December 18, 2007

Two days down and three to go until my Winter Break. I was very exhausted today. It seems that I am more tired on Tuesdays than on Mondays. It was also a rough day at work. I have a student that makes me feel like I'm banging my head against a wall. Actually, she and her mother both make me feel this way.

She made average grades during first quarter. But, now that they are supposed to be gaining some Independence she refuses to do any work on her own. Yes, she CAN do the work. She is actually very bright, but just feels that someone should sit next to her and walk her step by step through each assignment. She is an only child who is very very very very spoiled. Mom even does her homework for her a lot of the time.

I have tried giving her smaller goals. Like, ok, do these five problems and then I'll come check on you. Instead she plays with her pencil, rolling it across her forehead. I have 23 students this year and one of them is diagnosed with MR. I cannot sit by this child during every assignment and walk her through it, especially when she is so capable of doing it herself. When she gets into second grade next year no one will spoon feed her.

Actually, at this point I'm not sure she'll make it to second grade. If I had to fill out her report card for second quarter right now it would be straight F's.

I wrote to her mom yesterday telling her this. I explained about refusing to complete assignments and never bringing homework or make up work from being absent which she is absent frequently. She's missed 20 days so far this year and been tardy 20 times so far this year. Adding up all the hours she's missed in absences and tardies comes to a total of 23 days of missed school. We've only been in school 71 days.

So, mom sends back papers that I had given out at PT conferences as extra stuff to help parents help their children at home. These were not assignments. I explained that at the time. But, she sent back about 10 of these completed, half in her handwriting and not the child's, instead of the homework I sent home last night. Am I the only one confused by this? The homework for last night was taken out of the folder and put who knows where and the folder with the report card in it was dug out and papers selected from that were completed and turned in. I can't add those to my grade book. They are not the same assignments that are listed in my grade book. I could get by with it if they were at least the same skill, but not all of them are and how can I put a grade in my grade book for a skill when a paper of another skill is actually what was done????????

I have such a headache right now.

Michaela and Caleb stuffed the goody bags for all our classes for me tonight. That was nice not having to do it myself. I cleaned up our supper mess while they did that and then thought about what I should do next.

Well, tonight I decided I was just going to spend time with my children. So we watched Frosty's Winter Wonderland and T'was The Night Before Christmas on DVD together in my bed in my room. It was nice. I have a ton I should have been doing but just didn't.

After they went to bed, I wrapped Michaela's teacher's gift. I also wrapped my MIL's birthday presents. I should make her a card, but I think I'm going to just buy one this year. My creativity is just zapped right now. Plus, our basement is so fully of Christmas stuff right now it would just be more of a mess if I drug out scrapbooking supplies.