School Pictures

Friday Eve

Well, it is the eve of Friday, what a big Friday it is, our schools have a three day weekend. We are just back tonight from the open house at the other local Catholic high school, which in Brian's eyes eclipsed the first one by a landslide. This school had a very nice feel, although at first I didn't think it would. It's as large as the public high school (about 1000 students, a bit more even), and the building is old. However, as we went through on the tour, which was pretty well run and everyone was nice and well-spoken and just, well, normal, we got more and more comfortable.

One thing that particularly appealed to us in light of Brian's chiari issues is that the entire school is on a laptop program. Every student has a laptop and the entire building is wireless. Notes can be taken on the laptop, either typed in or written as if it were a tablet; all assignments are turned in electronically. All teachers report grades via 'parent connect' which is something I have heard quite a bit, but for some reason our public schools don't do. There are no textbooks to be toted around, they stay in school and are usually available to be viewed online at home.

Of course, this comes with a price tag. Our next visit is Sunday or Monday to one more school, and then Brian will visit the public school on the 28th with his middle school. Oh, and the school we went to today is also on "block scheduling" meaning that they have four classes in the fall, and four classes in the spring semester. Classes run for 70+ minutes, and they all have an hour for lunch in the middle of the day, which is also when a lot of clubs meet.

Progress reports also finally arrived, although Megan's did not. I called her guidance counselor and he read it to me, so it was all positive, the worst being the B she is getting from the chemistry teacher who feels it is his job to break the A students in to failure (not that a B is failure, but the 65 on her last quiz practically was). She has another quiz tomorrow. I always panic when she has a quiz in there after a particularly long day of swimming, because she's tired and has less time to prepare. And she's been not feeling so great the past couple of days.

Brian's was pretty good as well, the worst on his being that he is talkative in MATH class!!! The math class is taught in a strange way, though, and may lend itself to non-attentiveness. I thought at back to school night that it didn't sound optimal. Hopefully he's learning. He also has a test tomorrow; in that class and one in science. And then today, I got a call and an email from his social studies teacher, just to let me know that he has been doing very well in that class! So that was nice.

And in other news, I am still unemployed but will not be tomorrow. I awaited a call this morning to see if I would work today or tomorrow, but it turned out to be neither. But later, I got another call and have a pretty good assignment, I daresay. It's from about 10-1, so that should be great. Kevin has just informed me that there are TWO munks on the back porch, and all this without any cats being let out at all today! I got mad because yesterday I let Wren out, and she spent hours out there, and then came in, and went straight to the litterbox and left a big dump in there, didn't even bury it! Oh, and the house is clean. Today was a cleaning day. That's always noteworthy.

Multiple Migraine Menace

Well, the headache was not to be defeated. It came back with a vengeance in the form of a back-to-back 'aura' yesterday afternoon. I thought I'd be OK after the first one receded, and we set off for the open house at the Catholic boys high school next to our house, but as soon as we went to go out the door, I sensed a new aura starting over. It was mildly alarming, although it's happened before, jut not too often, but it did follow its normal pattern and passed within less than an hour between the two episodes. Afterwards, though, I was left with a sickening headache.

The school tour was OK, considering my condition, I tried to get the most out of the day. I enjoyed waiting behind people who seemed unaware of the line forming behind them as they grilled the guidance counselors at their information desk, particular the woman who pronounced the name of another local high school, Mater Dei, "mayter dee". Then there was the elderly gentleman who heckled the poor boy who sat alone at the Future Business Leaders of America table about capitalism. Bad enough nobody seemed to have any interest in leading business, but the poor kid had to put up with that onslaught of misdirected patriotism. (What?! You're not a capitalist? That's what America is all about!!! to which the kid replied, "Ok. I'm a capitalist)

Anyway, I just doubt this is the school for Brian but he and Kevin were swept up in the moment and paid the $75 and registered on the spot for the entrance exam, so I guess we'll just cast that die and see what lands face up. This school wouldn't honor any of the accommodations in Brian's 504 plan, somehow they are exempted from doing so, or perhaps it's just that if they find out he has any special needs, they won't accept him. This is sort of a cookie cutter old-school type of school, and I guess it does develop a work ethic and seems to produce a lot of achievers, but again you have the differential between honors and non-honors classes, and I don't know where we're heading with that.

