can manage to keep his confidence levels high. Poor baby.

PD, if you are lurking - how is your DS getting on at school now?

Good to see you back, Vag. So what's your possible timescale for a move back home, do you reckon? As for my book - don"t hold your breath, it's only being sent out to another publisher or two. After last time I have no reason to expect anyone to pick it up...

Kayz - so do you have your girl names all picked out just in case?

Indith - you are due before ZJ, aren't you? Hope you are getting through that vile last period ok.

Hey Jam, happy anniversary for the other day. Has your DH started his new job yet? Thanks for saying my picture looked glam - actually I was hugely hungover...DP is a bit better thanks but my goodness, what a slow recovery.

Invis - am pleased you thought that about the Updike, how wonderful. He is such an interesting writer - partly because he has written so many novels and yet they are so so variable. Some are really very duff and some are almost mindbogglingly brilliant. If you liked Couples, Marry Me and of course the Rabbit tetralogy are the other ones in that vein. But I don't mind the duff ones because I respect the fact that he has been genuinely experimental. At the moment I am reading a Graham Greene about Liberia and also The Tent, the Bucket and Me.

I am going to a wedding at Easter. DD1 is going to be a flower girl. I am a bit worried about this as she is very shy and I fear that she won't want to walk up the aisle etc. I have got another stone/6kg I want to shift before then - reckon I can do it in 9 weeks? Actually, my initial target is another 3.5kg and that might actually be doable.

Oh a couple more things -

Aubi - any more thoughts about three nippers?

ZJ - going back to your point about cost of private birth - it;s about £6k for the delivery and hospital stay, plus £5.5k to the consultant for the op and all the appts and then about another £500 for scans and bloods etc. However, a natural delivery is cheaper than a cs and if you have midwife led instead of consultant led it will be cheaper still. I guess also the hospital bit of the bill factors in London prices. So another scenario in another part of the country might cost half that. It is a lot of money but even now, when we are beyond skint, I am glad I did it. I was so fearful of pnd after my sister's experience and I knew I needed to have a birth I could get my head round. How is your DD feeling about the new baby coming?

Oh heck, look at the time.

LadyT I hope you are all on the mend very very soon. I am sure you could lose 3.5kg in 9 weeks if not more.
We have got names sorted for the baby for both girl and boy. I just really want to know which it is.

Do you get any more scans now Kayz?

Yeah I have a 20 week scan Monday, my BIL and SIL to be have booked me a 4D scan for a wedding present to have donw when we are on honeymoon and the MW said I will probably need a growth scan to check on the weight.

I have just spent a whole hour sorting the recycling (ok, it had built up a bit). I am all for conserving precious resources but I hear that quite a lot of it goes in landfill anyway.

Anyway, I am sure you are all thrilled by that little insight

Urrrrgh, so much to do...

X-posted Kayz - ah, well you will no doubt find out on Monday! A 4D scan - how cool, I always fancied one.

Does anyone with older kids have them at schools where they use Jolly Phonics to learn to read? DD1 has started doing them at pre-school but I have to say it seems like such a load of cobblers. I am a great traditionalist in these matters and I think these synthetic systems only help a few children. But they use this system at the school DD1 will be going to as well, so it looks like we are lumbered with it. It pees me off. DP is very much the same. Can anyone convince me it's not too bad after all, or do you share my dislike of this guff?

Not that that's a loaded question or anything

Last one and then I'm gone.

Talking about pre-school - the pre-school committee I am involved with has gone a bit sour, in that there seem to be factions and bitching. It is such a shame. I am trying not to get drawn in but it's all very disappointing tbh. I just think if someone pisses you off, roll your eyes at home about it, don't send round sarky emails and indulge in Chinese Whispers. Or am I unusually saintly? I am obviously in controversial mode today.

They use Jolly Phonics at ds' school. I don't like it much but the phonics system is widely used and is much better than a "look, say" system where children are encouraged to learn to recognise whole words. Once they have the phonemes in place they can sound out pretty much anything by breaking it down.

Of course in reality a combination of both systems tends to happen. Our language is so bloody complicated with letter combinations having a variety of sounds (think OW in Blow and in Cow) and then of course when learning to write so many different ways of making the same sound means you have to learn some words as whole words (how do you know if it is see or sea without learning it? Why does Kite use a magic e on the end to get the eye sound instead of igh?).

