Those of you on my fb already had to hear about this. Sorry.

[lisamoe]

Last year Jesse was involved in a pilot project at Clark Theatre that was 5 short plays written, directed, teched, and acted by teens. He acted in three of the five plays and had a great time. The project was a big success so this year they decided to do it again. Jesse worked pretty hard and this year he entered his own script for a one-act play called "Narrators." They had more scripts submitted this year than past year, but Jesse's was one of the 5 that were chosen.

I was surprised, but incredibly proud, because all the other plays were written by kids at least 2 years older than Jesse, some of whom have been writing for a long time. Honestly, Jesse could barely READ fluently three years ago and getting him to write ANYTHING was like pulling teeth, so we largely didn't push it, not wanting to ruin his future enjoyment of literature by nagging, and figuring that sometime he would find something that would inspire him to read and write for fun. It seems to have succeeded, because at the age of 13, he is reading his way through Shakespeare and discussing it intelligently, writing scripts for humorous little youtube movies, and is having a serious play he wrote produced for 4 performances this summer. (Hit me up for ticket info if you want to see for yourself.)

So not only am I happy and proud of Jesse, I'm happy and proud that we (most of the credit to my mom!) didn't make reading and writing a chore. Sure, he was a couple of years behind for a while and I had to endure a few years hearing about how everyone else's 4 year-old was reading Dostoevsky , but he seems to have caught up when he needed to, which is exactly how this homeschooling thing is supposed to work. :-)

Comments

[anathemad.livejournal.com]

News this good is worth hearing twice :D

[tura.livejournal.com]

Where are these so-called "you-tube movies"???
I'll show you mine...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1Q-OnunJwM

(I did all of the special effects for it - maybe someday I'll get to work on one of Jack's movies)

[angel-ent.livejournal.com]

lol - 4yr old's reading such heavy lit? Umm, more like those kids on the advertisement "Reading for Babies" They don't have a clue what the words mean or any real comprehension - just reading the words!

[lisamoe.livejournal.com]

Ok, that was an exaggeration, but I did have to hear an awful lot about how well everyone's kids could read chapter books when they were 4. I believe them, but I also don't really believe that my kids need to be on their kid's timetable. It was a big issue in Campfire, when there were several girls in Jesse's age group that were early readers and the boys were apparently stupid and holding the whole group back or some such by their refusal to get reading proficiently by 2nd grade.

I really think it's worse with homeschool moms. They mostly are good at reading and language arts themselves so that's what they teach and what they really value, and most of them aren't as clear on the need for advanced math skills or science knowledge so my boys came across to them as somehow deficient, rather than being seen as advanced in a different area. Sigh.

Anyway, I guess he's caught up now. :-)