I wish he'd chosen a hero with an easier job

C wrote this as part of a homework assignment a few months ago. It broke my heart a little. (The mess in Afghanistan left him feeling betrayed by Obama.)

Barack Obama is President of the United States. At first I liked him more than any other president but then, although he is better than John McCain, he isn't as good as I first thought. Though I still agree with his health care plan, the lesson is that I can't like and trust someone (especially not a politician) too much.

I wonder if he could sell it at the Little Book House

All the kids in C’s class are doing reports on different countries. For their final project, they are making an alphabet book on their country, with each letter discussing a different topic. (A, for example, could be about animals, and they’d list some animals found in the country.)

Of course, instead of choosing Ireland or France like a normal child, he had to go with Afghanistan. Some of his topic selections? J is for jihad, O is for opium, Q is for al-Qaeda, V is for vengeance (post-9/11 bombings by the U.S.), Y is for yearning (for children to no longer be killed by land mines). I suspect this was not quite what his teacher had in mind. Now he is supposed to add illustrations- I can’t wait to see it when it’s done.

A few weeks ago he sent the President a letter asking him to pull out of Afghanistan. He included diagrams suggesting a withdrawal plan. I thought it was pretty awesome but realized that most parents probably don’t get sappy over their kid’s military strategies.

beauty contests would be more interesting if they had talents like this

C (leaving for school): Oh, I forgot the Obama picture I need for the demonstration!
D: What demonstration?
C: I wrote speeches for a demonstration at school. I'm going to be Obama and Owen is going to be Bush.
D: You can't have a demonstration at school. It's...
C: I have to GO! Bye!

(later)
S: So how did those speeches go?
C: It was great! At the end I pretended to hit Owen and then he pretended to kick me and then I pretended to knock him over!
S: So was this at recess or what?
C: No.
S: It was in class?
C: Music class.
S: Uh, what did your music teacher think of that?
C: She thought it was great!
S: ??
C: It was for the talent show.
S: You and Owen did a mock debate for a music class talent show? What did the other kids do?
C: Oh, singing and playing instruments and things like that.
S: Those are more traditional skills to share.
C: She said she'd never seen anything like it before!
S: I'll bet she hadn't. You wrote the speeches for both of you?
C: Yes. It was kind of hard because I was Obama and wanted to say lots of bad things about Bush but I didn't say all of them because I didn't want to make Owen feel bad.
S: That was thoughtful of you.

subversive schoolwork

Choice excerpts of C's spelling classwork below. The underlined word is the spelling word.

Alex P. Keaton strikes again:
Always try to make much more money!
I am saving money now to make a foundation for businesses later.

Reading fantasy to him out loud means he doesn't learn how to spell the REALLY important words:
Ogers are very unpleasant.

Perhaps I should challenge him to make the whole assignment an ongoing dialogue:
When will I start the mission?
Why do you want this mission completed already?

I think assignments like this almost beg for these kinds of random responses, but I do wonder about what free-association world they come from:
Would you like to make some guesses on the stealth of contestant no. 37?
I had some sandwiches for lunch and found a topaz in one.

And we don't even make him listen to them:
Obama and Micane will give many long speeches before the coming election.

And from math class:

I attached 3 plastic fingers to one hand. Then I cut off 7. How many fewer fingers do I have than I started? (I had 10 to begin with.)

He was supposed to come up with a word problem with the numbers 4, 7, and 11. We are indeed disturbed by the finger-chopping bit, but disregarding his sociopathic tendencies, I'm intrigued by the complexity of the problem he came up with. (The answer is 4, for those of you distracted by the blood.)

it's the last day of school-

We'll see if C manages to effect a significant enough attitude adjustment for us to be able to keep him home next year. (I don't mind the homeschooling; I do mind the constant badgering of his sister.) Interestingly, our backyard-adjoining neighbor is pulling her same-age son out for next year, which could make things easier in many ways.

And his shirt doesn't help either

C has had a series of "literature projects" due each week at school. Given his WWII obsession and unwillingness to follow directions, I suspect that his output has been rather different from what his teacher expected. The first week was supposed to be a "banner" about a book. C constructed a 3-dimensional military tank out of paper and attached it to a piece of paper (the "banner") with a string. I didn't see last week's, which was a mobile; I only hope that he didn't make the cutouts in the shape of swastikas.

This week, he was assigned to make a mask. His choice of character is not unexpected.