But there are two other Catholic schools to check out in the area, one has block scheduling, where the periods are twice as long but they only take half the classes each semester, and then the other half the next, which reduces the amount of different homework, as well as the weight of the backpack. The other school is smaller, perhaps not as academically blessed as some, including the public school, but publicly funded benefits seem only to benefit those in the honors track or the special needs groups. It is easy to get lost in the mainstream.

Both Catholic schools have laptop programs, where they require each student to purchase a laptop and use it for all of their classes. This would be a great thing for Brian. And the middle school will take him on a tour of the public high school. So by mid-January, we should be pretty sure where he will attend 9th grade. I wonder if the Catholic school might give him a smaller environment in which he won't get as 'lost' as he seems to be doing in the middle school. Just not sure how we pay for this ... but ...whatever.

Speaking of honors, Megan has an impossibly difficult chemistry teacher this year. E is also in the class, she has him at a different time. Megan got a 65 on the last quiz, E got a 71. However, the fire alarm sounded while E's class was taking the test, and they were not able to complete the end, which included a few open ended questions, which is where Megan says she lost most of her points.

The scores were calculated as a percentage of total responses, but since the test given to the earlier class was lacking the more challenging questions, Megan maintains that this was unfair. I think probably the teacher is trying to shake the kids up early on so that they will see that they need to study more than they have ever studied before. It is only one quiz of three, and quizzes only count as 30% of the total grade. But my jury is out on this teacher; they all say he is a very good teacher, and that his students will learn more from him than anyone else. But I don't understand why he has to be impossibly hard. I have particular interest in this issue, in light of my chemistry debacle in 10th grade, which was sort of the catalyst that led me to drop out of Girls High School and pursue alternative education.

And so today I am just hanging around. I did some work on the middle school directory last night, but I have more to do. My neck is still stiff from the migraine, so I'm not going to attempt to work out today. In other news, Wren got out last night and tried to come in with a chipmunk! Molly seems to have stopped licking her paw again, at least for now, and Kevin is back to work but is about to embark on several trips in the upcoming weeks. Also coming up are many days off from school, and the start of the swim season. Otherwise, all is pretty quiet at the moment. Nothing of interest to report.

Home Sweet Home

We're here at last, back in the Land of Cats and Dog. Everyone survived, but Molly is still panting a lot, especially at night. I'm afraid to take her to the vet because I know it could mean, at minimum, a chest xray and blood work. I was worried because our pet sitter left a message, but it turned out she was just telling me that the roofer had shown up and started ripping off the roof! We were not expecting him, didn't know when he'd be coming, because we had asked him not to come during our Fresh Air week, and he just never called again. He did stick a giant sign on our lawn, though, about three weeks ago.

I guess it's better in a way - we missed out on two days of banging and flying debris, but today will be another big one.

So the week was fine, not really where you would choose to go on a vacation, but Silver Spring was an interesting place. There was a lot to do near the hotel, but they had only valet parking, so you had to tip the guy every time you wanted to take the car out, so we used that sparingly. And Megan swam OK, about how she would have been expected to swim with the amount of practice she has had this summer, and the pools she's been swimming in - half of them not even long course pools.

Brian had the two teeth pulled right before we left, and they have healed without incident. In two weeks, he goes back for the spacers in those two gaps. Starting next week, we have all of our doctor appointments. I'm taking them both to the dermatologist for various things, then we have the neurologist on the 11th and on the 12th the orthodontist. E arrives on the 21st, and Megan and Brian both have their check-ups on the 26th (happy birthday to Brian) and I have my dermatologist appointment on the 28th - if I can make it that long. I have been panicking over a small light mole on my cheek, because it sits on a bed of age-spot looking skin.

