#YearOfDisneyMovies

I decided one of the things I wanted to do in 2017 was watch more Disney movies, and maybe also get my son interested in them. I have my favorites, but there are some classics that I've never even seen in their entirety! I also haven't seen many of them since I've had a child of my own, so I'd like to review them and gauge them for appropriateness before exposing my son to the stories.

I have a list I made of the movies I will watch, in order of original release. Not EVERY Disney movie made the list, because there are only 52 weeks in the year and many more Disney movies than that, so you'll find I may skip some.

In the first week, I watched Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937). I had never seen the whole movie, but I was very familiar with the story because growing up, we did the Disney version of the play every year for Halloween in elementary school, and I was always the narrator.

The movie felt simultaneously really slow and very short. I feel like it dragged on some, but there wasn't very much to the story. I also didn't much appreciate the goriness of the queen asking for a heart as proof of murder (thankfully, the heart is only mentioned and not shown) nor did I like the whole "murder" concept in general. This is one my son can do without seeing for a long while.

The second movie on my list was Pinocchio (1940). Again, I have never seen this movie in its entirety. I was just never interested, and to be honest, it took quite a while to motivate myself to watch this now. My only experience with Pinocchio is from old Sing Along Songs compilations.

So, lots of threats of violence against Pinocchio = strike one. The idea of threatening noncompliance to societal norms with child slavery = strike two. I do appreciate the visual about lying and the emphasis on honesty and goodness, but strike 3 comes just then with the creepy old dude being extra evil about swiping little boys to take to Pleasure Island. The creep factor is just way too much. I don't even need to tell you how I feel about the underage smoking...I don't think my son needs to see this one, period.

Maybe I'm extra hard on the older stuff unjustly, seeing as it's from a different time...but I'm glad I'm reviewing these before my son gets a chance to internalize these sorts of messages. I do appreciate how game-changing these films were for the time and industry, and I'm glad I got to see them from that perspective. This week, I'm watching Fantasia, another movie I have no experience with. Let's see how it goes!

Our January Homeschool Goals...

Bu has recently expressed interest in writing letters as opposed to shapes and lines. He is bored with the "pre-writing" stuff and wants to go straight to writing!

There's a specific order in which letters should be taught for writing, from easiest to manage to most difficult. The list we are following is from Handwriting Without Tears. We are focusing on capital letters first and intend to take all of 2017 to go through each letter. We don't expect mastery or even independent writing by the end of the year, but we are instead aiming for introduction of how to write each letter and plenty of opportunity to practice so that he is comfortable with the concept by the end of the year. As with everything else, we do not treat learning as a race and we are not in an rush for any one skill or concept to be solidified by any given time. We find our son learns very quickly and effectively when he decides he is ready to.

We are also including some crafts and hands on activities this month, with a Winter theme in mind. I might revamp the way I planned things out next month, but I feel we got more done and were more motivated to work when we were doing unit studies as opposed to following a curriculum laid out for us in a book.

We also recently got a DVD player in the car, which means that Bu cannot easily scan through or change chapters and programs at will. I am taking advantage of this by introducing different educational DVDs and programs on the way to our therapy appointments, so he can become familiar with different characters, songs, etc that we can watch later at home and learn from. This month, we are focusing on a couple of Signing Time DVDs. He is very familiar with the people on the show but has his few favorite DVDs, so I'd like for him to branch out to others so he can learn more signs. I am also introducing a Kindergarten life skills DVD and nursery rhymes from Rock N Learn, which is a series I intend to use for many subjects. Familiarity and acceptance of the characters, style of animation, etc is a must.

We are reading a Preschool Prep sight words book every single day, just to get in the habit of reading for fun. Bu was recently assessed by his ABA therapist as being at or above age level for reading, in spite of being nonverbal. That is compared to typical children, not just children with special needs! His word and letter recognition is fantastic, and he picks up new words and spellings every single day. At a typical school, they might not have tested his reading ability for years, considering he can't verbally read. Yay for homeschooling and teaching/assessing in a way that makes sense for my individual child and his needs!

Here's to a great 2017 full of learning and growing!