Yes, I tried to encourage him to choose anyone other than Hitler. Yes, I have an e-mail in to his teacher apologizing. Yes, I started to try to explain to him how Hitler's image remains very disturbing to a lot of people, but stopped when I realized I might be doing more harm than good. How to explain to a seven-year-old how the horrors of a war that ended before his grandparents were born are still so resonant?

darn librarians

I suppose I should be glad that the school librarians trouble to notice the books that interest C and direct him toward others they think he might like. But I kind of wish they weren't actively encouraging his current fascination with Hitler. His current pick is "World War II: Battles and Leaders." He asked me why Hitler commit suicide, what an atomic bomb does, and the definition of "execute." Maybe I should appreciate the fact that the discussion enabled a conversation that didn't involve him storming off in a huff, but....

When I casually asked why he liked WWII books so much lately, though, he said "because I want to think of ways to stop wars from happening again." Thinking that he'd come up with a rather sophisticated prevarication custom-designed to make me happy, I tried to elicit something more antisocial. "Sometimes, even though I don't like to think about people getting hurt, it's exciting for me to read about battles." He looked at me like I was insane, and said, "It's not for me." So just maybe we're raising a little pacifist after all.

I wonder what Alfie Kohn would think of this.

C brought home a worksheet from school. One of the questions was, “Would you want to be friends with the main character of this book?” His response, referring to Helen Keller: “No, because she couldn’t see a thing!”


S: C yelled at me this morning for telling him I put bread in the toaster for him. It went better than usual, though, because when I pointed out that I’d done nothing wrong, he just harrumphed at me rather than contradicting me.
D (with egregious British accent): “An argument isn’t just contradiction.” We have to show him the Argument Clinic sketch.
S: He wouldn’t get it; he doesn’t understand jokes.
D: But it’s still funny. Hand me the laptop so I can pull it up and show you.
S: You’ve already told me about it, which was probably a good deal funnier than having to actually watch it.


A: Here is a cow.
S: Moo.
A: Talk to me, not the cow!


A (mumbling to herself): It’s a catastrophe!

his mother's son

I noticed that there was a request form on one of C's library books from school. While I have the public library set aside virtually all of our books for us, I didn't even know C could do that at school. Turns out he saw the book at the book fair but couldn't afford it. I'd like to know whether he pitched a fit and the staff found a way to appease him, or if he came up with the idea himself.

redistricting

Because I know everyone is fascinated with this process- at last week's elementary school redistricting meeting, all five scenarios presented had C switching from his current school to one which is significantly larger and not within walking distance. Not the end of the world, but also less than ideal- walkability is important to us, especially since we only have one car, and he has enough social issues without switching schools next year. I contacted everyone I could think of to try to change the boundary lines, but figured it was a lost cause. But at tonight's meeting, it looked like they're going to make the change I requested! Apparently tracking down the e-mail addresses of everyone involved and knowing someone on the committee made a difference. I'm so glad I put in the time to get this fixed. It's still not 100% definite, but I'm optimistic.

S: Did you sing any songs today at school?
A: Yes, we sang three songs.
S: Who did you sit next to when you sang the songs?
A: Clara. I like to sit next to girls better than boys.
S: Why?
A: Because boys pester me too much.
S: And the girls don't?
A: No.
S: What do boys do to pester you?
A: They do things like make alien hands* at me.
S: Well, C does that; do the boys at school do that too?
A: No. But Paul says, "stop looking at me!"
S: So that's why you don't like to sit next to Paul.
A: Yes.
S: Do you like to sit next to Casey?
A: Well, Casey likes to say, "I'm a dragon!" and I don't like dragons.

Unfortunately, C's bus came just then so I didn't get to hear what was wrong with the rest of the boys.

*Alien hands is what C calls it when he waves his fingers in someone's face. A hates it so much it makes her cry. We hate it so much that it makes us reconsider corporal punishment. Alien hands have been banned from our home.

I've been to a few more redistricting meetings and asked around, and learned that the comments on "socioeconomic diversity" do indeed seem to refer to the fact that the school C currently attends has a bit more rental property within its current catchment area. It's pretty darn funny.

Excluding NYC, about 32% of elementary school students in New York qualify for the school lunch program. 55% of those in Albany's Montessori magnet school do. It's only 6% at Elsmere, 3% at Hamagrael (the "rich" school). It amazes me that people really stress out about those 19 "poor" kids (potential bad influences?) without seeing the bigger picture here.

(And it just occurred to me that I've been spending too much time going to redistricting meetings. Dan and I have an agreement that each of us can go out two evenings a week; that still leaves us at least three nights a week together. He spends most of his nights out seeing friends or playing volleyball these days. Me, I go to meetings. I need to get a life.)

An article about speeding up Ph.D. completion.

What it fails to mention is what I saw in my program:

- people stayed in because they didn't have jobs yet, and didn't have anywhere else to go. You need a university affiliation to be considered by a hiring committee; you can't just go work in a quarry while you wait for the offers to roll in.
- other stayed in because they were comfortable there, and in no hurry to go out into the big bad world.
- a good amount of time needs to be spent learning academic culture and playing the game, including putting face time in at conferences and hoping to get introduced to important people.
- a lot of students get bogged down just because they're lazy- I don't know anyone in my department who regularly worked productively more than 25 hours a week (including myself). Motivation is tough, but necessary.