I really like the read, write inc system. They have lovely cards with phrases on like "blow the snow" to remember the sounds. I use them a lot to help ds. His school do Jolly Phonics but he is way ahead of where they are in terms of which phonemes he knows. Their reading books are the old ORT ones with Biff, Chip and Kipper which are word recognition not phonics based but as they get to know more sounds start sounding out the words anyway. I do have a set of Songbird readers at home (written by Julia Donaldson, fab) which are phonics based so if ds needs some work on a particular sound we can pick up the book that focuses on that sound.

Don't think dd's nursery do much with the children for literacy which annoys me as dd likes to look at the read, write, inc cards and is learning them well (she demands to be involved when ds is doing his homework so I started doing them with her). If they did stuff at nursery too she would be away.

ZJ glad your dh saw sense for the trip. No not long til interview, it will be a very involved day. Midwifery is very competitive so sadly not a case of having done all the impressing already.

LadyT I think ZJ is due slightly before me.

Still keeping my legs crossed. Getting paranoid about going into labour before the interview. Wish it was tomorrow.

Beans it is all about thermal base layers. Makes such a difference.

Thanks Indith, that's interesting. Yes, I don't think learning whole words is much good either.

I suppose I should be grateful they bother with any form of literacy work at her pre-school, as you say (She needs it as she is interested in letter and words)...I will just have to get used to phonics or else spend the next x years with high blood pressure.

They use phonics at DS1s school too. He seems to be getting on ok with it. But I'm not. He has a list of words he has to learn to read but he struggles with MY as he's never been taught what Y is.

Kayzr you need to group my, by, fly etc together for him and point out that y can have different sounds at the ends of words (and "eye" sound in "my" or an "ee" sound in "baby").

Whole word recognition is not as good as phonics, it really isn't, it just takes time with phonics to get all the building blocks in place. Some children find it wuite easy and others take time to understand the concept of blending and of those squiggles on the paper actually meaning something. It doesn't mean they are going to end up behind or that they are not as clever but if he is confident in his sounds then once it clicks he will be able to read pretty much anything.

I write the keyword lists down and cut them into little flashcards for ds, works better for him than learning them as a list.

They have a book that they've stuck the letters in. It has every letter but Q, U, X, Y and Z. Then he gets sent home with a book about how to make a cake. He reads it brilliantly but can't get MIX as he isn't sure what X is.

He's been taught at school to break it down. So MIX would be M-I-X and then blend the sounds together. So if he does it how they are teaching them he struggles with anything that has one of those letters in.

Can't wait for T to start school! I know it sounds very schoolmarm of me, but i really hate making planes out of toilet rolls and look forward to helping with reading and writing.

Latest from my sis is that she had a scan today and the baby is ok but she has a very low lying placenta that they're worried about (for her sake) so it's still touch and go. But every day they're both still there is a good one. She's at the John Radcliffe in Oxford - an hour and a half from her home, but the nearest place she could go as a an emergency. If there is a chance she's in it for the long haul they're going to look at renting houses in Oxford as it's just not doable from where they are (and her DH works in London). Anyway, that's a long way off.

Lady lovely to see you back, how are your ribs and lungs now? I love that your DD2's first sentences are food-related. Sorry to hear about the preschool bitching, how irritating. Are they asking you to effectively take sides? There was a thread on here recently about joining the PTA, and that was the one thing that kept coming up. Still worth doing though, IMO.

Ooh, pizza's here.

I'm not sure what Jolly Phonics is. DD1 has lots oh phonics lessons but they seem to mainly learn rhymes like Indith's "Blow the Snow" or "How Now Brown Cow". Etc. She still loves phonics lessons even though she reads very well so maybe doesnt need them. Also she learnt to read using ORT which as Indith said, is not a phonics systen.

I think phonics helps with spelling as well as reading. Which brings me to a small boast: DD (youngest of 60 in year one) won the combined year one and two spelling competition. It turns out she loves spelling... Odd child.

Must go, DH is feeling creative so has just produced cauliflower and lime frittarters (sp?) with a yoghurt and coriander sauce. This is either going to be great or really bad.

