Beneath the Wraps

I had looked into a Charter school while Jenna was still in kindergarten (which I referred to in this post )   She needed to be challenged, and just wasn’t getting that in our assigned public school.  I am still on the waiting list.           If she had started APA   in the first grade, I don’t think she would have ever questioned it.  She would have loved it in all the ways that I would have not, had it been available to me when I was a youth.  But after two more years of public school?  I think she would totally freak out and hate it even more than the school I was trying to get her away from.           Jenna is very smart academically.  But organizational skills and prioritizing is not in her nature at this time (something that we will be working on this summer) and I don’t think she will adjust well going from free spirit to uniform and structu...

If there are more than two people banding together to undermine authority – it is considered gang violence or gang related or birth of gang actions.  I was not aware of this until this morning, but evidently this cause took place in my daughter’s school fairly recently.           From what I understand it was a bunch of sixth graders.  The principal said there had been about 30 of them who had decided to stir up some mischief and were plotting their aggressive actions in the hall by the doors when they should have gone out for recess.            Of course when they were reminded of the rules to go out for recess and to disengage their loitering, they stood together and refused – which then led to the principal’s office (who by the way is the most awesome principal ever and is even tempered and rational and deserves respect) and the kids somehow blew everything out of propo...

When I was a youth, the only children that knew the principal were the ones who misbehaved during class.   And the only parents who knew the principal were the parents of the children who acted up.   I never knew my principal.   I knew his name.   I knew what he looked like.   But because the only children, who actually knew him personally, were the “bad” children, I had taught myself to be afraid of my principal.   Growing up, the principals were always male.   A female principal was unheard of.   As I have checked out schools in ours and surrounding   districts,   I am finding that it is rare to have a male principal – at least over the elementary schools. Two of the female principals I’ve encountered seem to have sticks up their butts, artificial smiles, and dagger themed tones to their voices.   Not pleasant.   But the principal at Jenna’s present school is so so different from any principal I have ever encounter...

What a great feature – this copy and paste.  Being able to sort your thoughts and move entire paragraphs and transfer information without retyping and having the ability to store information into tiny places and just hit a print button.  No more messy carbon paper.  No more perfect line up of the typewriter ribbon.  I think my favorite feature though is the copy and paste.  It is SO AWESOME!  Wish it had existed during my high school years.  That would have been sweet. I also like having spell check.  So often I hit the wrong key - or I really just don't know how to spell the word.  There's dictionary, thesaurus - such wonderful features that make typing up reports and blogging so much easier. Another feature that I really like on the computer itself is the search.  To be able to type in the name of your document or picture and have the search go through and find it for you.  That is very awesome. ...

          The elementary school that I attended opened the year before I started kindergarten.   At the time the school was designed with rooms that catered to entire grades – not just class sizes.             Three modular walls separated each group of students as there were four instructors assigned to each grade.   Each student was assigned a homeroom teacher.   But the homeroom teacher was not necessarily the same teacher assigned for math or reading or science, etc.   All of the students were taught by all of the teachers for that grade. It was actually a very good system.           I did not appreciate it then.   Nor did I realize that it wasn’t the normal procedure for an elementary school to function in that manner.   Most every person that I know has had only one teacher per grade during his or her ...

         We were on the waiting list with a couple of charter schools.  I had even looked into homeschooling – which is probably what I would have ended up doing if someone hadn’t pointed out the dual immersion program.           The dual immersion program allows students to learn a language in addition to English.  Students have two teachers, one who teaches in English for half of the day. The other will teach in a foreign language with math as the prime subject and will touch on the other subjects. At the time there were only eight schools within this district that offered this dual immersion program.  Two offered Chinese, two offered French and four offered Spanish.  The school closest to where we are living teaches Spanish – which seemed to be the most logical of the three languages as we have contact with almost as many Spanish speaking people as English speaking....

          After the economy started getting bad, we lost our house.   We were forced to move to a much smaller house in a quite low income neighborhood. We spent the first night in our small house the last day in November. But I kept Jenna at her first school until after Christmas break.   Realistically it wasn’t a very practical commute. If the economy hadn’t forced us to downsize – I don’t think I would have questioned Jenna’s opportunity for even just being considered for another school.   We were in the same district, but the boundaries were for another school.           I had tried to transfer Jenna into the school nearest to our house – one we could actually walk to if we needed to.   But they were “filled up” and we lived “on the wrong side of the street”.   My main objective for wanting her over there was to keep her on year round.   There are fo...

          When Jenna was three, we would walk hand in hand over to the public school twice a week for a preschool class that was offered.  At age four she went for four days.  At age five we enrolled her in kindergarten.  All day kindergarten to be exact. We were also in year round school.           I would volunteer in the class room once a week. We were both happy. She loved learning.  I loved her teachers. I never had any reason to look into another school.           Her preschool teacher was great.  She loved those she taught.  And Jenna was forever learning – and socializing.  Jenna was quite popular in her class. Holding hands with Paul the first day of school.  Soaking things in like a sponge.           Her kindergarten teacher was amazing....

          I’m not saying that Jenna has it easier than I did.   But I certainly didn’t have the modern conveniences that she doesn’t yet appreciate.   After all most (if not all) of them are older than she is.   Take computers, for example.           Back in the dark ages when I went to school, number 2 pencils were required for taking tests.   We were to pick a letter from A-E and fill in the circle COMPLETELY.   If any student was just one answer off (and had marked “C” for answer 4 instead of answer 3) every answer which followed was also marked incorrectly – and so even if I did know many of the answers – I didn’t get the credit for it.           Today (at least in her current situation) questions are given one at a time.   I suppose there is room for error with hitting the wrong button – but I don’t think th...

          I started reading to Jenna when she was still inside of my womb.   I would place earphones on my stomach and play Classical music for her.   I would hold a flashlight over my belly and turn it off and on and explain to her weather it was dark or light.           Roland read to her and her brothers read to her from newborn to preschool.   Jenna grew up reading books and has loved books ever since.   She especially likes books that encourage imagination or anything non-fiction that helps her learn.   I think that is SO AWESOME!           Of course I have to thank the library system for setting up the Beehive Nominee’s incentive program (or summer reading or whatever else is offered) as Jenna is always on a mission to complete the program and have her card filled ASAP.        ...