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@ALV91711: He has to save a small amount in "share" which he's going to use to buy his little brother a Christmas present. The rest, I ask him to split into "save" and "spend", but he's been just putting it all into "save" to save up for stuff, which I think is the right lesson I want to be teaching, haha. I don't know what I'm doing.
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@Adira: That sounds like a good way to do it. I like that he has to buy a gift for his brother with his money. Does he have to do anything to earn his allowance or does he just get it?
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@ALV91711: No, he just gets it. He does have chores that he does though - I didn't want to tie chores to his allowance because I wanted him to know you just have to do chores as being part of a family. And the allowance is more to teach him about money.
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@Adira: smart. We don’t do allowance but Isaac has certain chores he has to do or help with. Then he can earn money by doing extra. Over the summer he did things to earn money to save up $12 for something he wanted.
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We keep trying to implement an allowance but keep forgetting and we never have cash around LOL I'm struggling with the idea of tying it to doing certain things, because I kind of want her to think about earning money the way we do - by working - but I also agree @adira, I don't want to tie it to chores and stuff because that should be done anyway.
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@Mrs. Carrot: I'm kind of toying with the idea of tying it to school somehow. I started it right when he started school, and I plan to increase it each year as he increases in grades, because school is kind of like his job. But I'm not sure how to really tie it into how well he does, etc. Maybe if he did so poorly he was suspended/dropped-out, he'd stop getting the allowance?? Or if he had to repeat a grade, he wouldn't get an allowance increase (similar to a job where if you do poorly you don't get a merit increase)? I haven't spelled it out to him though because I'm not entirely sure how I want to do it, if at all.
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HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone!
I just saw the allowance discussion now. We pay B a weekly allowance of 1 EUR. We don't tie it to anything as I strongly believe that an intrinsic motivation to do chores or be good in school is better than a "I do it for the money" approach. So while we do talk about what he wants to buy with his money we do not interfere too much. I also read somewhere that some kids just get a bigger pleasure by saving for something big whereas others like to buy multiple smaller things. So far he has bought himself some small things but saves most of his money.
I find it helpful to have a specific day set out on which we pay the allowance that way I can make sure to have the right amount of cash around and B reminds me it is time for his "pocket money".
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@Pumuckl: We basically do the same thing. Allowance day is Sunday (although he usually gets it on Monday because I forget, haha). Xander really likes spending his money, but does tend to save up for slightly larger things, rather than buying $1-$2 items. And if he doesn't have something that he REALLY wants, he tends to just save all his money until something comes up.
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@Adira: Yes same here, I think he'll probably get himself a LEGO set or something in the future. We shall see. I remember my fist big spend was flowers for my mum and a gameboy
So we'll see what he comes up with.
Do you give Logan an allowance? I don't give J one yet but sometimes it gets tricky, when she wants something that I have no interest in buying for her and we'd make B buy it for himself but at just about 4 years old I am not sure she could handle it yet... -
@Pumuckl: Nope, no allowance for Logan. But he's a big saver as far as I can tell! He has money from previous Christmases and Birthdays, and he just never really wants to spend much of it. When we go look at toys, he buys himself one or two Hot Wheels cars and that's it! So even though he doesn't get an allowance, he still has plenty of money, haha.
I plan to start him on an allowance the same time I did Xander - the summer before he starts Kindergarten.
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@Pumuckl: Happy New Year!
@Adira: How much do you give him each week?
We haven’t been doing allowance but give him opportunities to earn money by doing extra things around the house. There are certain chores he has to help with but he can so others for money. It has been a while since he has done anything though. This summer he was really into it but then bought what he saved for and sort if stopped.
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@ALV91711: We give him $2.50 a week. $0.50 automatically goes into his "Share" bucket and that he'll use to buy Logan gifts for Christmas. Then I ask him to put $1 in "Save" to save up for bigger items. And the last $1, he can put into "Spend" or "Save". So if he wants to buy $1 of candy every week or a Hot Wheels car every week, he could. He usually just puts $2 in "Save" though and buys bigger items as he accumulates enough.
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@Adira: I love that he has to put money in share. That is such a great idea.
So far in 1 week he’s done extra chores to earn $6. But now he’s feeling kind of sick and hasn’t asked to do anything. DH is going to give him $5 to help take in the empties. Lucky kid.
How is kindergarten going for everyone? Isaac loves it! He is excited to go every day. It is amazing everything that he learns.
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@ALV91711: I do love that the kids are starting to see money as a motivator, haha! That's why I went into Engineering!
