Great American Challenge

This post is strictly a “mommy post” meant for me and yes, I may brag a little about my son, but I’m his mom and that’s what I am supposed to do, right?

Jacob is in the A.L.L. program this year and it has provided a lot of great opportunities that he wouldn’t have otherwise gotten. During the meeting with his teacher, Miss Louw, at the beginning of the school year, she told the students about the “Great American Challenge.” She told them it was strictly optional. She went on further to say that those kids that did it would be rewarded. There are a low of rumors going around about what the reward might be but nobody really knows for sure.

Anyway, Jacob took that challenge and made a goal to have it done before the end of October. He had to finish all seven tasks and they had to be passed off by April 15th (no exceptions) but he decided to get it done and get it done fast. So for the past month and a half he has been studying, memorizing, repeating, these seven things:

1) Label the fifty states, their capitals, the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico and the country of Canada and Mexico on a blank map of the United States (no help or misspelled words).

2) Recite by memory the Gettysburg Address. (8 helps)

3) Recite by memory in order of Presidency, #1 through #44, the names of the Presidents of the Unites States, first, middle and last name. (no helps)

4) Write, spell and punctuate perfectly the Pledge of Allegiance. (no helps)

5) Sing or recite by memory the first verse of the Star Spangled Banner. (no helps)

6) Recite by memory the Preamble of the United States Constitution. (no helps)

7) Recite by memory the condensed version of the Declaration of Independence. (8 helps)

He could only pass them off on Mondays and could only try each item once per week. He had to do it in front of the class so that adds to the pressure. I was so proud of him for doing this. It doesn’t affect his grade and was completely optional. He worked REALLY hard. Only those of us in the family can really appreciate the extra time he had to put in to do it (in addition to his huge load of homework every week). He passed off his last item this past Monday and was all smiles when he got home.

His teacher told him that no other student has ever passed it off this quickly, which only added to his excitement. Plus, and most importantly, she told him that he motivated a lot of the students to do it, especially those that thought it wasn’t “cool” to do at the beginning of the year. Way to go Jake!