Olsen's activities

It seems like Olsen has been undertaking a lot of activities recently. He has been doing really well skiing and has been able to snowplow down the bunny hill on his own. He was doing so well that Adrian took him up on the lift on his 4th day of skiing. Adrian said Olsen did pretty well but is not the best at turning. We ordered a little backpack harness for him and will try it next time to see if it will help steer him a little better. This video is of Olsen and Adrian coming back down from their first run from the chair lift.



Olsen has also started swimming lessons. He is in a class with three other kids. He does well for the most part, but we hit a little snag where he doesn't always want to jump into the water to the teacher. When it's his turn to jump, he'll shake his head no. The teacher will get him to his feet and he'll do it, but his first inclination is to not want to. He told me it is because water gets in his eyes, so I was thinking of getting him goggles to see if that will help. I am not sure if he is going to be able to float on his back on his own by the end of these lessons, but I think he has had fun with it.


Olsen practicing how to float on his back.

I feel like Olsen has been doing a lot of activities that promote his gross motor skills, but I need to do more to help him improve his fine motor skills. Olsen does not really care for arts and crafts. I can set out the paints and even spray shaving cream on the table for some finger fun and it will keep Olsen busy for a maximum of 5 minutes, sigh. Sometimes I get concerned because it seems like a lot of kids his age are into the whole drawing thing and can write their names. But I have also heard not to push it and he'll get it when he's ready.

Funny story, I was talking to a friend (his daughter is 6 months older than Olsen and draws birds and things) about how Olsen doesn't hold a writing utensil correctly yet, and he said that sometimes he gets concerned too because his daughter doesn't always hold her chopsticks correctly, ha ha ha. Oh well, Olsen has a kind heart and is quite interested in reading, so I think he is fine. I have read that in Finland, they do not teach kids to read until age 7, and Finland consistently scores high on academic achievement tests. So from that, I am taking away that, right now, young children mostly need the opportunity to learn through play, and they can experience academic rigor later.