Landon and Carson

*I initially wrote this and saved it in my drafts since no one else wants to read about how the boys are doing in school, but then I smacked my forehead and reminded myself that I am keeping this blog for US.  So yes, another blog post about school which I know the boys will appreciate one day when they have kids in school and they are frustrated parents themselves. I know I love to look back at my old report cards and compare how I did to how the boys do. I would love to have more specifics with what I struggled with and what I excelled in. So even though personal blogs have kind of gone the way of the dinosaur I still love keeping records of our lives. Just imagine how great it would be to read books our grandparents kept with the details and fun events of their lives and the lives of our parents. I'm excited that one day my grand kids and great grand kids will have these books to read and will know who I am and know what our lives were like in the year 2013 when things were so different from how they will be fifty or one hundred years from now.

Landon is so full of it and always make me either laugh or roll my eyes. Today the boys get out super early at 12:15 so teachers can prep for PT conferences next week. I dropped the boys at the curb. Landon climbs out and walks up to the front passenger window.
"So are we going to be in school for like four hours today?"
Me:"Yes, I'll pick you up in four hours."
"Mom, four hours spent at school is wasting four hours of my day!"

Like he has so many other things on his schedule. He was hoping he'd get out earlier so he could miss math class today. He was in grade 1-2 math and apparently wasn't being challenged enough so they moved him up a level. Math is not so easy anymore. The math problems he was doing were already much more difficult than Carson ever did in first grade, and it was still easy for Landon...but then again, Landon is a natural with math. He told me math was so much harder yesterday. New class, new teacher, new math problems. I'm anxious to talk with his teacher next week to see how he's holding up. The fact that kids separate for classes based on their ability is my favorite aspect of this school. I know that they are being challenged, but not above what they can handle.

Truth be told, I'm more relaxed, the boys are happier and I get mad or yell at least 90% less than I did last year. School was a big stress on our family life and I can't explain it, but everything seems much smoother this year. I'm actually enjoying my kids on weekdays, rather than getting after them constantly for not focusing in school, or not knowing how to do homework, or losing a stamp. What a change! Don't get me wrong, I still get frustrated but not so much with the boys. Carson is on his THIRD book report since he started school and they are hard! He's never had to do a book report so to suddenly have these difficult outlines, rough drafts etc dumped on him is tough for both of us and I don't blame him for not knowing how to do it since he was not eased into it, but thrown in and it's literally sink or swim. We're learning together and while it's frustrating, at least I can be frustrated with the school and not specifically with Carson. On the positive side, if Carson goes back to traditional public school he'll be ahead of the game as far as writing book reports go.

Last year Landon often brought home unfinished work from Kindergarten or would lose his stamp for a ridiculous reason. It wasn't that the work was hard, but the opposite. It was a bit too easy. He was bored and wasn't being challenged. He lost his stamp several times for completing math work ahead of the class. Silly, right. Apparently his teacher wanted the whole class to do the math work together, but Landon would read through it and do it within a few minutes and would therefore get in trouble. The math was too easy, and I know most of the kids would have benefited from being challenged a bit more. But this was the problem, they catered to the average student and it just wasn't working for the boys. Landon was ahead in math and got in trouble because of it, and Carson was behind in math and NEVER received any extra help at school. He was frustrated and I was frustrated, especially since we were both trying so hard.

Truth be told, when the boys initially started at the new school, I only bought them two complete uniforms each since I was secretly planning on putting them back in their home school within a few months. Well, they're doing so well that I've resigned myself to keeping them in school since they're both excelling. So we went shopping and bought the boys a uniform for each day of the week. The two they each had are already looking pretty worn since they were getting washed 2-3x a week. I just can't let my kids re-wear dirty clothes. I like knowing they are fresh and clean each day. So now they have a uniform for each day and I have already figured a rotation so I insure they only get worn/washed once a week. Landon's already worn through the knees on a pair of Khaki's so I had to find pants with reinforced knees for him, otherwise it would be very costly replacing uniforms every couple months.

I still get sad when I see the other kids walking home from school. However, I do enjoy the time I get while driving to talk to the boys without any distractions. I love hearing about their day, their friends and their homework. Last year I was freaked out at times about sending a third child through school since it was so stressful and I found myself yelling waaay too much, but now I feel like it's doable and I can actually enjoy being a mom on school days.

On Wednesday we attended the morning assembly to see the fourth grade sing My Grandfather's Clock. We loved it. Once again we got to sing the Star Spangled Banner with the kids and watch them do their "sound-off", not to mention the fourth graders were so cute and hear them singing such an old classic was so much fun. The boys have music class a couple days a week are are learning some great songs. Currently they're preparing for a Veteran's Day program where they can invite any veteran's for a breakfast and program. I pulled up the music to "Thank You Soldier's" on Youtube and Landon practiced over and over again. Have I mentioned how happy the boys are? I just wish this was our neighborhood school so they could attend with their friends and walk to and from school together.



John plans on keeping them at this school indefinitely, while I was only planning on this year. I guess this is a discussion we'll have at the end of the year when we really sit down together and evaluate how this year went. Fortunately/unfortunately so far so good.