Pearl is 4.5 years old, but she's so tall and strong that she's often mistaken for a 6 year old. She likes school and can't wait to learn to read. She already sounds out words and writes whole stories with wonderful, inventive spelling.
Storytelling is Pearl's very favorite thing in the world. She wakes up thinking about stories she wants to tell and goes to sleep mumbling about chapter 2, chapter 6, chapter 13. She draws a lot too, but really her pictures are just another form of storytelling. She sketches quickly, adding brilliant splashes of color to emphasize certain settings or characters, but really the concepts are more important to her than the art.
When Pearl was 6 months old, Marcia took a Montessori parenting class with her. The babies crawled around, played with toys, and ate snacks while the teacher observed the children, conversing with the parents and demonstrating ways to interact with the kids. The idea was to teach parents how to get out of the way and let children do more (age-appropriate) things for themselves. Rather than orchestrating and leading activities, parents were encouraged to set up an environment and let kids explore and develop more independently.
One observation that the teacher made about baby Pearl was that she had an incredible ability to concentrate on her work. That trait is one that she has developed further. In September I shared with you a few pages of her Field Guide. It was 50 pages long when she finished. Every day she comes up with new projects to build and stories to create. The ideas don't come from us. She comes up with the projects and carries them out herself.
Some of you may remember Pearl's video Puppies to the Rescue 1. Marcia tells me that this afternoon Pearl told her the plotlines of Puppies to the Rescue 2 - 11. That is the full extent of the information I have received so far, but if I can dig up any more "Hollywood Dirt" on this topic, you will be the first to know.
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