Family Portrait Drawing, 2nd week review

The 2nd week of school went pretty much like the first week with a few more bumps. We had 1 major morning meltdown over clothing (nothing felt right) and one horrendous evening of one meltdown after another because of being overtired (I think).
Parker had her first 'cafeteria food' this week and that went smoothly. Considering she's accustomed to just unpacking a lunch, going through a line and picking everything out is a big deal, but she insisted she could do it and I guess she did. She chose a corn dog, cantaloupe and black beans.

Here's a family picture she drew the 2nd day of school. Bob's smile is concealed by his beard.

In case you are wondering, this is how our school district is approaching the Obama speech issue that everyone is losing their minds over:

From the Office of the Superintendent

The President of the United States will conduct a live web cast on Tuesday, September 8. The Department of Education has billed this as a “Back to School” Speech and the department website has provided some activities that a teacher could choose to do with his/her students. Many of the activities seem appropriate for a lesson in civics. However, the will not participate in the live web cast on Tuesday September 8 for the following reasons:

· District teachers have done collaborative planning in advance and the notice we received on this speech is inadequate for us to incorporate it into meaningful

lessons

· Since the speech is live, we are unable to receive a copy of the text in advance which handicaps a teacher to prepare a meaningful lesson

· It would be rare that the same resource would be equally appropriate for a Kindergarten student and a senior in high school. Since we do not have details on the content, we do not have the information to determine the grade level and/or subject matter to which it is best aligned

· If we access as a web cast, we do not have sufficient bandwidth to get a clean audio and video program. We actually learned this last November when our volleyball team state playoff game was web cast during school

· At this time of the school year, I am unwilling to allow any activity that may have little benefit, but could serve as a distraction to the core mission of the school. Whether the President’s words to our students have a political tone or not, this address has already become politicized and could serve as a distraction in our schools.

Therefore, we will not web cast the speech on Tuesday, but we will download it and review it to determine if it does have any valuable instructional benefit. In the event that we choose to use any of the speech at any level K-12, parents will receive advance notice and your son/daughters will be able to choose an alternate assignment and opt out of the speech.
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In other news, I'm sad to report, it appears we are ballet school dropouts. Remember the meltdown evening I mentioned earlier? That was the day we were supposed to go to ballet. She told me in hysterical sobs that she didn't want to go to ballet anymore, that it was too hard and too soon after getting home from school and that she'd prefer to just do her own 'homeschool' practice. So we stayed home. Not the usual way I'd handle something like that, but...you've heard the phrase "you can lead a horse to water...."? Well and even more impossible task is putting a bawling 5 year old into lycra tights. We're going to give it another week just to make sure, but I think her mind is made up. It didn't seem hard, but it is right after school and I can totally understand why she'd just want to stay home after a long day of school. She used to love to put on her ballet stuff and dance around, so hopefully she'll keep that up.

Shoe Tying and first week review

We made it through the first week of school. It was the easiest week I've had in a LOOOOONG time. During preschool, the first week back was a big adjustment....Parker would come home and flop on the couch and need lots of down time. And it didn't change all that much as the school year went along. For some reason, now, she energized and ready for more action when she gets home. She needs a big snack, but is ready to play with friends immediately....unlike last year when she needed a good hour to recover.

We had a huge breakthrough this weekend in shoe tying. She LOVES her running shoes and has been very frustrated that she can't tie them....and she's very easily frustrated when trying to learn. Apparently, I have not been letting her watch enough tv...because that's how she put it all together. She was watching Little Bill (a Bill Cosby creation) and they showed Little Bill learning to tie his shoes. Bob said Parker came running into the room and said "I wanna try something" and got it on her first try, including remembering the rhyme.
The audio is low, so here's what she's saying:

One little loop,
what do you do?
Wrap it around,
then pull it through.
Now you have a bow
and you tied your shoe!


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