In other news, I heard from the guidance counselor regarding Brian's 504 plan for accommodations. He didn't really want to be bothered making any changes to it, but I don't really think three C's on a report card are a good sign, especially when they are there mainly due to lack of studying and failure to turn in assignments. So I want to see what else we can work out, or what we might be able to put in there. If I can't get any input from the doctor, I might seek out someone who specifically helps with these modifications, like a child psychologist or neuropsychologist. I'll talk to the pediatrician too, if I don't really make progress with the neurologist. He seemed happy enough to wait it out when we talked to him in February. But maybe we have waited long enough.

Damn those Ducks.

Not enough wine in California, I say. It's just been one of those days. I let Megan skip her beach club practice because she had two Y practices yesterday and was just worn out. I dragged Brian out of bed and took him, because he needs it. I went for my walk and was sweating bullets from the humidity. I thought I must have bullet holes in my face and blood was pouring out, but I was just sweating.

Anyway, come back to find out that between bees and lane line issues, they did a beach practice instead of a pool one. Waste of time. Then it started to rain. But at least I wasn't the one to crash my car into the seawall, as the Favorite Boy's sister did. Oh well. A lesson learned about the hood of your car being longer than you think it is.

So then our E saga continued. I realized the paper she had been sent told her almost nothing about us. She had Megan's Facebook, but that is mostly meaningless banter, plus it says she is married to someone named Michael, before that she was married to Charlie and before that Michael and Charlie were married to one another. But E doesn't know that. So I sent her a whole email telling her about the town and the school, and attached a few pictures of us, and, lo and behold, she still wants to come! So she will be here sometime between August 21 and 26. She said her original date was the 23rd, but other students are leaving on the 21 and 26, so she will travel with them if possible. I told her the 21st is better, but we will work it out no matter what. We have our physical appointments for the school sports forms on the 26th in the morning.

Oh, by the way, the board approved her enrollment last night. Now we just need an official letter.

But then, the mail came. Sigh. Oh, make it stop. In the mail was a letter from the schools. I thought it would be Brian's test scores, but worse, it was his report card. He received three C's this marking period: spanish, science, and language arts. I am so upset about this. Somehow I feel the school will not think it is worth getting this upset over, but I certainly do. Social studies was a B+, as was math; math should have been an A. I do not know what to do with this kid anymore. So I took him to baseball, and came home and poured myself the largest glass of wine that I could hold. It just never ends with him. I was expecting report cards tomorrow. And I still have the test scores to look forward to. Oh, help me, please.

Oh, yeah, and Megan's SAT2 scores were finally available online. Her friends texted her and said they got a 540 and a 560. I couldn't log in and then finally managed to. She got a 530. Not so good. The others studied and prepared more, but honestly, that is out of 800, so none of them are getting into any school based on those scores. Any school that requires an SAT2 in the first place will look for a grade of 700 or higher - perhaps even an 800. But I don't think most schools actually even require them anyway, which renders this nothing more than an exercise in test taking. The girl who got the highest score left the most blank. The others must have lost points on their guesses. Megan, rocket scientist, answered them all.

So that is that. In other news, um. Well, we have strange white bugs in the soil under one of the plants in the yard. I am going to try to trap some and take them to a garden center. Hopefully they are easily eliminated; I hope the plant will at least bloom. It looked like it had been doing so well up till now! Oh, and the shed. Kevin's shed is being delivered on Saturday. He is so excited! And the neighbors who already hate us because our pool ran water past their driveway for ten days will be really furious when they see this thing show up!! Haha!

Friday News

Well, the day was not so bad, even after the principal happened by and found the class largely not on task at 9:30 because we hadn't started our lessons for the day. The band teacher had forgotten his stands at his other school and had to go get them, so we were waiting for the first group to leave for band before launching into poetry and alliteration (as if I even know what that is). Anyway, perhaps she was checking up on me, because she came back about 20 minutes later, to tell me I had to give up my prep to meet with the other fifth grade teachers to sort through the science kits in the All Purpose Room. Well, luckily I had the class entranced with my fascinating readings of the poem, "Souvenir"; they were so quiet at that time that you could have heard a pin drop. Come to think of it, maybe they were asleep.