Xander LOVES Kindergarten! He's made a bunch of friends and just seems to be having so much fun! I do think he's getting tired though. He gets excited when he has a three-day weekend coming up, haha.
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@Adira: Isaac has started to say some days he doesn’t want to go to school. He also isn’t feeling 100% so I hope that’s why. I think only having 4 half days and being home helps though. But I do have him in swim lessons on his off day to keep him busy.
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How is everyone doing? We have the first birthdays coming up this month right?
We'll see we what theme B decides on this time... Last year we had a ninjago party but first I still have to schedule J's birthday which was last month but we still need to do the friend party. (Her birthday is 1/10 so NOBODY is in the mood for another party, so we usually push it to february).
B is also really excited about school and is really interested in the different subjects. I think so far he has a really broad interest in music, math, sports, science and arts. I think that's a good thing and will probably make him less prone to boredom which he totally doesn't handle well. That was the one feedback we received where I don't really know what to do: He seems to have trouble concentrating when he has nothing to do physically (like no pen/paper etc). Not really sure how to foster this except for letting him get older? What we did now was that his teacher has a little crochet animal that he gets to keep his hands busy. Does one of you ladies have any ideas what we could do to support him?
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@Pumuckl: Xander's birthday is at the end of the month, but we won't get a chance to celebrate until mid-March. I haven't asked him about a theme, but I'm guessing it's going to be Pokemon because he's OBSESSED!
I don't have any advice on helping them to pay attention. Xander got the same exact feedback. I'm hoping it's more an age thing than anything else and hoping time will help...
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@Pumuckl: I can’t believe that we will have 6 year olds soon! I don’t have ideas on the boredom, I really think it is the age. I know at home Isaac barely sits still, he can barely sit at the table through dinner.
We are not going to do a party with friends this year. His bday is a couple Fay’s before spring break and I’m taking the boys to see my family. We are going to do a party with his cousins at my moms house. We are loosely doing a superhero theme. He told me he’d like a piñata and to play outside.
It doesn’t seem like anyone is doing party’s in his kindergarten. Either that or he’s not invited. He got invited to one in December and that is it.
@Adira: Isaac is just starting to get into Pokémon.
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@ALV91711: We JUST got invited to our first Kindergarten birthday (and it's during our cruise, so we're going to miss it). I think it's less common because these kids barely know each other. I remember when I was growing up, 1st grade parties was more a thing.
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Hi everyone!
Yes, it's crazy to me that these kids are six and that we've been connecting on this HB thread for almost 7 years! How time flies!
Peter is very into sports, especially basketball and soccer. He decided to have his birthday at a local basketball game. At first, I checked ticket prices for the NY Knicks at MSG but they were like $90/ticket. No thanks! Plus, I couldn't quite imagine how I would wrangle 10 six year olds through NYC and MSG. Then, I found out about this other option. It's a team called the Westchester Knicks and they play about 15 minutes from out house. I think they are a farm team for the NY Knicks, not sure. For $25/kid, we were able to get third row seats to a 2pm game, goodie bags that include and tee shirt and foam finger, and a hot dog, french fry, soda lunch for each kid. During half time, they are giving us a little party room to sing and have cake. We invited 7 kids and I think it will be a very affordable but fun birthday party! The only catch is that there are no March home games in the afternoon, so his party will be almost a month before his actual birthday. He doesn't seem to mind though!
Kindergarten has been going surprisingly well. He seems happy and likes going to school each day. At his conference, his teacher said, "He's like the mayor of Kindergarten. All the kids sit around him during snack time while he puts on a slapstick comedy routine." Umm, I have never seen this comedy routine and I have no idea where he gets his jokes from!
I think it's very common for Kindergarten boys to have trouble focusing all day, especially since school has become more academic and structured. I'm not really sure that there's much you can do at home. I really wish public education would swing back in the direction of a more play-based curriculum.
What kinds of after school and weekend activities does everyone participate in? Right now he plays soccer on Saturday mornings in the fall and spring. I want him to take swimming lessons and music lessons and art classes and tennis lessons. There are all these skills and hobbies that I want him to get exposed to, yet I also cherish our free family time and his play time. How do people fit it all in?
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@QueensBee: That birthday party sounds AMAZING!!!!! I bet everyone will have a blast!
As for extra-curriculars, we aren't doing very much. We did gymnastics September-December because the kids were loving it, but we're currently taking a break from that. Probably in March we'll start back up again and either do gymnastics or a sport (depending on interest). And we'll do swimming May-August. We're also doing Cub Scouts, but that's only every other week on Wednesdays. All other activities are on the weekend. I suspect we'll add more things as time goes on, but I don't want our schedule to be too busy...
