7th grade

I met with Timmy's teachers and the school psychologist this afternoon.  I had requested this meeting early on so that we could discuss strategies to help Timmy succeed in 7th grade, since no one shared my opinion that he should repeat 6th grade.  His language arts/reading teacher sat right next to me and told me that she has over 100 students, and that she wasn't sure which one is Timmy.  She was the teacher I met at back to school night who I thought Timmy would like best.  During the meeting, she got up to retrieve her seating chart from his class so she could place his face.  I know it's just the second week of school, but geeze!  I am pretty sure that I would not admit to a parent that I knew in advance I would be meeting with, that I didn't know who her kid was!  Anyhow, the meeting went OK - I expressed my concerns about Timmy's adjustment, and his (un)preparedness for the more difficult grading scale; his civics teacher told me he got an 83% on his first quiz, which made me happy till she said 83%  is a C, not a B, as it would have been in Camp Lejeune.  I told all of the teachers that I would like to keep the lines of communication open - that Timmy's greatest "handicap" is disorganization, and that quite often, homework gets "lost" between his completion (I always check his planner for his assignments, and he has to show me the assignments when they are done) and turning it into the teacher.  I told them that I don't expect any of them to accept late work for full credit, but that I would appreciate notice well before report cards come out, if he is missing a lot of work, or doing poorly.  They all agreed to keep me posted, and to implement the accommodations he got last year.  He did not take his concerta this morning, and they all said that he was fine in class.  Although, behavior has not been an issue in school (as it is much more obvious when he hasn't had his medicine at home), but I would be interested to see if he can focus at school and retain information without the concerta, since I really don't like medicating him if he doesn't need it.  He doesn't like it either - says it impairs his imagination, which is his personal favorite thing about himself.  Anyhow, this was the homework scenario this evening:

Me:  Timmy, you have a spelling/vocab test tomorrow.  Where are your words so I can quiz you?

Timmy:  I wrote them in my planner.
Looking in his planner, I find the words listed under a section entitled "Books I Want to Read"

Of the 10 words he had, these are the ones he found difficult:

Binary - having 2 parts

Binomial - having two names (I had to look this one up - see previous post.  I don't think that was the definition they were looking for)

Duplex - "a type of battery" - um, no

Bipartisan, "having two parts" (makes sense to me!), but again, "no".

Duple-"like a big lego" nope

Spelling was another challenge, we should definitely have started reviewing before today.  Sigh.   

His civics homework was to gather political cartoons and/or articles to contribute to a group project on the election.  I can honestly say I could not have cared less about politics or government when I was his age.  Helping him to find cartoons that we both understood (or that I could explain to him), was truly a challenge.  Where is my husband when I need him?  Oh yeah, he's in Colorado again. 

Timmy's math spiral notebook already looks like he's had it all year (I just found it under the couch).  He truly is a delightful kid, and fun to be with.  But, he is a MESS!!!!

As frustrating as this all is, I can picture my husband reading this and laughing, because I tend to be a bit scattered myself.  He once told me that there are a lot of qualities I have that he finds endearing, but that is not one of them!  Timmy and I are quite a pair..........