The Searchlight of Insight

"Fintry" by Carys

For those who don't know, Fintry is located
halfway up the west side of Lake Okanagan,
near Kelowna, BC, Canada.

Indiana Jones

Sebastian has discovered Indiana Jones and I mean really discovered... he found out the other day we had an extra Indiana Jones movie. Yes, we've let him start watching Indiana Jones. Considering all the other violent stuff that's out there, Dr. Jones is tame. Certainly no worse than Spiderman or Superman. (We put our foot down at Batman.) For the last two months we thought we only had Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom. While playing around with one of the DVD's extra features, Sebastian found The Last Crusade - wow, was he excited. I bought an Indiana Jones costume that consists of hat, pants, jacket, toy whip and bag. The outfit is a motivational tool. Sebastian gets one piece every few weeks to reward positive behavior.

Thus far Sebastian has earned the bag and a four foot toy whip (made of foam.) Above is a picture Sebastian drew at school. It's Indiana Jones hanging from his whip, while shooting a baddy. Please note that in this picture Dr. Jones is also wearing a fedora and carrying a bag. Oh, and Tess would like you to please notice the neatness of Sebastian's writing.

Sebastian's Art 2008

Today, in anticipation of moving in several months and the installation of a new flat screen TV for the kids, we were cleaning out corners when we found some of Sebastian's art from this past year. Note... some of this is a year old! The first piece is from a collage Sebastian did when he first entered Primary 1/Grade 1 in August 2007. Then we have a colourful rendition of his name from the end of P1.

The certificate at left is from the completion of a special reading and writing course Sebastian completed during P1 last spring. He is now quite an accomplished reader and his writing skills improved considerably. (Sample to follow one of these days.) Next we have what I call "The Grid," completed at some point in the last six months.

The Owl, The Stocking and The Man sound like the title of a book and could even be used for illustrations in such a book. Sebastian just informed me that he completed all of these masterpieces last year in P1, NOT this year! (He was very specific about this fact.) Seb also hadn't seen these pictures for a long time, and was quite amazed they'd made their way onto the computer.

Next we have The Bear and The Boots. I love The Boots because they are so colourful and festive. Sebastian explained to me that he did both these pictures last year in P1. The Boots were actually two sides of the same boot merged together in Photoshop... you can see the slight line down the middle.

This item, The Cereal Car, is from the beginning of this school year when the class did an engineering project. Each student selected pictures of a car (Sebastian picked James Bond's most recent Aston Martin... sigh) then studied the pictures in class. Each student then supplied items for the class that could be used to build a car. Items were shared and the end result of the project was building a car from scratch after making designs on paper.

Last but not least we have a very curious picture/piece of art completed by Sebastian in P1. Sebastian calls it "Being Cross" but I have been refering to it as "Dark Mood" because the picture looks more like Sebastian when he is a bit moody verses cross. Regardless, Sebastian that the teacher said he could be any mood he wanted. Sebastian chose being cross. "Then," he continued with glee, "I got to decorate it!"

"Feelings: happy, sad, angry" by Carys

The Moon, by Sebastian