With S out of town for the week on work, I've been doing all the parenting myself, which means I've had to pay closer attention to some of the school stuff S usually handles. I'm reasonably informed about what's happening in my kids' school lives. I drop them off every morning, so I know all the people who work at the school, and I know a lot of the other kids and parents in their classes. I go to half the parent-teacher conferences, because S and I usually split them up evenly. And I get bombarded with automated text messages and emails telling me the latest classroom news -- some of them I even read. But, I just want the big picture. I feel like I don't need (nor do I want) the details about specific assignments and projects and such. My view on that is that's on the student. It should be structure in a way such that they can manage things on their own with minimal parental involvement. I think it's better for the student that way, and I know it's better for the parent that way.
S agrees with me on this in theory, but in practice, once one of the kids starts to struggle, her Mama Bear instincts take over, and she feels compelled to help them. Then we have an argument, because I feel pretty strongly that learning to overcome struggles will be far more valuable to our kids in the long run than will getting a 3 instead of 2 in social studies our the next report card. It got to the point to where S said, "Do you want our kid to be held back in second grade?" which if you know DC public schools, is extremely unlikely to happen, and if it does (but it won't), then maybe it is for the best. Because both our kids were born in August, they're just as close in age to the children in the grades one below them than they are to the kids in their own grades. I think this matters, at least a little bit. At some point, it won't, but for now it does. Development is still month-to-month at their ages.
But, since marriage is a compromise and all that. I've been trying to not be so militant about my no-help policy. This especially comes into play when S is away and filled with anxiety (and maybe some guilt) about not being with her kids. She was especially worried about this big project Lil' S1 had due -- he had to research numerical facts and then present them on a poster board with pictures -- so I assured her I would work on it with him. It went fine. The only things I did were Google and print pictures of things he told me he wanted (he doesn't know how to do that, and I don't want him using my computer to try to learn) and trace some of his letters in marker, because it would have taken him all day to do it by himself. This seemed reasonable. It came out decently. He said the presentation went well, and the only comment he relayed from his teacher was that he got a point taken off because he didn't write his name on it. Then he tried to blame me for it, which is a perfect example of when helping is counterproductive -- he should feel full ownership of his work, good or bad.
The other thing I've had to work on him with is his spelling. Apparently, they have weekly spelling tests, and he's been scoring in the 0%-10% range. His teacher mentioned it to me one time during drop-off, and I agreed to help him, and then I said that I didn't even know he had spelling tests. The moment it came out of my mouth I realized, it was one of those things you say in your own defense, but it actually makes you sound worse. She gave me a look of astonishment (not in a good way), and then said, "I post them on Rallyhood every week." I smiled, shrugged, and assured her that he would do better in the future. See, I learned from my previous mistake. I didn't tell her that I still hadn't created a Rallyhood account and was only vaguely familiar with its existence.
So, we did some spelling words. He's a dreadful speller, which is somewhat strange, because he's a pretty strong reader for his age. I'm not super concerned that he become a crack speller. I would guess my spelling skills are well above that of the average adult, and it doesn't really help me much in life. I know many intelligent people (e.g., my wife), who aren't great spellers. It's not that important a skill, considering we communicate mostly through devices that literally spell for us. But, what studying spelling words can do, I think, is train him to focus his mind on something that he doesn't particularly love. That is a very important life skill. No matter what school we attend, or what job we hold, there are always parts we don't like, and being able to do those parts efficiently, nevertheless, I suspect, is crucial to our success and satisfaction in those endeavors.
Plus, I've long felt that rote memorization gets a bad rap as a learning technique. Everybody is always about "the concepts," which is great, but in my experience the concepts are often facilitated by the memorization. All the basic math formulas I learned in pre-college -- Pythagorean theorem, quadratic formula, limit definition of a derivative, etc. -- I memorized and used without having a deep conceptual understanding. And then later, with more experience, I gained this understanding, in large part because I already knew (through memorization) what they were and where to use them. The what and where led to the how and why. I still remember looking over a friend's algebra homework as a freshman in college, and seeing how they completed the square, and having an epiphany: That's how the quadratic formula is derived! If I didn't know the quadratic formula by heart and hadn't memorized the step-by-step process of completing the square, would I have made this connection? I doubt it.
Anyway, back to Lil' S1, we spent a long time on his spelling words, and he only learned five of the ten words on his list, and I'm not convinced he will retain even those when his test comes around. But, I think we made some progress. He did much better toward the end. We all have our memorization techniques, and I think Lil' S1 was starting to figure his out. I feel confident that we can get his scores up in the 80%-100% range before too long.
