Last night we attended parent/teacher conferences for Sam. The verdict: He's doing great. His reading level has improved since November (the last time it was checked), and he's reading at the level he is supposed to be at by the end of the year. His reading comprehension (being able to summarize what he's read) has vastly improved since November. When Ben and I saw his writing response on his reading assessment, we couldn't believe that our son had written it. It's not that Sam can't write, it's that he usually chooses to write as little as possible. On this paper, the entire page was filled. And he correctly summarized what he had read - a previous concern was that his mind wanders when he reads so that when it comes time to write about the story there are gaps in his summary. Or he just fills in the gap with information from his imagination, which didn't happen in the story at all. This time, he filled the entire page with sentences relevant to the story.
Sam's math level continues to be above grade level as well. He is pretty stubborn about math - he either knows how to do it and is confident about his answers, or he refuses to try (like on pre-tests) because he can't stand to have a wrong answer. But he catches on pretty quickly to the concepts. And I am well aware from our homework struggles where his weaknesses in math are (subtraction facts!)
Socially things are going good. She commented that he deals pretty well with another little boy (and friend) who just likes to pick at Sam sometimes. Sam gets frustrated easily but is handling these issues more calmly apparently. Sam and his friend tend to have battles about who's right all the time, and since neither one can stand to be corrected, it can sometimes be a problem. But apparently the boys are doing better at handling it on their own. And Sam is not a tattler, which is quite a stigma at this age.
Maria continues to excel as well. We did not go to her conferences - she told me she didn't see a need, and neither did we. Middle school conferences are "student-led," which I don't really see the point of - we talk with her all the time about school and what is going on there. We have "student-led" conferences at our dinner table most nights. And her teachers can certainly get a hold of Ben or I easily enough since we are all in the same building. Her science teacher spoke to me just the other day about how wonderful she is (and shared with a third party in our presence): "She's just the whole package. Smart, friendly, polite, mature, talented..." There was more but you get the idea. As part of student council, Maria got to read announcements on the intercom for the entire school each day during January. Neither Ben nor I could hear them since we are not in the middle school, but many people expressed to us about what a wonderful job she did - we still get comments about it. Apparently she made quite an impression.
Here's another example of Maria's character. Last week she was telling me how Mrs. Kehlbeck was teaching her science class about the atom and she didn't have a large model of the atom (none of us do, for some strange reason). Maria, who has never met a problem that couldn't be solved with some yarn and a crochet hook or two knitting needles, decided she would crochet Mrs. Kehlbeck a model. So Thursday night she started making little balls to represent protons and neutrons (I helped to make sure the atom was a correct representation of a particular element), and Saturday Ben helped her put the entire thing together with wires. She was so excited to surprise Mrs. Kehlbeck with her model, and was just so happy to make someone else happy.
So I guess this blog post can be summarized by saying we have two pretty awesome kids (not that I'm biased or anything).
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