the early years

Josh held his head up from a very early age (at about a week).  He wasn't like most babies, content to be laying down.  He wanted to be in an upright position most of the time.  When he laid on his stomach, he constantly spit up.  Josh never crawled much.  By 9 1/2 months, he was walking alone.  As a mother, I thought these milestones were good.

Josh was a happy baby and very loving.  He was a late talker, like his brother.  Once he He has always been clumsy, but adventuresome.  Josh never expressed a lot of interest in learning his abcs or numbers.  We couldn't afford to send him to preschool, and I regret that.

In November of Josh's Kindergarten year at a private school, I remember reviewing the color words and sight words, and Josh  would tell me that he didn't want to go to school.  As a mother, it tugged at my heart because I felt Josh was behind the other children.  His teacher held a conference with us, and we learned that Josh was behind the others.  We worked with him, but it continued being a struggle.

Josh's first grade teacher was a first year teacher, and we struggled throughout the year.  We started second grade, and I just knew it would be better year because Mrs. Shular was admired by kids and parents.  I talked in length with her on many occasions, and she worked with Josh individually many, many times.  I still have the Emails that Mrs. Shular and I shared.  When I asked Mrs. Shular if we should hold Josh back to second grade again, she said that if we worked with Josh he might be okay for third grade.   We worked with him, but Josh didn't always retain the information that we tried to teach him.

We moved at the end of third grade year into a neighborhood with 5 other boys within three to four years of each others ages.  Josh was happy and content with the new neighborhood and friendships.  

Third grade...a very frustrating year.  We still were at the private school and had another first year teacher who was introverted and didn't always give the information to parents that was needed.  This by far was the worst year.  Josh never talked about this teacher like he did his others, and many of the parents were unhappy so I thought our test scores might be in part due to the teacher.  His standardized testing was below grade level for all years to this point.

to be continued...