School Troubles
I'm back to feeling overwhelmed again. It's just the school stuff this time. Trying to be a very proactive and involved parent is just difficult with three kids in school. Part of that is that I have a gazillion other things going on that are not school-related to try and take care of also, but there's nothing new about that. . . .
Parent teacher conferences are this week. (As part of my super common memory loss, I keep getting the dates and times all mixed up for these. Fortunately, I got to the one with B's teacher this morning at the right time.) Anyway, my meeting with B's teacher just reinforced how discouraged I feel with all this school stuff. B's spelling test scores are too low (already!) and of course, I haven't practiced spelling with her a single time this year. Her teacher reminded me we should be studying these words every day. She's also concerned with B's reading and her handwriting. I've been aware for awhile that B's reading progression isn't going like it should. She does fine reading all these words one day and the next day she just guesses based on the first letter and gets mad. When we sit down and force her to pay attention, she does fine, but it is a major power struggle doing it this way and my nerves just can't take it. Terence took on today's homework with her, but he can't do that very often. I need a new solution, a new way to motivate B to work the next time she throws her pencil down and moans and whines and refuses to do anything.
Then there is all I am supposed to be keeping on top of with J and M. M's work load is astonishing. I know that by 5th grade they are doing more stuff (and all the economic stuff she's learning this year is impressive) but keeping track of all this is not so easy, for her or for me. I got a slip this weekend that said she had missing assignments for the week, and M could only shrug and say that she thought she had gotten everything but there was an assignment she hadn't realized she was supposed to do. J is doing everything on his own but he speeds through stuff so fast I don't think his reading comprehension is going all that great. Though he is very, very good at math also, he tackles it so fast that he often misses questions altogether. Considering how bright he is, I was surprised to see that his standardized test scores (the Stanford one) came back so middle-of-the-road. But on further thought, I bet either he was speeding through everything so fast his accuracy was not so great, or he got bored with those long stretches of "fill the bubble in completely with your number 2 pencil" and just didn't try. (For those of you who know J personally, can you just picture him having to sit still in his chair for two hours straight and not wander?) Either way, I need to find a way to get him to slow down just enough to do quality work. M has the opposite problem. She's lucky to get her work done even when she has hours to work on it. Miraculously, she scored extremely high on the AIMS (our state's big standardized test). Maybe she would work faster at home if I treated it like a high-stakes test. . . .
Last but not least, I keep wondering if I should be doing some preschool-like stuff with K. He won't go into kindergarten until 2014, but I'm not sending him to preschool so it seems like I should do something. But I already have a headache just thinking about the school stuff with my older kids without throwing yet another thing onto my list.
Ugh!
This is one of my most important jobs though-- one of the reasons I'm a stay-at-home mom. I wanted to make sure that my kids got the very best education possible, which is mostly likely to happen if I am heavily involved. However, even typing that statement is making my chest tight with anxiety.
Education matters-- my involvement matters-- my kids being successful in school matters. But how much does it matter? Enough to make my head hurt? Enough that I should cut out some other things from my life, like my piano lessons? Enough that I should have panic attacks over it if I feel like I'm failing in this area?
There has got to be a better way!
Parent teacher conferences are this week. (As part of my super common memory loss, I keep getting the dates and times all mixed up for these. Fortunately, I got to the one with B's teacher this morning at the right time.) Anyway, my meeting with B's teacher just reinforced how discouraged I feel with all this school stuff. B's spelling test scores are too low (already!) and of course, I haven't practiced spelling with her a single time this year. Her teacher reminded me we should be studying these words every day. She's also concerned with B's reading and her handwriting. I've been aware for awhile that B's reading progression isn't going like it should. She does fine reading all these words one day and the next day she just guesses based on the first letter and gets mad. When we sit down and force her to pay attention, she does fine, but it is a major power struggle doing it this way and my nerves just can't take it. Terence took on today's homework with her, but he can't do that very often. I need a new solution, a new way to motivate B to work the next time she throws her pencil down and moans and whines and refuses to do anything.
Then there is all I am supposed to be keeping on top of with J and M. M's work load is astonishing. I know that by 5th grade they are doing more stuff (and all the economic stuff she's learning this year is impressive) but keeping track of all this is not so easy, for her or for me. I got a slip this weekend that said she had missing assignments for the week, and M could only shrug and say that she thought she had gotten everything but there was an assignment she hadn't realized she was supposed to do. J is doing everything on his own but he speeds through stuff so fast I don't think his reading comprehension is going all that great. Though he is very, very good at math also, he tackles it so fast that he often misses questions altogether. Considering how bright he is, I was surprised to see that his standardized test scores (the Stanford one) came back so middle-of-the-road. But on further thought, I bet either he was speeding through everything so fast his accuracy was not so great, or he got bored with those long stretches of "fill the bubble in completely with your number 2 pencil" and just didn't try. (For those of you who know J personally, can you just picture him having to sit still in his chair for two hours straight and not wander?) Either way, I need to find a way to get him to slow down just enough to do quality work. M has the opposite problem. She's lucky to get her work done even when she has hours to work on it. Miraculously, she scored extremely high on the AIMS (our state's big standardized test). Maybe she would work faster at home if I treated it like a high-stakes test. . . .
Last but not least, I keep wondering if I should be doing some preschool-like stuff with K. He won't go into kindergarten until 2014, but I'm not sending him to preschool so it seems like I should do something. But I already have a headache just thinking about the school stuff with my older kids without throwing yet another thing onto my list.
Ugh!
This is one of my most important jobs though-- one of the reasons I'm a stay-at-home mom. I wanted to make sure that my kids got the very best education possible, which is mostly likely to happen if I am heavily involved. However, even typing that statement is making my chest tight with anxiety.
Education matters-- my involvement matters-- my kids being successful in school matters. But how much does it matter? Enough to make my head hurt? Enough that I should cut out some other things from my life, like my piano lessons? Enough that I should have panic attacks over it if I feel like I'm failing in this area?
There has got to be a better way!
Comments
This year is been way chaotic as Chloe and Hayley have homework and Rigby is more active and Finley likes to be fed a lot. I feel like keeping track of it all is a full time job.
xo to you. mothering it a tough business.