Last summer, we started going to a new church. The kids love it there. They have children's church during the regular Sunday morning worship time. The children's church teacher is Jane. She is kind, loves children, and loves Jesus. All of the children love her.
David is a little behind in his schooling. He has dyslexia, a mild astigmatism, and minor hearing loss that he was born with. His falling behind began to weigh heavily on this mama. In September of last year, I felt hopeless and I began to pray for someone to come into our lives who could spend a few hours every week in one on one tutoring with David. I just felt like that was the direction we needed to go. I had no idea who could fill this position.
In early November, seemingly out of the blue, Jane approached me. She said she had heard from a mutual friend that David was struggling and she didn't mean to pry, but she had the strangest feeling that she ought to ask me if she could work with David one on one. I had told the mutual friend that David was struggling, but I had told no one at that church about my desire to find a tutor! I was really excited. She even lives close by! He has been going to her house one day a week ever since.
One of the things she believes in is letting the child's interests lead his learning. She told me she knew that David really loves cats. We have four cats and he talks about them to anyone who will listen. She said, "I love cats, too. I also have shelves and shelves of books about cats. We will start there. I will let him look at them and we will both read through them." Yes, Many of them are children's books because Jane was a teacher!
So they meet and they talk about each other's cats and enjoy a snack. David talks about Goldie, Billy, Nibby, and Alice. Jane talks about Rew, Sam, and Cali. Then they dive into books. They take turns reading pages. She has David write some of the words. She will have him do a puzzle or activity. Then they will continue the routine. The time flies by. She allows him to borrow the cat books he particularly enjoys as long as he brings them back next time.
I am so thankful for her. We just celebrated David's birthday with a trip to a local pottery painting place. David, his two brothers, Jane, and I were the ones who went. Naturally, David painted a cat. Jane asked David to draw a picture of her cats on a plate. She filled the drawing in with paint and had it glazed as a forever keepsake. They may move on to a different subject at some point, but I think it is sweet that the initial connection has been cats.
These photos were taken before the pieces were glazed.
(*This story was written by my daughter, Karen)
(*This story was written by my daughter, Karen)
