Apple's New Obsession

So, Apple is adjusting... adjusting to being a big sister, adjusting to baby cries, adjusting to not being the center of attention any longer. She is doing remarkably well, but it is still an adjustment. So, hubby and I try really hard to spend some one on one time with her every day. Right now, it's pretty easy, because the baby sleeps so much. I imagine, it will be more and more difficult the older he gets. We will figure it out.

So, she has really started liking word finds. You know, those puzzles that your teachers gave you in school as busy work? Lots of letters in a grid and you have to search for words in the letters. She is getting pretty good at it now. We do a puzzle at night before bed.

Over the weekend, she watched Akeelah and the Bee on the Disney channel. For those of you who did not catch it, it's about an 11 year old little girl from an inner city school district working her way up to the national spelling bee and winning. Apple is infatuated with this movie. We have actually watched it every day since it first came on. Over the weekend, she kept asking, "Give me a word to spell..." And we would. It was fun and challenging for her. (spelling isn't her strength)

Last night, she was working on her word search and finding word after word. The strange thing was these were big words. She could read them, but she didn't know what they meant... words like adjourn, parliament, approve.

So, I said, "You are doing so well with the word searches, we should add something else to it."
She said, "What do you mean?"
"Well, wouldn't it be neat if we had a dictionary and you could look up the words you don't know the meanings of and learn what they are?"
(Her eyes lit up.)
"Yeah! You have a dictionary in your room, right?"

She was right. I did have a dictionary in my room, but it is from 1952!! It was a dictionary my dad had when he was in school!! But, it was a Junior dictionary and it had definitions and sentences using the words. It was perfect, for now.

We pulled out the dictionary and I started to show her how to look up a word. (I forgot about all the alphabetization involved in this process.) I barely got started explaining it to her and she stopped me...

"Mom, I've already had a lesson on guide words. I know how to do this."

So, I watched...

The word she was looking for was 'adjourn'.

Sure enough, she turned to the A's... flipped the pages until she found which page the word was on based on the guide words at the top of the page... she searched the list of words, found adjourn, and read me the definition. WHO KNEW!?!?

So, I'm on the hunt for a terrific elementary dictionary... apparently, she likes words much more than I knew!!