Great that the baby is still doing ok :)

Kayz are the books the ORT ones with Biff, Chip and company? Sounds like he is having trouble with word recognition/look, say technique (which is fine, lots of kids do, it is a bit of a crap system, hence why schools went back to using phonics) with those books you can encourage breaking down of longer words as the books gets more complicated and you know they have the sounds to do so but otherwise they are supposed to look at the pictures, talk about what is happening and then guess at the words using the start sound as a guide. So if Kipper is mixing a cake then you look the picture, ask him who it is, ask him what he is doing then take a look at the words and the theory is that he should then be able to have a pretty good guess. If it is the book I'm thinking of then "mix" continues to appear with various ingredients so when you look at the picture you are asking him what Kipper is mixing in. At the moment he will NOT have covered all the phonics sounds to be able to read all the words in an ORT book by breaking them down so trying to do so will be confusing. For instance your cake book probably has "flour" in but I bet they have not yet got to "ou", instead he should be looking at the picture, seeing that Kipper is adding flour and working it out from the start sound and the context when it says "Kipper put in flour" or whatever it says.

He will already be doing some whole word recognition, when he learned his name that was recognition. Reading the word "cake" in his book was probably recognition using the picture because he probably hasn't got to learning about magic e on the end of words yet affecting the vowel sound (so that the "a" in cake is an "ay" and not as in "cat"). I think it is hard supporting them as parents because schools are not always very communicative about which sounds they have done and about how we are supposed to do their reading with them. The ORT books baffled me for quite a while and I probably had ds' teacher rolling her eyes at me, we had an exchange of comments in the reading diary as she explained that he shouldn't be breaking words down but learning to recognise them .

The books don't seem to be from a set. He is on the pink shelf and the national average for the end of reception is to be on the lilac shelf. This was a cartoon sort of book about making a birthday cake and the one before that was a kids national geographic book about weather. It seems very hit and miss.

He does really enjoy his reading. He hates writing. I just worry lots as some of the children in his class are on the shelf that isn't usually used until year 1.

Well done your dd Arti!

There are lots of different phonics systems around. All use the same basic phonemes of course but teach them in different ways. Jolly phonics is the one with the crappy hand signs for each phoneme. Then it throws all the vowel sounds at them on one big pile with not much help . I like Read, Write, Inc flashcards because of the rhymes on them, learning the sounds within words makes so much more sense. The school in our village I didn't want ds to go to for various reasons uses Read, Write Inc and they say since they swapped onto that from Jolly Phonics a couple of years ago spelling has improved a LOT. I can understand how. Eg, ds wanted to write "mouse" the other day and asked me how to write the middle sound, was it "ou" or "ow"? With Jolly Phonics there would be no way of telling him other than giving him the answer but because we use Read, Write Inc at home I just had to say "shout it out" which is the rhyme on the "ou" card and he knew.

Sounds a bit rubbish Kayz, could you ask the teacher to go through their system with you? Just say that he seems a bit confised to you and you want to know how best to support him at home? Or maybe just get a set of the Songbird books which are phonics based and work up in complexity as you add sounds and read those at home with him.

You've convinced me, Indith. I am going to get her some Read, Write, Inc cards. Jolly fookin' Phonics gives me the pip. I find it confusing myself, let alone DD1. When we are at home she just likes to spell out the letters in the normal fashion in books then I try to get her to roll them together or she guesses from the pictures. Also she loves to spot the letter O or the letter D in any words, for her and her sister's names. While she is interested I am happy to explore it with her.

Spot, that's tentative good news - the JR is supposed to be v good for that sort of thing. The ribs are better, thanks. I am still coughing but because I am coughing a lot less, I am much less inflamed around my rib injury so it's less painful. I saw that thread, yep. I like almost everybody, but people generally seem to get the hump with each other a lot over sod all and there are definite bands of people, representatives of whom try to nobble me at drop off or pick up to tell me the latest and ask "what I think about it" etc. I have to be a bit careful as I will probably be seeing this people for years, and I would like my girls to be pals with them and I have so enjoyed the odd little social event myself. I just wish they'd all chill out. Have you met anyone in your village yet?

Arti, those frittatas sound gorgeous! And how brilliant of your DD1.

Haven't finished but supper's ready...