School's out for Summer!

Emily is finally out of school for summer break. Her last day was Friday, although it was only a half day and was filled with the annual talent show and the year-end awards. Emily wanted to play her violin for the talent show. She and her friend Ansel decided that they would do a piece together with Emily playing and Ansel singing. They decided on "Go Tell Aunt Rhody," which is Emily's favorite piece. I am not exactly sure why, but Ansel decided to sing only the 1st and 3rd verses. Overall, I think that they did pretty well and I think that Emily was pleased with how it went. Also, Emily is known in her school for enjoying the macabre so this song was good in that it further fueled her reputation. :) 

As for the year-end awards, all of the kids got lots of awards for their work during the year. A couple that stood out for Emily were her character award - she embodies Responsibility - and her AR award. Apparently the Accelerated Reader program is able to estimate how many words the students have read based on the AR tests that they have taken during the year. We were surprised to discover that Emily had read well over 300,000 word this past year. That seems like a lot and was by far the greatest number of words read in her class.

Other than the activities on the last day, the month of May was also filled with performances, field day, and a trip to the pool. Overall, I think that Emily enjoyed the performances and the trip to the pool, but was not very thrilled with field day. She doesn't like feeling pressured to go, go, go, so I think that sort of competition can be overwhelming for her. Anyway, here are a few shots to commemorate the month:

Celebrating the performance of their play, "Squirrel Etiquette"

Swimming and popsicles

The Rainbow Team on Field Day

Although the school year is over, the students still have work assigned over the summer to keep their skills up during the break. Emily has been working on that and also keeping up with her reading. She tried to bring her kindle to tennis/swim camp yesterday, but I made her leave it home. More and more, though, she seems to be finding time to curl up with a good story.

We also received Emily's 4th quarter report card last week and her teacher said, "How I will miss Emily's dry sense of humor and view of the world. She is a child who seems to take everything in stride and has a sense that while this moment may not be great, it is just a moment and a better one is coming. She has certainly helped some of the children in the room with this perspective. It has been a joy to be a part of her learning journey this year." Very sweet.

As for the rest of the summer, there is camp this week and next and then we are off to France and Minnesota for the rest of the summer!