Tonight I'll be tutoring Avonlee in Math, for the third week in a row. She was struggling with fractions, but I think she's over it now. When we started, she seemed to think that a fraction was nothing more than two numbers separated by a line. They didn't make any sense to her, especially all the rules for working with them.

Now she has no problem with adding, subtracting, and multiplying fractions, including mixed fractions. She knows how to find a common denominator. She likes my examples with marbles! I'm testing her tonight, and if she does well then we're moving on. (Obviously, fractions aren't going away. They never do... but we won't have to focus on them exclusively.)

She's probably never going to love math. Her parents both hate it. Our hope is that being taught by someone who *does* love math will at least make it easier for her to reach her potential. Kids know (as would any adult) when their parents are dreading a particular subject.

Soon, possibly next week, I'm going to start working with her younger brother Ethan. Separately. He's been described as the opposite of Av. "Advanced." I'm going to try to ignore that, and just let them both work at their own best pace. How would it affect Av, to frequently hear that she's struggling where her younger brother is excelling? At least they don't seem to be very competitive.