It also doesn't point out the fairly obvious fact that we really don't need too many people with Ph.D.s!

I went to a meeting last night about redistricting the elementary schools; on the current map, we're only a block away from being assigned to a rather less desirable school, so I wanted to see if it's likely we'll be reassigned next year. Unsurprisingly, the meeting didn't begin to give me any answers to that question, but a somewhat unexpected issue was raised- someone asked if the redistricting was going to consider the socioeconomic balance between the schools in its decision-making.

One of the elementary schools located in a more rural part of town has the most economic diversity (i.e. a few not-so-rich people live out that way). Busing kids to and from that area would be illogical and, I would imagine, undesirable to anyone involved. So I'm not entirely sure what they were getting at, and it wasn't explicitly stated. Other than that rural area, Bethlehem residents for the most part range between pretty rich (I include those who'd consider themselves middle class in this category, because compared to the folks a mile down Delaware Avenue into Albany, they are) and very rich. I've heard some grumbling about the new PTA-funded playground equipment at one of the elementary schools that includes more of the very-rich, and am wondering if that's what this is about- is the person who raised the question (someone I dislike, incidentally, whose kids attend C's school) offended that his kids might only benefit from the fundraising efforts of the pretty-rich folks, rather than the very-rich?

Following the question, someone said something earnest about how we needed more economic diversity in the schools (racial diversity, of course, being completely off the table). I muttered "we live in Bethlehem!" under my breath, which got a few snickers from those around me, so I don't think I'm missing something obvious here....

The head of the Montessori school down the road just called to let us know that A has a space there for the fall! We were so far down on the waiting list that we figured we had no chance, but I made Dan call last week and it paid off. It's for the afternoon session, which isn't so good- A is still napping, plus we know several people with kids in the morning program- but given our current lack of child care, we're thrilled to have ANYTHING. Now I just need to somehow, in the next three weeks, convince A that she wants to go to school and that she is ready to give up naps.

In addition to crawling more determindly, A is starting to point/ touch things with one finger- a precursor to using the thumb and finger to pick things up, rather than raking at objects with the whole palm of her hand. It's amazing how she's making enormous strides in both gross and fine motor skills simultaneously, especially since she's also making more and more sounds. (She's not saying "hi" like C clearly did by this age, but she MIGHT have said "mama" and "da-da" a few times. We like to think she did, anyway.)

C began a morning day camp sponsored by Bethlehem Parks and Recreation today. It was so poorly run that I almost didn't leave him there, but with kindergarten coming up, I was worried about setting a precedent of backing out before giving the program a chance. (We'll be fully prepared to pull C out of kindergarten if it's not working out, but we want him to go for at least a month before making that decision.) None of the teenage counselors (there was no one there over 20) there introduced themselves to either me or C, and none of them made an effort to engage C in any activity. I might have excused them since I was still there and they may have figured I wanted to work with him, but there were two other kids who clearly needed help yet were just left to stand by themselves looking hopeless and confused. After half an hour, despite C's protests, I forced a counselor to take charge of him and left (feeling horrible). Once at home, Dan suggested that before we decided to pull him out, he'd check it out again and see what was going on now that I was gone. The kids were on the playground and a school administrator let Dan into a classroom facing the playground so he could spy on the kids. C was trailing behind the counselor I'd left him with, talking continuously, so obviously doing okay. Probably in the hopes of shaking C, this counselor was actually engaging with the other campers. The rest were chatting amongst themselves, except one who was sleeping on a picnic table. (Keep in mind- this was the FIRST DAY of a camp session for PRESCHOOLERS. When I was a day camp counselor, I certainly had days I sort of blew off, but I was working with grade-school aged kids that I knew well enough to know if one of them needed attention.)

Expecting the worst when I picked C up, I wasn't surprised to find him milling aimlessly around the cafeteria where the camp is based. But when I brought him out to the car, he was in a pretty good mood- apparently someone managed to break through their apathy for long enough to organize a game of duck-duck-goose, which for whatever reason he loves. And he said, "Maybe we'll play it again tomorrow!" So despite the mediocrity of the program, we're hesitant to pull him out when he's willing to go- again, because of kindergarten coming up. (Which raises a whole lot of questions about whether we should even be considering sending him to kindergarten if we think a camp where the kids are ignored is suitable preparation for it, but we have another month to contemplate them.) After tomorrow, we'll decide for sure whether or not to keep him in; either way, Parks and Rec will be getting a call from us demanding that they monitor their employees better. (There was a grown-up supervisor at the camp I worked at, and it definitely made a difference.)