Jonah is so hard on himself

Every week Jonah brings home a new book and a list of words that we go over. After he reads the book, we have to sign off that he read it and make a comment on how he did. Yesterday Jonah brought home a new book for the week to practice reading. When I pulled it out of his backpack and walked over to him he saw the book and he immediately got upset. He told me that he was NOT going to read that book and started crying. When I asked him what was wrong he told me that the book is hard to read and he will never get to bring a new book home and he also said, "I am six years old and can read, but NOT this book". I told him that Mrs. Jamison wrote me a note saying that this book might be challenging but she wanted to see how he did with it.

He was still very upset and I told him that I would help him with the words that he did not know, we could sound them out together. After a 15 minute meltdown, we sat on his bed and he started reading it. The book was 24 pages with a sentence on each page. He was doing awesome until page 12. He came across the word "isn't" and stumbled on it. He of course got upset and I told him not to and sounded it out for him. He continued to read. The next word was "always" and then he kept on going.

Go figure... he cruised right over the word Hanukkah with NO problem. Seriously... he can get that word? So he finished the book and gave him a high five and he was so proud of himself. I told him to stop being so hard on himself all the time, we practice so we can learn.

You would seriously think that I was mommy dearest! Make him do everything perfect, trust me, we do not do that. We let him make mistakes so he can learn. He is just to hard on himself. He is a perfectionist, which we are working on. I tell him all the time that everyone makes mistakes. His teacher also works with him on that.

When we first started reading Luke decides to come in the room, stand in front of Jonah and rip one... He starts dying laughing and says, "Jonah, did that cheer you up"? COME ON LUKE!