Our little performer....

April is apparently National Poetry Month (who knew) and each kid at New Life was required to memorize a poem. The kids were then supposed to recite their poem in front of the class, parents and judges. (Wyatt recited a poem about Christopher Columbus but asked his teacher if he could recite it to the judges in private as opposed to in front of the class. There were a few other kids who did the same thing and, luckily for him, his teacher didn't see a need to force the kids to get up in front of their peers.) Sadie, on the other hand, was so excited for her poetry recital! (And her teacher required each kid to get up and recite their poem, which I do thing is good for kids to learn how to do. But Wyatt was thankful he didn't have her as his teacher!)

It was a packed house and Sadie loved every minute of it!

This doesn't really have anything to do with the poetry competition, but I took this picture of Sadie's report on owls that was hanging in the hallway outside of her classroom.

Ok back to poetry.......

Sadie found out the following week that she had won the poetry reciting competition for her entire class and was then asked to recite it in front of the entire elementary school. To say that she was in her element would be an understatement. I was actually a bit nervous for her and was praying she wouldn't get too flustered by the microphone, the lights, the big stage and all the people. And of course she didn't. She even looked around the room, looking people in the eyes and using lots of expression as she recited her poem. (I only took one picture because I didn't want the flash to throw her off and make her flustered. Now looking back, I'm quite sure the flash would have just been fuel for her stage presence!)

On stage with the other winners at the end (my good friend Amber, who I taught BodyAttack with, had a daughter who also won for 4th grade--just to the left of Sadie). 

She loved it and we were so proud of her. It was great for her because Wyatt continued to be amazed at her poise and confidence and love of being on the stage. And hearing that from Wyatt just made her little heart soar!