Differences

Having more than one boy sure helps prove that even though you come from the same gene pool, you can be SO completely different. Riley and Liam have been pretty much opposites right from the beginning. They look different than eachother, they have very different personalities, tastes, love languages, interests, hobbies, etc. It couldn't have been more obvious that when I read their report cards yesterday. The areas where Liam excelled were the areas that Riley struggles in and vice versa.
I must say that it has been nice to have a "keener" on my hands with Liam. He LOVES to learn and do "school" at home. He will sit down and do worksheets, puzzles, math quizzes etc. all morning if you are there to watch! He has all of the sudden taken to math and can add any numbers to ten and is learning some multiples of 10 etc. He is a bit of a perfectionist and will erase his writing over and over til it is just right.
His brother does not like to do anything that requires him to sit and concentrate. He does not like to read or write and definitely learns best through playing. He is not self motivated and does not pride himself on being neat or being right. He is just there for the experience and the fun and when he is bored, he is done. I found this out pretty early on in his life as we struggled through piano lessons, crafts, homework and chores. He is so tricky to motivate and help stay on task, that I knew I would die if I ever had to homeschool him! His teacher acknowledged his need for a strict routine or else he tends to get off task and get silly! He would benefit from a tight schedule at home as well, as he just gets crazy and drives us all batty! He also requires a lot of time to burn his energy with sports. The trick is trying to run this three ring circus and keep them all busy at once!
I don't know where Shea is on this spectrum. He is loving his books and singing songs, and especially playing on the computer. He is trying out the Fisher Price website lately which has good alphabet and shapes games. I think he will be quite ready for kindergarten when the time comes.
Liam's kindergarten teacher had asked the kids to pick something that they wanted to teach the class. Liam is not a performer (unlike his big bro), so this was not something he was anticipating. It took us some time to decide what he was going to teach. Originally we had planned that he would teach the class how to draw an ostrich, cuz who knows how to draw an ostrich, right? and he has a great step by step book that would help him to do it. But in the end, while making lemonade the other day, we decided he could teach them how to make that! He loves to help in the kitchen. So we made up a large recipe card and I had drawn on these little pictures to go with each word (like lemon/sugar/water) to help him along. I packed up our jug, measuring cups and all the other supplies and off he went to school. I so wish I could have been a fly on the wall, because I'm sure his "cooking show" would have been the funniest thing to watch! Just imagine a 6yr old measuring out 6 1/2 cups of water at the tap (with the classmates counting for him 1, 2, 3...) and then squeezing a lemon etc. and then mixing it all up! I'm sure the teacher was laughing as he can be quite serious about it! I asked her about it later, and as expected, she said that he was just going right to work making it without telling them what he was doing. So she had to stop him quite a few times to get him to explain himself! She said he did a great job and knew all the answers to the measurements etc. and the class all got to have a sip from the plastic cups we brought. When he came out of school, he looked at me with his serious Liam brows and said..."We're going to need 18 more recipes because everybody likes it."