When AJ is in charge

Change, my friends, is a comin'. When AJ grows up, no matter which profession he chooses, you can expect him to make some changes.

For instance, there will be no decorating for Christmas until after Thanksgiving. Walking into the fully decked mall yesterday, AJ announced, "When I'm president, if a store puts up Christmas stuff before Thanksgiving, I'll tell it it has to close for a week!"

Speaking of change, note the new eyeglasses, which was the reason for our trip to the mall.

These frames can bend and stretch in ways I didn't think possible. In other words, they're hopefully flexible enough to survive puppies and hockey helmets.

As we waited for the new glasses to be ready, we stopped for lunch in the food court. AJ, die-hard fan of Potato Olés that he is, chose Taco John's. Watching me fill our glasses with pop, AJ said, "Wouldn't it be nice if we had our own cups and we could get pop any time we wanted? If I owned a Taco John's, I would say that pop is free." He paused to analyze this business decision, then announced, with the wisdom of a six-year-old, "I'd still charge for children's drinks, but pop is free."

Coincidentally, the movie Big was on TV last night. AJ loved it. During a commercial break, as I attempted to take a nice photo of him in his new glasses, he made clear something else that would change if he was the one making decisions. You can look however you want in pictures:

The "pretending to sleep" pose

The "pretending to be shocked/scared by something on TV" pose

The "I crack myself up" smile

Yes, if AJ was in charge, there'd never be a dull moment. But come to think of it, that's not much of a change from how it is now.

Snow + puppy + glove = "Mommy, help!"

The snow that's been predicted all week - first for Sunday, then for Saturday night into Sunday, then for Saturday afternoon - showed up Friday afternoon. It wasn't a lot, just enough to remind us about the fun of winter driving, and to get Sydney excited to play outside in her new (hand-me-down) snowpants and brand new gloves.

Of course Gus wanted to join her. He's gotten over his initial "What just happened?!?" shock of seeing snow on the ground, and now seems to enjoy playing outside more than ever. And so out the back door they went in search of accumulated snow.

That lasted about a minute and a half, and then Sydney was back at the door, "Moooommmmmm! Gus has my glove!"

We did our best to corner him, which didn't work at all.

Gus loved this game of chase, dodging us with ease and running around the yard.

I finally threw one of his toys at him, which shocked him enough that he dropped the glove. I grabbed it, put it back on Sydney and headed back inside. Just as I was taking off my coat, Sydney was back at the door, yelling for me and yelling at Gus. Back on went the coat as I headed back out to repeat the "chase, dodge, throw things at the dog" process. It took a little longer this time because Gus apparently wasn't as surprised anymore by the sight of toys hurtling his way.

At last I was able to retrieve the glove. I again put it on Sydney's hand and went back inside. Before I took my coat off, I turned around to see what she was playing with Gus. She was feeding him snow.

No wonder it was so easy for him to grab her glove! Here Gus, why don't you just take it.

Report card time

RIT score. NWEA RIT Scale Norms. Lexile Range.

Huh?

These are all words on AJ's standardized student progress report, which I received last night at a conference with his teacher. It's not just the terminology, but the grades that have me baffled. According to this standardized test, AJ is slightly above average in reading, and below average in math.

Below average? In math? This is the child who is constantly calculating numbers in his head. Maybe he's strategizing to set the bar low, so he'll show marked improvement by year's end. Even the teacher said his low score had surprised her.

And then I looked at the breakdown. When it comes to number sense, computation and measurement/geometry, he's in the top 80th percentile. In statistics/probability and algebra he's average. It's the problem solving - where he scored in the bottom 20 percent - that brought his overall grade way down. It's the longer questions, which he probably didn't understand to begin with because his mind started wandering, that he couldn't solve.


Self portrait of a first grader



That whole paying attention factor reared its ugly head a few times. Mrs. Baird says Alex is getting better at waiting his turn to talk, rather than blurt out whatever thought comes into his head, it's still affecting his ability to pay attention. She speculates that he's focusing so hard on his thoughts (so he doesn't forget them before he has a chance to share) that he's then missing whatever it is she's teaching.

I'd say she's got him pretty well figured out.

Moving on to the regular report card, the news was much more as I expected: top scores in math (which totally contradicts the results of the standardized test) science, music, art and phy. ed. He's good in language arts, with two exceptions. His handwriting is bad and there's a category called... of course... "Speaking & Listening." Alex has no problem speaking and expressing himself in front of the class or in small group settings, Mrs. Baird assured me. It's that darn listening part.

And time management. He wasn't graded on it, but here's an example of how well AJ works in "Centers" (small groups with minimal supervision). The assignment was to write all the letters of the alphabet, first in lowercase, then uppercase. He was given 10 minutes to finish. And he got this far:

I don't mean to sound overly negative. I know my son's strengths and weaknesses. I just find humor in the overly polite way educators try to explain the areas in which he struggles. For instance, in the area "listens attentively" the comment was:

Alex is often quiet during instruction, but when called upon randomly to answer a question or come to the board, he doesn't know what he's been asked to do.

For "displays self control", the teacher wrote:

Alex has improved, but should continue working on controlling his urge to talk or blurt out during instructions.

Despite all this, Mrs. Baird says AJ is doing great and she very much enjoys having him in class. She is as entertained as I am by the way his mind works.

Here are some other examples of what he's been doing during his first quarter in school:



Our neighborhood

 

My dad will appreciate this all-school art project focused on shading.