So it really was an OK day, this teacher leaves reasonable lesson plans, but her entire room is a mess! She has stacks of papers on her desk to the point where you are afraid that if you move one, the whole desk might collapse. To some degree, she leaves duplicates on a table at the front of the room, but you must brave the Big Desk first, in order to get your bearings for the day. When she had Megan for fifth grade, I sent in Megan's baby picture for the yearbook, and she gave it back to me at the end of the year, after finding it on her desk. Luckily, I ran the yearbook and substituted another one.

But those days always go quickly. We were scrambling to get things done. One kid would say, we always do it like this; to which half the rest would all respond, "no we DON'T!!" with indignation. I had to put out a lot of those first throughout the day, but it was fine. I'd go back. Not like that first grade class last Friday. Give me this group any day. Even Nick D., who couldn't stop talking. Then I had to remind myself that this might be how Brian behaves in class. With that in mind, I took away five minutes of his recess. While he was on the bench, one of the other teachers told me he sits there often.

Speaking of Brian...today his report card came and it was not good. Of course, there were some positives, so I can start with those: as he has redeemed himself in chorus and been granted amnesty from the Seat at the Head of the Class, he has been given an A in chorus again, as well as in math. When I told his math teacher that since the brain surgery, blah blah blah, she wrote back saying, "I didn't know he had brain surgery! The poor baby! Does he need a computer? I'll send him a book for home, and some ????"(no idea what this was, but she sent it, it had to do with 3D shapes for geometry); and she did. So he got an A.

Which was interesting, because the other day I had a conversation with his fourth grade teacher, which I started by telling her that was the best academic year he ever had, despite having brain surgery, pneumonia, and missing 32 days of school. She insists that this is not because she was strict (she doesn't think she was, but she is mistaken) but rather because she let the students know what was expected of them, and she took an interest in them. Perhaps she is onto something after all. Too bad she''ll be retiring, along with the teacher I subbed for today.

Otherwise, I believe his social studies grade also improved from a C+ to B+ or some such ... which is a start. We haven't heard how he did on the last test, though, the one he didn't study for until we got the chapters copied at 8:00 Sunday night.

Onto the rest: science declined by a + ... meaning it's a B without one now. But that's sort of OK. I think the grade was mainly based on project work done in-class, and for some reason, Brian hasn't mastered independent work yet. But the biggest dismay comes from the languages - both Spanish and our very own, English. In LA, he dropped a full letter grade, from a B+ to a C+, which may be due in large part to the Rip Van Winkle test I uncovered yesterday, with "67D" written on the top. One example of his response to the vocabulary part:

word: pestilence Brian's definition: something from your past

and so it goes. Here's one from the written responses:

Question: Why did RVW prefer younger people? Brian's response: Because they were nice to him, and he liked them.

And this, folks, is my life. Oh, wait, Spanish. Now he has gone from C+ to C. He claims it's a test he took after the trip to Florida. But funny thing about that, he had the Spanish book with him in Florida. He even ... "studied"...

One thing about Spanish 1 in 7th grade. It is a high school level course (reminder: despite these C's, he got an A on the midterm) in which one must maintain an average of C+. So he is in danger of having to repeat it. Which, according to Megan, may be OK. She says Spanish 2 is "much harder." She is now in 3. It isn't a big deal, I guess, because I would never put him into 3 anyway. I'd have him either repeat 2 or change languages. Megan's teacher speaks to them IN Spanish. He would never survive that. I'm sometimes not sure that he understand English.

Megan's report card should come tomorrow. Stay tuned.

In other news, Megan's knee is hurt. She went to the beach practice the other night, and hated it. He made them run six miles. Six. She has not run since October. Now she can barely walk. She had to run the mile in gym today, too. So she did it in 7:12. I believe she normally runs a 6-something (ha!). But she won't complain, she is too stoic. She'd rather run on it and ruin it for life. If it isn't better by next week I'll have it checked, but I'm furious. She's a good runner and if her knee gets wrecked because he made them overdo it their first time out ... expletive ...I know how it is to lose your knees before anything else. I think I'll buy her an embarassing knee brace tomorrow...hahah -- when I bought mine, I traded woes with a senior citizen and her husband. Her xray had just shown arthritis, and she needed to wear this brace over her knee-highs.

Tomorrow: landscaping!!!