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@QueensBee: That sounds like such a fun party! The kids will have fun.
Isaac is in bowling on Saturday mornings and swimming Thursday afternoons (he doesn’t have school Thursdays). Bowling ends in May. His swimming ends mid March. He wants to do swimming again and the next 10 week session starts in April. He really isn’t interested in doing any sports so for now we aren’t doing any. Since I’ll be home this summer I want to put him in a couple day camps.
I’m with you in that I don’t want to over schedule. We need family time and he needs time to just play.
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Hey ladies,
thanks so much for your feedback. So glad to hear most of the little guys seem to have trouble with sitting still and it isn't just B.As to extra curriculars, he has done swim lessons in the past but that was always a huge fit so for now we are skipping them. I hope that by summer he is more willing to go again. His daycare teachers have suggested we start him on a contact sport (karate, judo etc.) because he is just so strong that often times he has no idea that he is actually really hurting someone when he is just playing around and being silly. So I hope he'll like the judo class. He does want to try tennis as his dad plays but we'll probably not do that until 7 or so. Art & music he is exposed to at school and unless he himself states that he wants to do more we'll skip. His school offers some ext. cur. and he plays handball in his after care hours once a week. I like that it's basically within his school hours and we don't miss any family time and he still gets to partake
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@Pumuckl: Thatbis awesome that he can do activities during his after school care.
Starting in grade 1 Isaac will be able to get involved in school activities/clubs if he chooses. I really hope that he will.
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Hi everyone, it has definitely been a while. Just thought I’d check in and see how everyone is doing. It is hard to believe that we are at the end of kindergarten! How did all the kids do and any plans for the summer?
This has been such a crazy year for us. Isaac has done so well in kinder and is speaking French so well. He has two weeks left to go. He has been such an amazing big brother. The baby is 9 months already and Isaac has a lot of fun playing with him.
I’m taking the boys away to see my family for about 9 days at the beginning of July. Isaaccis doing daily swim lessons for two weeks in the middle. We are hoping to go on a couple camping trips but are going to start with one night and see how it goes. I don’t go back to work until September so we have plans of going to the outdoor pool, zoo, some splash parks we haven’t been to and hopefully check out a couple festivals. It is looking to be a fun and busy summer.
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@ALV91711: Awww, what a nice update! I can't believe Baby Brother is 9 months already!!! That FLEW by!!
School ended last week for us, so today is Xander's first day of "camp" at our local YMCA. I'm soooooooo nervous for him! I HATE change! I know it'll probably be fine and he'll have a good time, but I just feel terrible that he has to do something new AGAIN and we don't know anyone that's going to the Y this summer. At least this will be our last "new" thing for a while!!!
Xander loved Kindergarten! He did really well, though he definitely struggled with staying focused, especially towards the end of the year. His last Report Card basically said "Need improvement" when it came to all "focus" related items. Oh well. Xander's worried that none of his friends will be in his class in First Grade. I'm hoping at least 1 of them will be, but we won't find out until the end of August.
No real big plans for the summer. We're hopefully at some point going to visit my grandparents in northern Vermont (about a 3 hour drive) because I haven't seen them in years and they are getting pretty elderly at this point... Otherwise, hopefully some playdates with Kindergarten friends and a lot of just chilling at home!
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@Adira: I know, this year has gone by crazy fast!
How did the first day of camp go? Is he doing this instead of daycare?
I think after 10 months of school and being 6 focus would be hard by the end of the year. Isaac's class has been outside playing at the end of the day almost every day now. They have lots of outdoor time planned in the last couple weeks, probably because how do you get them to stay still and do work?
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@ALV91711: The first day of camp went well! He made a friend and it sounds like he had fun. They bus to a local park in the morning and play games at the park, then back to the Y for a snack and other activities, then lunch, and then an hour of swimming in the afternoon. I think he'll like it!
We were going to just do the daycare so that Xander and Logan would be going to the same place this summer, but our daycare determined they could no longer support school-aged kids because the Preschool & Pre-K classes are so big this year. So this summer sucks because our daycare is on one side of town and the Y is on the other, but next year we'll send Logan to the Y as well I think.
That's awesome that your school has so much outdoor time! I wish ours had more. It's so tough to be in classrooms most of the day, especially when it's so nice out now.