Here's a close up of AJ's contribution.

And this is just the first quarter of first grade. If we can get him to pay attention, the rest of the year should be just fine.

The unfairness of Christmas

For 2,000 years, the true story of Christmas has been shared, passed down from generation to generation. Biblical scholars, language experts and scientists alike have closely studied and compared even the finest details and variations between  the gospel accounts.

And yet, leave it to my six year old to raise a question I've never heard asked.

Sydney's choice for a bedtime story one recent night was a new paperback I'd picked up entitled "The Christmas Story".  AJ and I took turns – I'd read one page and he'd read the next.

As I read the page showing Mary riding on a donkey with Joseph walking along side on their way to Bethlehem, I commented, "Can you imagine walking all that way?"

A few pages later, Joseph and Mary had made it to the stable, and the picture and words described Joseph making a soft bed for Mary from the hay.

And that's when AJ interrupted, "Why does the girl always get the lucky stuff?"

He's such a gentleman! I'll be sure to share this story with his wife someday – ideally when she's nine months pregnant.

With age comes wisdom

For as long as he can remember, AJ has always wanted to be bigger. To be older. Some of his best friends are six months older, and he wants to catch up to them. He knows he has to finish high school before he can be a brave Army soldier, and so he wants to grow old enough to do that.

But all of a sudden he's discovered that older isn't always better. "It's not fair," he told me as we arrived home last night. "I have to go to school five days a week, and Sydney only has to go three days."

And not only that, the homework he has to do in first grade isn't nearly fun as what his sister is bringing home from preschool. While he has to work on a spelling assignment...

Sydney gets to jump over boxes. Seriously. One of Sydney's take-home projects, obviously geared toward improving coordination and physical activity, was to find various sized boxes and jump over them.

As AJ struggled to understand the concept of creating a code - assigning numbers to letters and writing his spelling words in code, Sydney was leaping and laughing. And driving her brother crazy with jeaolousy.

Which made for a wonderful incentive. We saved the boxes for when AJ finished his assignment.

So AJ was happy in the end. But it got me thinking. When is it really better to be older? With age comes ever-increasing responsibility.Throughout school he will always have harder homework. And then he'll move on to college and into the real world, and - while he'll certainly enjoy more freedom - he'll again have greater responsibility than his little sister. The best he can look forward to is that someday she'll catch up. God forbid she somehow manages to retire before him. Then there'd be no justice in this world.

Hmmm... perhaps it's because I've often commented that being grown up isn't as fun as I'd thought it would be. That makes it kind of hard to offer comfort. I better just stick to offering boxes as a distraction.

Operation Mom Screwed Up Again

This is what happens when I try to do something good for myself like join an adult Sunday School class. I miss out on the kids' classes, and forget important things like coming prepared with a packed shoebox of toiletries and gifts for Operation Christmas Child.

And so on Sunday, which was a family Sunday School event, we spent the hour filling out the greeting sheets that will accompany our boxes.

Whichever children receive our boxes - if they know how to read, and if they speak English - will learn how old my kids are and that AJ likes Legos and Sydney likes to play on the computer. They'll also know what our house looks like because the kids drew pictures, which look exactly like our house looks. If our house was green (Sydney's version) or orange (AJ's version).

 

And then after Sunday School, Mommy and AJ raced to Walmart to pick out toothbrushes and toothpaste, washrags and soap (which we ended up replacing because AJ thought they were too stinky - thank goodness I still have plenty of hotel-size soaps that were leftover from last summer's vacation.) We also added crayons, markers, a small notebook, candy, a few small gender-specific toys and some other things.

Next it was time to pack our shoeboxes.

And then Mommy went in search of bigger shoeboxes so we could squeeze everything in.

At  last we were done and so headed back to church (the boxes aren't being picked up until tomorrow morning, I checked.) AJ hopped out of the mini-van, eager to help play Santa. 

And then we discovered the doors were locked, and so headed back to the mini-van. Jeff's going to try again to drop off the boxes this morning.

For all the hassles, it was a good lesson in charity for the kids. When AJ first heard about the program, he excitedly exclaimed, "I want to get a box!"

I explained to him that the box was the only gift many children would receive, his expression changed to one of horror. Who could imagine anything so horrible? Reality checks aren't always fun, but they sure are helpful when trying to teach kids to be grateful for the good life they take for granted.

That was a FUN party!

It is a wonderful day (or in this case, evening) when children reach a certain age or stage of maturity. It's the stage when they happily play with friends, with little parental supervision or guidance needed.

Saturday night we invited our friends the Kilichowskis and the Kuklinskis (can you tell we live in Finn country?) over for a lasagna dinner. Is it any wonder why AJ enjoys playing with these boys? They came dressed and armed for battle. 

On the girl end of the spectrum, Sydney and Reese apparently found Sydney's tube of lip gloss and excitedly presented their glamorous new look.

I somehow managed to miss getting a picture of Avery. For the most part, she stuck with the boys, borrowing one of AJ's helmets and Nerf guns. But the tutu she was wearing didn't quite fit with the rest of the army theme.

And while the kids ran around the house battling foreign invaders, or hung out in Sydney's room playing princess or preparing snacks and treats, the grown ups got to sit and talk, watch a little TV, and just enjoy time with good friends.

The next morning, I surveyed the living room and was pleasantly surprised by how clean it had remained. And then I walked into Sydney's room.

Surveying the wreckage, Sydney smiled up at me and said, "That was a FUN party!"