Is It Really Only Tuesday?

This week is creeping by. Today I had to work all day in a resource room. The thing about the resource rooms is that they have very few kids, but the kids are all at such different places that there might as well be 100 of them. Luckily, in this class, one of the kids has a para (personal aide) so there was an extra person in the room. The other thing about the resource rooms is that they group the kids by relative grade level, so you never have just one grade at a time.

The push for next year is "inclusion". The latest trend in education thinking is that special ed and resource kids will do better if you mainstream them, but give them in-class support in the form of a resource teacher. I have heard that there will be no resource rooms next year, and the resource room teachers will "co-teach" in selected regular ed rooms. I have also heard that the elementary schools will only hire new teachers with dual certifications in special ed. There are so many kids who can't keep up in school today. I don't know if it's No Child Left Behind, vaccines, or just our society, that teaches 'to the test'. These are all reasons that I don't think I would ever go back to school for my degree. I've seen too many do it, and they're all still out there, searching.

At the end of the day, one of the special ed kindergarteners had some sort of medical incident and was sent to the hospital in an ambulance! They said he had a seizure, and he had a low grade fever, but his poor teacher was waiting by the door in tears. She is two days from her last day before maternity leave for her second child, with the first being not even two years old. She has one of the roughest classes in the school, with only ten kids (!), and then this had to happen. So hopefully he will be OK. I like this kid, despite himself. He's quite a character, and very smart, so I'm not sure what his classification is. Maybe he's mildly autistic. When I was in the class last week, he said to me, " I don't want to do math. It's boring." And he's six! (I have to admit, it probably his - he is capable of much more than calculating how many apples go to each child when there are six apples and two children)

So otherwise the day was OK, just a little long and I had one kid that couldn't understand me no matter what. It went like this:

Me: there are 36 inches in a yard. How many inches are there in a yard?
Kid: (looks intently at book): Um. One?

This happened in reading, too:

Me: The main idea of this story is getting energy from the wind and the sun. What is the main idea of the story?
Kid: Um. Windmills?

And that was that. Luckily you have pull-out only for an hour in the morning for reading and for forty minutes for math in the afternoon. And I haven't been in this class a whole lot, so I don't know the kids as well as I do the 4th and 5th grade resource kids - who are - by the way - much farther along.

After that, I spent an hour and a half on the phone with the AT&T customer service people. It seems that the place where I bought my cell phones and have changed the plans over the past, oh - I don't know - 12 years? - has been going into the system and making changes to my plan. I have caught the changes, but no rep has bothered to help figure out how until today. This one looked it up and saw that thay had even entered a false drivers' license expiration date, and changed my plan. They actually screwed everything up, because they changed Megan's line to the main line, and they did away with my texting ability completely, which it took me a few days to realize. I just thought everyone was ignoring me all weekend.

So she corrected everything, gave me a credit for the month's fees for my troubles, and said she would register a complaint against the franchise, which is privately owned. She also made a change so only corporate stores can change my account, or I can do it online. That's just insane. I guess they're compensated for new services sold, like the time they put roadside assistance and voice activated dialing without my permission. Jerks.

And there was my day. Brian is searching for Ralph S. Mouse so I can find out how Ralph does in The Great Mouse Caper, as I have read three chapters to this resource group and am dying to know how it turns out. He doesn't seem to have it. Now he is talking about Mr. Popper's Penguins.

And finally, in other news, Megan has come down with the sniffles. I gave her the last of her prescription decongestant, but this seems to need more than that. She is in good spirits, but she's trying to get out of going to school. She also informed me that her math grade has dropped to a plain A. So she won't be #1 in her class after all. Oh, there go my hopes and dreams. It's because of the week missed for Nationals, she got two 86's on tests. Sigh. Brian's baseball team lost tonight, again, 6-3. He had an error on first, a few strike-outs, and four runs scored in the innings he pitched. Other than that, he did great. Oh, and they had a bad ump. That's always fun. I am hoping for no work tomorrow so I can catch up on laundry and chores, and spend some time with Rusty in my lap. But if they call, I will take it, because someone told me today there are nine weeks of school left!

But .. it is only Tuesday.