Nevada State Citizenship Award

The Fourth Graders at our elementary school have a optional challenge they can work on during the year called the Nevada State Citizenship Award.  To earn it they must memorize the State Song, Preamble to the Nevada constitution, all 30 governors, all the counties and county seats, the physical map, state symbols, and Native American tribes.  They have to pass everything off by Spring Break.  He and I set a little goal to be done by Christmas so we didn't have to worry about it.

When my mom was here she helped him with the hardest task of memorizing the full names of the 30 governors.  They had some pretty awesome memory techniques they used and he passed them off before she left.  WooHoo!  He told us that his class applauded him after he finished passing them off to his teacher.  That made me laugh :) (And now my mom has them memorized as well... what useless information to know!)

The last week before our Christmas break William only had two things left to pass off--the counties/county seats and the state song.  After passing off the counties he was feeling a lot of pressure to memorize the song in the last 2 days before his break.  He had a little meltdown Wednesday night and we told him we'd worry about it after Christmas.  I set the song at his place on the table that night hoping he'd change his mind in the morning.  By the time I came out of my room the next morning William was up and had already memorized the entire thing!  He passed it off that day at school.

I got a message from his teacher that afternoon stating how proud he was of William for passing off everything.  William is the 3rd person in the entire 4th grade to earn this award--and the 1st person in his class! 

I had promised him a little reward if he finished before Christmas Break so that night we headed over to Target and got some peppermint hot chocolate and a sugar cookie.

Congrats William!  You worked so hard!