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I love reading the updates on the Spring 13 kids
We were traveling in the US and just got back to Europe and I didn't want to post an update from my phone – I know totally oldschool B has done really well in what you guys would call Kindergarten. While he still has some social issues because he often is still very “hands-on” and playful a lot is due to the fact that he is one of the youngest of his class. (Kids here are 08/2012-07/2013 in his class). I really hope he’ll catch up to that so that he doesn’t end up as an outsider. His class will move on as is to 1st grade. Much like Isaac learnt French in school, B is learning English in school. I do try to speak English at home with the kids but our main language is definitely German.
Luckily our school offers activities during most of the summer holidays. They are 6 weeks long here and for 4 of those weeks he can just do activities in school. For the two weeks off my mum will take care of him for one week and he’ll go on a multi-day hiking/trekking trip with DH on the other week. I just hope the weather will be nice.
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@Adira: Hope camp is still going well. What a pain to have to do drop offs so far from each other. If your daycare isn’t taking school age kids what are you going to do for before and after school care for grade 1.
This last week Isaac’s class has visited a couple of the grade one classes. His big takeaway was that there aren’t centres to play at and there are spread boys/girls washrooms.
@Pumuckl: That is awesome that school has activities for most of the break. That definitely makes things easier for you. That hike sounds fun. That is interesting that he is one of the youngest in his class, the way the cutoff is here Isaac is one of the oldest. One of his classmates turned 5 less than a month befor he turned 6.
Our summer break is about 9 weeks. I’m glad I’ll be home this summer but I just have to figure out what activities we are going to do to fill our days. Hopefully we will get some play time with a couple of the kids who’s moms stay home.
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@ALV91711: Oh, we weren't using our daycare for before/after care anyway. I changed my schedule so I could get out of work at 2:00 so I can do pick-up, and my husband just goes in a little later so he can do drop-off.
How's Isaac feel about going into 1st grade? Xander's not really looking forward to it because he's heard there is homework and he's worried his best friend won't be in the same class as him. I'm not sure how many 1st grade classes there are, but I assume it's 3 like Kindergarten.
@Pumuckl: That's pretty cool your school offers activities! I think ours does too in July, but it's only for a few hours each day, so it doesn't work for us since we need all-day care.
I think our summer break this year is 11 weeks, which is pretty good. We actually got really lucky with the snow this year so the school year didn't extend at all and ended on time (which almost NEVER happens).
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@Adira: That is good, save a bit of money too that way. Isaac seems excited for grade 1. They have gone to a couple of the grade 1 classes over the last week. He commented how there were no centres to play at. I’m not sure how many grade 1 classes there will be but there were 4 kindergarten classes this year. We have been talking about how he might be in a class with other kids and that is ok, he will see all his friends at recess and lunch. In a way I guess we are lucky he doesn’t have a best friend so we don’t have to worry about him getting split up from them.
I have to go back to work in September and I’m not really looking forward to it. I’m hoping they will let me decrease my hours when I go back so that I can drop Isaac off. They start early, 8:07am and he will be taking the bus from daycare but we will see once we get the bus schedule, if it is too early I’ll either change my hours or hope they will agree to a decrease!
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Well hello Ladies,
how's summer life for you going? We have been back to school for a week not, so I now officially parent a 1st grader. Not sure how that happened. He's been really difficult in the last couple of weeks since he's striving for independence so much, like wanting to walk to and from school by himself and just not sticking to rules around the house. On the other hand, he is the best somedays when all of a sudden you find him cleaning up the toys in the living room by himself and sorting through everything. So, it's pretty challenging to not lose my cool some days but mostly it's also great to see him be so self-assured in his abilities. -
@Pumuckl: Hello! How did our babies get so big so fast?! Do you guys walk to school? How far is it? How old do you think you will let him walk on his own?
School starts Sept 3 and I go back to work on the 10th. We are just trying to enjoy the last couple weeks of being home together. My mom is coming out for a few days this week to celebrate babies first birthday. This year has gone by so fast!
Isaac is excited for grade 1! I’m going to be dropping him off at school and he will be taking the bus after to daycare.
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@ALV91711: Well technically I guess he could walk but it is really busy streets and it's quite a way so he would have to leave pretty early. What he will get to do is walk home from school to his dad's office which is like a 5-10 minute walk but for now he still needs to practice his traffic awareness skills and he needs to fully learn how to read the clock because him leaving at 3:30pm would skrew my DH's day up pretty badly
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@Pumuckl: I wouldn’t wanting him walking alone on busy streets. That would be too scary. I feel like Isaac knows his road safety but to actually see him use it when we are out walking is almost non existant.
So we'll see what he comes up with.
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