Generations of Kindergarten

As a Mom to a preschooler, I was well aware of the "just wait til Ben gets to kindergarten" statement. I pretty much thought that these well-intentioned Moms were warning me about his attitude or behavior or something. I don't recall anyone warning me about the curriculum.

Ben has a book report due this week. Have I mentioned that he's in kindergarten? Oh, and that he can't read yet? His other homework this week was addition and subtraction. Thankfully, he's equipped with a math brain and gets through these problems (yes, WORD problems) pretty easily.

And March is "sight word assessment" month. In order to get a satisfactory on his skills assessment, he needs to identify 30 sight words in 1 minute. Right now he gets around 5-10. I am bribing, uh, I mean, incentivizing him with a new Wii game if he'll at least work on them with me so he can get the 30. We started this in February. Today is March 1st and so far - no go. He does not want me to help him with his homework.

He waits for hubby to come home. I don't get it. I don't care if his numbers are backwards or if his letters are not neat. Hubby is all over him to make sure the pages looks neat and orderly. I guess this means that Hubby has to help him memorize sight words (hmmm...probably not going to happen).

Ben has already accomplished skills I remember first discovering in higher grades like greater than and less than and 2d and 3d shapes. He learned the first week of school about Mondrian (I had to look him up).

I know some moms have their kids in private learning centers (Kumon and such) to help them get ahead on their skills. Is that what I have to do?

Not excited.

So, if anyone has some advice on sight words (and don't use the words flash cards to me) I would love to hear it. Better yet, if anyone would like to tutor Ben so I can skip the daily 5 rounds I have to go with him just to get him to look at his homework, I'd really appreciate it.