Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

Wednesday nights are a challenge around here. The girls' school sends home "Wednesday Folders". Inside the folders are newsletters, completed assignments, parenting tips, fundraising forms, and homework. Usually it's just a couple of pages, but when you multiply that by three, it adds up. Tonight we had handwriting, math and more math. Mary told me on a previous Wednesday night that she likes "word" homework way more than "number" homework. Sorry, kid, I think you got that from me. I couldn't agree more. The frustration tonight began upon opening the Wednesday Folder. One of Mary's math pages was different from Laura's. I put on my best teacher voice and gave the speech about how it's not about easier or harder. It's about different: what each brain needs to learn. Blah, blah, blah. I don't think they bought it. Anyway, Mary's page involved subtraction using a number line. It wasn't clicking. Diana tried hard by making these nifty "fact family" charts. I thought they were cool, but it still wasn't clicking for Mary. I opened the art drawer to find something to use as manipulatives. I was looking for beads or something like that which she could use to do the subtraction problems. What I found easily was a little baggie of googly eyes. You know the little white ones with the black wiggly pupils that you glue on crafty things that need eyes? Perfect, I thought. So I dumped them out and modeled for Mary how to use them to subtract. That worked and she went off on her own to finish while I helped Laura with her "not harder, just different" paper. I could hear Mary talking away to herself while she worked on her subtraction. Eventually I realized it wasn't math she was talking about. I think it was, "and the Mom flew off to Tennessee leaving the children and the dad at home" that caught my attention. In the, oh, 12 or so seconds since I had turned my back, Mary had turned the pile of googly eyes into a family and was creating a whole story around them. Tennessee?? I had to laugh out loud. Mary's response to me asking her what she was doing? "I made them into a story, Mama." What can I say. The child has wanted to be an author since she was two. And, she likes word homework way better than numbers.