One thing that helped a lot was motivating him through "extra" iPad time. I use quotes because I just adjust the baseline, so that it's actually just normal iPad time. He usually watches 15-20 minutes at night, and so I told him he could have five minutes plus an additional two minutes for each of five words he could spell correctly without looking at the sheet. So, he took a few minutes to study, and then I administered the "test," and after not being able to memorize any of the words for the previous 45 minutes and complaining about it constantly ("Daddy! I don't know how to learn things!"), he magically got every single one correct. I was happily surprised. I guess that's the power of the carrot -- figuratively speaking, of course. If I offered my kids a literal carrot as a reward, I don't think it would work very well.
I'll keep you all posted on how it goes. But, to put things into perspective, both my kids seem to be happy and well-adjusted little boys. They both seem to "get it," meaning they know how to function within their little stations in this world. That is probably much more important than what percentile they fall into scholastically. One of Lil' S1's good friends was admitted to the psychiatric department at the children's hospital last night. I don't know why exactly, but I do know an ambulance had to come get him at school, and they don't send ambulances to schools for nothing. It's obviously a sad situation all around. His parents are going through a terrible divorce, and it seems like their dad is running away from it all, putting everything on their mom's plate, and she just can't handle the full load.
We help out when we can, but there's only so much we can (or, truthfully, are willing to) do. Last night for instance, she texted S and asked if she could come over and spend the night at her house with her youngest child (the little brother of the kid in the hospital), so that she could stay at the hospital with her oldest son. S isn't in town, so she can't do it, and I have to watch my kids so I can't do it. Plus, that's a big ask, in general. We know these people, but were not super close friends. But, maybe that shouldn't matter. Maybe you should just help people who need help, because it's what you should do. I don't know. I mean, what I would like to do, all things equal, is phase these people out of our lives. It's too much drama, and their kids get along less and less well with our kids as they get older. Lil' S2 doesn't even like their youngest son, even though they're the same age. (This kid has a serious temper and a hitting problem -- a legit one, not a playful, watched-too-many-episode-of-Power-Rangers one -- which explains why Lil' S2 doesn't like him. I wouldn't like him either.) But all things aren't equal, and these kids need stable adults in their lives, and this woman needs help. Knowing this, is it ethical to say "it's not our my problem" or "I have my own family to worry about" and wash your hand of the whole situation ? I don't know. I really don't.
But I do know that suddenly spelling test don't seem like a very big deal.
Until next time...
S agrees with me on this in theory, but in practice, once one of the kids starts to struggle, her Mama Bear instincts take over, and she feels compelled to help them. Then we have an argument, because I feel pretty strongly that learning to overcome struggles will be far more valuable to our kids in the long run than will getting a 3 instead of 2 in social studies our the next report card. It got to the point to where S said, "Do you want our kid to be held back in second grade?" which if you know DC public schools, is extremely unlikely to happen, and if it does (but it won't), then maybe it is for the best. Because both our kids were born in August, they're just as close in age to the children in the grades one below them than they are to the kids in their own grades. I think this matters, at least a little bit. At some point, it won't, but for now it does. Development is still month-to-month at their ages.
But, since marriage is a compromise and all that. I've been trying to not be so militant about my no-help policy. This especially comes into play when S is away and filled with anxiety (and maybe some guilt) about not being with her kids. She was especially worried about this big project Lil' S1 had due -- he had to research numerical facts and then present them on a poster board with pictures -- so I assured her I would work on it with him. It went fine. The only things I did were Google and print pictures of things he told me he wanted (he doesn't know how to do that, and I don't want him using my computer to try to learn) and trace some of his letters in marker, because it would have taken him all day to do it by himself. This seemed reasonable. It came out decently. He said the presentation went well, and the only comment he relayed from his teacher was that he got a point taken off because he didn't write his name on it. Then he tried to blame me for it, which is a perfect example of when helping is counterproductive -- he should feel full ownership of his work, good or bad.
The other thing I've had to work on him with is his spelling. Apparently, they have weekly spelling tests, and he's been scoring in the 0%-10% range. His teacher mentioned it to me one time during drop-off, and I agreed to help him, and then I said that I didn't even know he had spelling tests. The moment it came out of my mouth I realized, it was one of those things you say in your own defense, but it actually makes you sound worse. She gave me a look of astonishment (not in a good way), and then said, "I post them on Rallyhood every week." I smiled, shrugged, and assured her that he would do better in the future. See, I learned from my previous mistake. I didn't tell her that I still hadn't created a Rallyhood account and was only vaguely familiar with its existence.
