I can't seem to keep up with anything thesedays, let alone blogging. Years from now I'm going to look back on my printed out blog pages (no I don't really do that) and wonder if I was abducted by aliens or something in the fall of 2004. It would be more interesting than what goes on in real life lately. I spend my time, just like my dog - twirling around in circles hoping my head will catch up with my ass. No progress on that front yet.
It seems like everybody wants a little piece of me the last few weeks. Santa wants me shopping for great little gifties. Of course the kids want me shopping for great little gifties too, and of course they have lots of other unreasonable requests like clean underwear. GAH! Animals want food, Doug wants taxes ready to be filed within a reasonable time period and naturally I'm supposed to put the hooey-dooey on every piece of paper I pack into the little box in hopes it will somehow keep us from owing money this year. Yards and yards of fleece scream from the sewing room. I hear the muffled muttering as I walk through to feed the guinea pigs for like the hundred thousandth time (no wonder they're called pigs). They say things like "I'm never going to be a Spiderman robe. Never!"
And the big-headed dog material says, "You think that's bad. I won't even make it to being a bag. A BAG! IT'S TWO SIDE SEAMS AND A HEM! THAT'S IT!"
So then the stuffing that has waited for nearly two weeks to be poked into a small opening left in the side-seam of a pillow gets in on the act and I feel just awful.
All this creativity happening and I have yet to come up with an idea for gifts for the grandmothers, my father-in-law, or my sisters-in-law and their little boy.
I'm never going to make it.
Emily's teachers are after me to set up a time to 'meet'. It's beginning to irritate me to hear Emily tell about her one teacher and how she rolls her eyes when she finds out that my available time slots do not line up with hers, yet again. Something tells me I'll be lucky to come out of that meeting without having snatched that woman bald-headed.
I took Emily out of the AR reading program at school because it was killing her desire to read. It's a reading incentive program. An extra, for cripes sakes. So when I talked to the curriculum coordinator for the school and explained the problem she said "No problem. It's certainly not good if it's having that effect on her." I was so excited. But now the teachers want to make a plan. A PLAN. And I can't, for the life of me, get them to understand that Em has a reading plan already and has no need for anyone to interfere with it. She reads what she wants because she wants and in doing so, she ENJOYS reading.
But noooooo, we gotta have a plan.
They are educated people but they can't seem to get the idea through their head that the AR program is most suited to reluctant readers. Kids that don't want to read normally can fairly easily be motivated to do so using the point goals and tests for rewards. Emily is not that kind of reader. She loves to read. But she's passing over the books she WANTS to read in order to choose lower level books that she can finish in time to meet the goal for the week. Not meeting the reading goal is BAD. It's just awful when you FAIL to meet your reading goal. And she hates reading those books because they are not the ones she wants to read in the first place. When she is finished reading a book she wants to TALK about it and relive the emotion of the story.
Em is a REAL reader but the set-up of this program is doing its best to turn that around. So they'll let me drop the AR program but they are still insisting on a plan.
Give me a break.
Somebody is just not listening to me.
Since Em has had the restrictions of the AR program lifted from her she has enjoyed reading again without anyone forcing her or monitoring her progress. I suggested she read The Outsiders because it's a favorite story of mine and it is nowhere to be found on her AR list and there'll be no test. She's plugging right along, telling me in voice full of emotion about Ponyboy and Johnnie going to Dallas for help after Bob was killed.
"Can he help them?"
"Where will they go?"
"Do you think Ponyboy is cute? I think I like him."
This is reading. No plan. No problem.
It seems like everybody wants a little piece of me the last few weeks. Santa wants me shopping for great little gifties. Of course the kids want me shopping for great little gifties too, and of course they have lots of other unreasonable requests like clean underwear. GAH! Animals want food, Doug wants taxes ready to be filed within a reasonable time period and naturally I'm supposed to put the hooey-dooey on every piece of paper I pack into the little box in hopes it will somehow keep us from owing money this year. Yards and yards of fleece scream from the sewing room. I hear the muffled muttering as I walk through to feed the guinea pigs for like the hundred thousandth time (no wonder they're called pigs). They say things like "I'm never going to be a Spiderman robe. Never!"
And the big-headed dog material says, "You think that's bad. I won't even make it to being a bag. A BAG! IT'S TWO SIDE SEAMS AND A HEM! THAT'S IT!"
So then the stuffing that has waited for nearly two weeks to be poked into a small opening left in the side-seam of a pillow gets in on the act and I feel just awful.
All this creativity happening and I have yet to come up with an idea for gifts for the grandmothers, my father-in-law, or my sisters-in-law and their little boy.
I'm never going to make it.
Emily's teachers are after me to set up a time to 'meet'. It's beginning to irritate me to hear Emily tell about her one teacher and how she rolls her eyes when she finds out that my available time slots do not line up with hers, yet again. Something tells me I'll be lucky to come out of that meeting without having snatched that woman bald-headed.
I took Emily out of the AR reading program at school because it was killing her desire to read. It's a reading incentive program. An extra, for cripes sakes. So when I talked to the curriculum coordinator for the school and explained the problem she said "No problem. It's certainly not good if it's having that effect on her." I was so excited. But now the teachers want to make a plan. A PLAN. And I can't, for the life of me, get them to understand that Em has a reading plan already and has no need for anyone to interfere with it. She reads what she wants because she wants and in doing so, she ENJOYS reading.
But noooooo, we gotta have a plan.
They are educated people but they can't seem to get the idea through their head that the AR program is most suited to reluctant readers. Kids that don't want to read normally can fairly easily be motivated to do so using the point goals and tests for rewards. Emily is not that kind of reader. She loves to read. But she's passing over the books she WANTS to read in order to choose lower level books that she can finish in time to meet the goal for the week. Not meeting the reading goal is BAD. It's just awful when you FAIL to meet your reading goal. And she hates reading those books because they are not the ones she wants to read in the first place. When she is finished reading a book she wants to TALK about it and relive the emotion of the story.
Em is a REAL reader but the set-up of this program is doing its best to turn that around. So they'll let me drop the AR program but they are still insisting on a plan.
Give me a break.
Somebody is just not listening to me.
Since Em has had the restrictions of the AR program lifted from her she has enjoyed reading again without anyone forcing her or monitoring her progress. I suggested she read The Outsiders because it's a favorite story of mine and it is nowhere to be found on her AR list and there'll be no test. She's plugging right along, telling me in voice full of emotion about Ponyboy and Johnnie going to Dallas for help after Bob was killed.
"Can he help them?"
"Where will they go?"
"Do you think Ponyboy is cute? I think I like him."
This is reading. No plan. No problem.
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