Speaking of groundhog. One of my sons had an assignment today at school where he was supposed to use three adjectives to describe a groundhog. This assignment stressed him out a bit and he didn't want to do it. He used one of his allowed breaks that he can have, and then when he went back to do the assignment he decided he didn't want to. The focus room sheet said he "threw" a chair so I had him show me what he did with the chair. What he did to the chair was not throwing it. He knocked it over, there is a difference there. Was it right of him to even knock it over out of frustration? NO not at all. That was not ok. However, he still did not THROW the chair. Anyway, he was sent to the focus room (fair enough, I agree with that he needed to calm down).
In the end, I asked him why he didn't want to do the assignment. He looked at me and told me that he didn't want to do it because he didn't know what a groundhog LOOKED LIKE so how could he describe it?
Valid reason.
If I don't know what something looks like how am I supposed to describe it? I know he's seen drawing or cartoons of a groundhog but he had not seen a real one. So he and I sat about looking up groundhogs on the internet. He got a good look at groundhogs, real ones. I asked him to describe the groundhog, and he easily described him as small, fluffy, brown, fat. All he needed, was to see what you wanted him to describe.
**Not my image**
He's been struggling in school this year with staying focused and handling his emotions when he is frustrated. First grade can be tough, my daughter struggled big time last year too. She had massive anxiety issues last year, and this year now that she's in second grade she's doing fantastic anxiety wise. (I had massive anxiety issues in third grade). He has a fantastic teacher, the same one my daughter had last year. Very thankful for the amazing teachers and staff that work with my kids. They are with my kids for basically 40 hours a week give or take. As well as many OTHER children too, so yeh, they definitely get my respect! I used to want to be a teacher, until I actually shadowed a teacher. While they said cute things that made you go "awww" quite often, I also decided teaching...was not my thing. I didn't have the patience for it. So yes, teachers...serious respect for you!
The past couple of weeks have been especially frustrating at home during home work time because it's DRA testing time. Yipppeee...and by yippee I mean open another bottle of wine and shoot me in the foot please. It's difficult enough to get my kids to do home work on a good day. When DRA testing is coming up and I am really amping up the at home work trying to make sure they are "getting it" it just seems to be torture for all of us, no matter how FUN I try to make it.
Tonight, I attempted to mix something my kids LOVE with something they hate. They HATE sight words. However, they love NERF Guns! So I took a dry erase marker and drew a giant target on the door of my fridge. I wrote sight words in side the bulls eye until all the words were in it. Then the kids got to shoot at the bulls eye and whatever part of the target the NERF bullet hit they had to read the words within that circle. I thought it was brilliant. (it was an adaptation to an idea a friend sent me from Pinterest where the words were written on index cards and taped to the wall and the kids got to shoot the words with the NERF guns, I adapted that idea to fit my own kids). Unfortunately, my children didn't see the "BRILLIANCE" of it. I mean, my daughter thought it was pretty awesome. She enjoyed laying on the ground and pretending to be a "sniper" so she could shoot better. (FYI my daughter would make one heck of a sniper).
One son threw a fit that it was "BORING" he was mad I wouldn't let him play a video game (HEY no video gaming until the WEEKEND MY SON! You know the rules, and even then it's only for a total of TWO hours on each day of the weekend and it has to be spread out through each day not two hours straight playing a video game. Also, you have to spend an equal two hours doing some kind of school work like reading, math, writing, sight words. Then the rest of your time is spent playing outside weather permitting or playing in your room). I know, I'm totally harsh.
The other son just flat out didn't want to do it and kept throwing tantrums and so I finally let him hide under the kitchen table to pout and I ignored his fit and focused on the other two, and told my son under the table that when he decided to quit throwing a fit he was more than welcome to join us. I even got into it and was shooting at the target and reading sight words too, that way it was a game for ALL of us. Eventually all my kids were participating again and we did have fun. Eventually we had to move on to reading and fluency and then on to math. I have a lovely collection of math work books and they had to do several pages in those tonight. I've started timing them on fluency and math. The school always wants them to go "FAST FAST FAST" I don't really agree with making kids do things quickly. The faster you go at something it does increase your risk of error, I would rather my kids go slower and get it done correctly than rush through it, my kids need a little extra time to read, write, and think about things, they cannot do it as fast (though they are improving and that's good). I also do not over pressure them at home. I think accuracy is more important than speed. I'm also not the school though. So if the school wants them to be fast...I guess they just have to learn to be faster.
The faster my kids are told to go, the more anxiety they have and the worse they do. That's when my one son flat out shuts down. He does NOT handle being rushed at all. He literally just cannot do it. It frazzles him so bad he has a break down. At home if I even say "hurry up guys we have to get out the door, hurry hurry" He panics. He doesn't know what to do, and he freezes, and cries, and shuts down. THAT slows us down a million times more. I give him numerous reminders well in advance and go one step at a time and he is able to focus and get things done and is usually ready and out the door with everyone else. Too bad his dad hasn't figure that out though. Dad still struggles with figuring out what works for our boys. He has our daughter fairly well figured out, but the boys are still a ball of constant mystery and headache for him. He'll get there though, he's trying to figure out what they need and how to help, he's a good dad. I'm glad he's my husband and glad he's their dad.
(to be fair I'm still figuring my kids out most of the time, ha!)
We added two new fur members the family recently. They are daughters to our dear cat Hagrid who passed away this fall. Their Daddy was a good cat. His daughters however...are a wee bit psychotic. Anyway, tonight they ended up in the middle of all of the school stuff while we were working on home work. One minute the school stuff was next to them, the next it was on top of them. One of the kittens looked mildly annoyed, but it didn't stop her from going back to sleep.
We still need to work on Valentines cards for the class party next week at school, and for my daughters girl scout troop as well. That's a lot of cards.
I'm trying to keep track of all the lists of names, and who chose what cards, and who needs a box to put their stuff in and yeeeeesh. I don't know if I'm going to make it, ha!
We will make it through the week, we're almost to the weekend! We got this!
Mom Circus