So, we did some spelling words. He's a dreadful speller, which is somewhat strange, because he's a pretty strong reader for his age. I'm not super concerned that he become a crack speller. I would guess my spelling skills are well above that of the average adult, and it doesn't really help me much in life. I know many intelligent people (e.g., my wife), who aren't great spellers. It's not that important a skill, considering we communicate mostly through devices that literally spell for us. But, what studying spelling words can do, I think, is train him to focus his mind on something that he doesn't particularly love. That is a very important life skill. No matter what school we attend, or what job we hold, there are always parts we don't like, and being able to do those parts efficiently, nevertheless, I suspect, is crucial to our success and satisfaction in those endeavors.
Plus, I've long felt that rote memorization gets a bad rap as a learning technique. Everybody is always about "the concepts," which is great, but in my experience the concepts are often facilitated by the memorization. All the basic math formulas I learned in pre-college -- Pythagorean theorem, quadratic formula, limit definition of a derivative, etc. -- I memorized and used without having a deep conceptual understanding. And then later, with more experience, I gained this understanding, in large part because I already knew (through memorization) what they were and where to use them. The what and where led to the how and why. I still remember looking over a friend's algebra homework as a freshman in college, and seeing how they completed the square, and having an epiphany: That's how the quadratic formula is derived! If I didn't know the quadratic formula by heart and hadn't memorized the step-by-step process of completing the square, would I have made this connection? I doubt it.
Anyway, back to Lil' S1, we spent a long time on his spelling words, and he only learned five of the ten words on his list, and I'm not convinced he will retain even those when his test comes around. But, I think we made some progress. He did much better toward the end. We all have our memorization techniques, and I think Lil' S1 was starting to figure his out. I feel confident that we can get his scores up in the 80%-100% range before too long.
One thing that helped a lot was motivating him through "extra" iPad time. I use quotes because I just adjust the baseline, so that it's actually just normal iPad time. He usually watches 15-20 minutes at night, and so I told him he could have five minutes plus an additional two minutes for each of five words he could spell correctly without looking at the sheet. So, he took a few minutes to study, and then I administered the "test," and after not being able to memorize any of the words for the previous 45 minutes and complaining about it constantly ("Daddy! I don't know how to learn things!"), he magically got every single one correct. I was happily surprised. I guess that's the power of the carrot -- figuratively speaking, of course. If I offered my kids a literal carrot as a reward, I don't think it would work very well.
I'll keep you all posted on how it goes. But, to put things into perspective, both my kids seem to be happy and well-adjusted little boys. They both seem to "get it," meaning they know how to function within their little stations in this world. That is probably much more important than what percentile they fall into scholastically. One of Lil' S1's good friends was admitted to the psychiatric department at the children's hospital last night. I don't know why exactly, but I do know an ambulance had to come get him at school, and they don't send ambulances to schools for nothing. It's obviously a sad situation all around. His parents are going through a terrible divorce, and it seems like their dad is running away from it all, putting everything on their mom's plate, and she just can't handle the full load.
We help out when we can, but there's only so much we can (or, truthfully, are willing to) do. Last night for instance, she texted S and asked if she could come over and spend the night at her house with her youngest child (the little brother of the kid in the hospital), so that she could stay at the hospital with her oldest son. S isn't in town, so she can't do it, and I have to watch my kids so I can't do it. Plus, that's a big ask, in general. We know these people, but were not super close friends. But, maybe that shouldn't matter. Maybe you should just help people who need help, because it's what you should do. I don't know. I mean, what I would like to do, all things equal, is phase these people out of our lives. It's too much drama, and their kids get along less and less well with our kids as they get older. Lil' S2 doesn't even like their youngest son, even though they're the same age. (This kid has a serious temper and a hitting problem -- a legit one, not a playful, watched-too-many-episode-of-Power-Rangers one -- which explains why Lil' S2 doesn't like him. I wouldn't like him either.) But all things aren't equal, and these kids need stable adults in their lives, and this woman needs help. Knowing this, is it ethical to say "it's not our my problem" or "I have my own family to worry about" and wash your hand of the whole situation ? I don't know. I really don't.
But I do know that suddenly spelling test don't seem like a very big deal.
Until next time...
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