OneRepublic - Counting Stars feat. Disney Villains

Pumpkin Heads 2001

It's almost Halloween, so I thought you could use a fun Halloween treat. Thanks to Aunt Ashes for helping, and to Wendell Minor for giving us one of our most favorite Halloween stories, ever. 

Enjoy!

Girl Scout National Convention

See you there?

Our Great Japanese Adventure

Should you be interested, the photo album for our trip to Japan is now on my flickr site.

You may see all 188 pages by clicking here

Is this Kansas?

School is a difficult thing for JB. Being dyslexic is more than just reading letters and numbers backwards. It also makes it difficult for her to focus on and remember instructions, and home work takes a ridiculously long time. Each and every single year she has been in school, we have followed the same methodology. It goes like this: 

The term starts. 

I meet the teachers.

 I explain JB's learning style to them. I give them a book about dyslexia. They don't read it.

 They inform me they are the experts and this is the way they've done it for (insert amount here) years, and they are sure she will be fine in their class.

Homework loads increase and increase until JB is doing 6+ hours per night.

She gives up dance class, and most extra curricular activities in order to do homework.

I go back to talk to teachers some more.

They inform me they are the experts and this is the way they've done it for (insert amount here) years, and JB just needs to get more organized.We re-work her organizational system to fit the newest trends in binder technologies. It doesn't help.

We have a 504 meeting. They give her extra time on assignments, which is great, but if she actually uses it, she falls farther and farther behind and is always playing catch-up.

JB tries, but hours and hours of homework begin to effect her health and sleeping patterns. I start "helping" with her homework by completing the crossword puzzles, coloring the maps, reading the assigned novels and telling her what happened, completing the final editing on English reports so they can go in on time, etc.

I go back to talk to teachers. 

They inform me they are the experts and this is the way they've done it for (insert amount here) years, and JB just needs to focus more, try harder, and not worry so much about her grades. At one school in the past we were even told "She can still go to college. She most likely won't get a scholarship with these kind of grades, but there are lots of state schools that will let her in, you're just going to have to pay for it." 

This year has started out pretty much the same. Finally, Monday night, I reached a breaking point. When JB gets stressed, her temperature spikes, she turns white, and she doesn't sleep. The homework load for the night was ridiculous, mainly because it's tough anyway, but she had a lot of catch-up work to do. She worked for about 6 hours and I realized she had at least another 4 hrs to go, when at 10:30 p.m.  I told her I wouldn't allow her to do anymore. We would go in to talk to the counselor in the morning, and insist on dropping one of her classes, and she will have to take summer school or on line school or something else, because this is ridiculous. 

So, I sent her to bed, and spent the rest of the night formulating my arguments. Planning the things I needed to say to get the point across that we need to drop a class, and that this cannot continue. I mentally armored myself.  I didn't sleep. I had to be prepared to shoot down their newest hipster plan of the hour to change JB's behavior so she could fit into their mold of the year.

Bring it on.

Tuesday morning we went to school together. I asked the school counselor for a minute of her time. I started my arguments by saying, "We've hit a wall..." 

That's as far as I got. 

The counselor politely ignored me, turned to JB and asked "What can I do for you?" JB explained she was having a hard time keeping up with the homework. The counselor pulled up her grade reports for a few classes. She was missing a lot of science lab book assignments, so they discussed which items were missing, and why they were missing. The counselor hurried and pulled the science teacher into the meeting. They made a plan for JB to come in after school for a  brief tutoring session where the science teacher would instruct her on some short cuts to use in order to complete the lab books faster, and ways to make the lab documentation process simpler. They even discussed going to an on-line lab book so JB didn't have to write so much...she could type it all in instead. 

They looked at the courses she would need for graduation. They discussed ways to tweak her schedule next term to better fit her needs. She will probably drop at least one class, and add a mid-day tutorial class which is a class set aside for kids to do homework with peer tutors while at school. If dropping a class is a problem, she could earn missing graduation requirements over the summer by attending courses on line or at Bridgerland Applied Technology Center. They discussed changing her PE class from regular PE to Yoga, to help with anxiety and stress reduction, while still earning a PE credit. There are only 11 days left in this term, so dropping a class right now is not a great idea. So, instead they recommended prioritizing the given assignments and if needed, just not doing some of them. For example, she is doing better in English right now, so if the choices are completing an English paper for 100 pts, or completing a science paper for 100 pts, focus on the science and don't bother with the English. If you have a passing grade, skip that homework to focus on raising points in the classes without passing grades. 

SKIP THE HOMEWORK?!?! 

They told her to do what is most important. Don't do it all. Prioritize. Relax. Take a break if needed. JB (Not Mom) will talk to the teachers when/if she needs extra time.

They will work on a plan to fit JB. 

They will work with JB on making her own plans. 

I didn't say a word. I didn't need to.