Notes from teachers

To have a child in elementary school is to be inundated with paper. Everyday, the already-tattered folder comes home in AJ's backpack, filled with recent examples of spelling and vocabulary and math assignments. Notes about upcoming events and projects are also common - almost as common as requests for money for those upcoming events and projects: $5 to rent roller skates, $7 for a yo-yo, $10 for miscellaneous art supplies. Music concerts, community ed. events, field trips, weekly and monthly re-caps: I have no right to ever complain that I am uninformed.

The pastel rainbow of notes never stops. They come daily, get read and then clutter up the dining room table or kitchen counter until I get ambitious and at least clean up and move them to the recycling bin.

And now that Sydney is in pre-school, I see double the tree carnage.

But of all the notes, my favorites are the personal comments from the kids' teachers.

After Sydney's first full week of preschool, this is what her teacher was able to tell us:

Sydney was so excited to be at school. She was loving using scissors. She said she's never used scissors and is so excited! Remind her to cut with thumb on top ("Thumbs up for good cut")

Meanwhile, AJ gives his teacher all sorts of content to write home about. A recent e-mail included: 

I wanted to let you know Alex has been doing a wonderful job of not talking when I'm talking or teaching in the classroom. We're still working on listening to directions, such as when I'm teaching and I want the kids to come to the board and do something... he has a hard time listening, and therefore knowing what to do when it's his turn. We're working on it though! And I'm learning more about him and his love for learning, history, etc. every day. He's so much fun to have in the room!

My personal favorite was a note jotted on a homework assignment of AJ's. The teacher had read a book to the class about "Big rigs", and the kids were supposed to write sentences about what they'd learned. AJ's sentences included "Big rigs drive to Florida." and "They drive very, very fast." The teacher gave him credit for using his imagination, writing:

This is nice, but we didn't learn this in the story.