Movie Night at the School...and Making the Grade. Or not.
2005-09-16
10:18 p.m.
Movie night at the elementary school tonight....ahhh. I could bean the PTA member who thought of this brainy idea!
The idea of the kids coming to school at 7:00 in their pajamas with blankets and pillows to spread all over the cafeteria floor and watch movies is a good one. Sounds cool on paper, anyway. But the movie they picked was Herbie the Love Bug, the 60s version, and I don't think one kid actually watched it, mine included. Plus they left the lights on in half of the cafeteria, which meant that whole half never settled down.
A PTA mom jumped up and announced every 20 minutes or so for everyone to be quiet and not run around so folks could hear the movie. Ha! Ha ha ha ha! What'd she say???
I had my two boys and Hunter, friend of Oldest Son. Hunter and Oldest Son really wanted to go all the way to the front, where we would be looking UP at the big projection screen, but I nixed that real quick and made them settle down in the middle with me and Youngest Son. Then they really wanted to go somewhere, anywhere, away from me and Youngest Son, and I wouldn't let them do that, either.
Finally a family two blankets away packed up and left, and I did let OS and Hunter move there. Close enough to get away, but close enough to reign them in when they got too wild.
The injustice of allowing that wasn't lost on Youngest Son, of course, but I did manage to eventually get him to lay down and even go to sleep. Then I could bide my time watching all the other parents and a surprising number of grandparents wait zombie-like for this to be o.v.e.r already, all of us twitching to get out of there.
Just when I thought I would have some semi-peace, Hunter pulls his damn tooth that's been loose all evening, and he's bleeding. Which freaks him out. Of course. I got some paper towels from the cafeteria and wet them to try to stop the bleeding (which was not all that bad). I swear, if it's not one thing, it's another.
So I know I mentioned Oldest Son and I had a conference with his teacher this week. Well, I thought that conference went pretty well, and we've studied as effectively as I know how this week, and still we had some failing test papers today. And OS didn't bring his Social Studies book home, which he had to have, because the extra credit work is due on Monday now.
I started looking at his papers, though, and realized on the math test he failed, he actually had the right answers, which were geometric figures that were either flipped, slid, or turned. Only every one was marked wrong, and on "flipped" it was written in "reflection," and on "turned" was written "rotation," etc. Hmmmm...I looked at the directions...nope, said, "Answer flipped, slid, or turned for each question."
Also, on his vocabulary test, he got every single question right, except he misspelled the ones marked wrong, and the words were in a box at the top (*#$#*$$<@?), along with an instruction saying, "SPELLING COUNTS!"
Since he forgot his Social Studies book, we went back to school to get it, where I spoke with his teacher again. (Just as a funny aside, the closer we got to his classroom, the slower OS was walking. He looked like a kid being sent to pick his own switch from the yard.)
His teacher said for the math test, she had written the instructions on the board that they had to be answered either rotation, translation, or reflection, and that it was really hard grading all those papers, because a whole lot of kids had the concept down (as did mine), but they didn't follow the direction, so it was wrong. Hmm....OS told me earlier, no, he didn't know they were supposed to be answered rotation, translation, or reflection.
So what I'm gathering from this week's experience is Oldest Son can learn what he needs to, he just can't follow directions.
I'm really at a near panic over his nine weeks scores right now, because we're well over halfway through, and he had two Ds on his interim report, which he's had two more F tests in those subjects, so hey, they've not improved at all...but fallen some more.
I have got to figure out how to get his attention that this teacher expects things done right and done right the first time. And because her tests are pretty short, too, there's hardly any margin for error. And by God, you have got to follow directions!!
We have taken away the TV, scooter, and video games until the grades improve. We are going to retake those tests this weekend, and he's going to do all three extra credit projects. I hope it's enough.
We don't expect OS to be a brainiac, we really don't. I also can't say he's never failed a test. But never has he failed so many or had anything less than a C on his report card, and he hasn't had many of those. He's always been an A/B student with an occasional C.
Hunter told me tonight that his mom is sending a note to the teacher on Monday recommending this math test be thrown out, because she now knows of three students who failed it (hers and mine are two of them) because of the directions. I told Hunter, yeah, but we went and talked to the teacher this afternoon, and she says she gave y'all the directions on the board. He insisted, yeah, but he didn't hear that either, and it wasn't fair.
Secretly, I agree with his mom, but outwardly I'm telling my son, hey, you didn't follow the directions, and this is what resulted. I think taking the issue up with the teacher in the way Hunter's mom is would just give my little I-can't-follow-directions-anyway student even more excuses, and he can come up with plenty of those on his own. Doesn't need my help at all in finding excuses.
Hunter's mom says he's really struggling in the same subjects as Oldest Son. I asked her if she'd been to a conference with the teacher, but she hasn't yet. I told her we had, and I'd gotten the idea that this teacher expects plenty out of these guys, and while it's definitely going to be a rough year, it'll probably be good for them in the long run (she says with a big, big hope she's right). Wish I had a crystal ball to see the end of it right now.
Okay, this was probably a very boring post to all of you without kids, but to those of you who do, I'm all ears on how to help channel my son in the right way. Hubby agrees with my suggestions today (taking away the electronics, scooter, etc. and retaking the tests, doing extra credit), but he thinks we should find a positive incentive, too, to let him know we feel like he's trying.
Man, that sounds good, I agree, but thinking back to my parents...they didn't ground us over Cs, but we knew they weren't happy with them. Bring home a D or an F, though, and all hell broke loose. And we didn't get any positive incentives, we just got our privileges back as we earned them when we brought the grades back up.
Hubby thinks we're probably going to make OS a nervous test-taker, but I think the only way he'll ever learn to pay attention and follow directions -- and hopefully pass fourth grade -- is to stop him in his tracks right here and start making him redo, redo, redo till he finally gets sick to death of redoing tests and gets it right the first time.
I know this is small peanuts compared to the teen years, but God this parenting gig is getting harder by the day.
Over and out.
2 comments so far chocolate chaos - 2005-09-17 05:36:50
and it just keeps getting harder and harder.... it seemed 4th grade was when school got tougher .. like they arent little kids any more.
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grizmom - 2005-09-17 12:12:08
I gotta tell ya PC, you're right right right on all accounts here. You HAVE to let them know you're very much aware of the work they're doing, and, very much aware of what they're capable of, and that you expect more than they're giving. You also have to let the teacher know that you're "watching" from all aspects - check. Last but not least, a little positive feedback to OS will go a long way. I know all to well about bringing home a D or F and look the hell out. It's a fine line you're walking but I promise you, (speaking from experience here) when they get to college and get into the things they so enjoy, you'll look back at this and think, wow, they really CAN read and count and and and... and I don't even have to "make them!"
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