We had Teacher conferences for the kids today. In the past, they've done them at the end of first quarter, when we get our report cards. Now they are doing them a month in so we know what goals the teachers have for them. So proud of my kids.
Delaney is in the high group for reading. On the Fountas & Pinnell scale, she is at Level G. The expected level for first graders is to be at level G by third quarter. She is doing amazingly well, and I'm sure that by the end of the year, she'll be well past the benchmark of Level I. She's also doing well in math. Her teacher thinks she may have self esteem issues, but she is just shy and will warm up in another month or two. Her teacher says we should give her lots of encouragement and praise and tell her she's doing well. We feel that we do this in a healthy dose, so it's definitely not about her not getting enough praise and encouragement at home.
Part of me wants to say that she does it for attention, but if I say that, and it is a self-esteem issue, then I am not helping the problem. She has been acting up a bit lately, and when she gets in trouble, or things aren't going her way, she says that everyone hates her. Then two minutes later, she is fine and says she loves everyone, and that Mommy is the best Mommy ever, and Daddy is the best Daddy, etc. Her brothers do chide her and tell her she's stupid, or when she talks about fun, exciting stuff that she's learning, they tell her she's dumb, and that they've known that a long time. They get in trouble for it, and it stops for a little bit, and then they do it again. I doubt that really is the reason behind her behavior. I think that she is just a little shy, and still needs time to warm up and get comfortable with everyone and her environment. Her teacher did say that sometimes Delaney will raise her hand, and when her teacher calls on her, sometimes her face gets really red, and she acts like she forgets the answer or she is afraid to answer the question. So, I talked to Delaney about it today, and she said that she sometimes doesn't remember the question. So, I told her that she needs to ask the teacher to repeat the question, because she knows the answer, and will remember it as soon as the teacher repeats the question. I don't really know what to do about that. I should probably just talk to Delaney about how things are going with that and then touch base with the teacher again in a month or two.
Our next stop was with Zane's teacher. She was so uplifting. We walked in, and right away she had such nice things to say about him. She said that he is just a joy to have in her class, and that he's doing well. She says he is fairly quiet, and subdued and works on his assignments, but she loves it when he starts to get a big smile on his face, and she knows he's got something to share with the class. He will then go into a story or a description about something. Zane loves to talk, and when he is allowed to, he could probably go on for quite a while. He is very creative and has an extremely active imagination. I'm sure that he tells stories that are made up, and other things that he imagines he'd like to see happen. I've told my stories about the boys talking about planting a money tree, and then buying all kinds of things. Zane is definitely the instigator and dreamer of all things imaginable. Zane's teacher also said that he is a great helper, and he always knows when her things are ready on the copier. He sits near the door, so she frequently has him go and get things for her. She also knows he has ADHD, and I wouldn't be surprised if this is just an activity that she uses for him so he can get a little break and come back refreshed and ready to delve into his next task.
Zane tested very high on the Reading test. His reading level on the Fountas & Pinnell scale is an X! The highest level for a fifth grader is Level V, so he is above a 5th grade reading level. He is placed in the advanced guided reading group.
He also tested very high on Math and has been identified as Gifted in Math. His teacher was surprised that he wasn't identified as gifted in reading, because he tested high in reading as well, but sometimes it is more than just the scores. They don't really do anything different for those gifted in reading until 4th grade anyway. But I am super proud of him.
I did talk to his teacher about the AR reading tests. It doesn't seem like he has a lot of opportunities to take the tests, because they only have two computers and a lot of kids. But I did talk to her about possibly having a weekly goal on the AR tests, or giving him expectations that are a little higher, because we think that he is sliding by with the smaller ones, and that I'd rather see him get close to a higher goal, than to just make a goal that is really low, when I think he could possibly be capable of more. I don't want to set him up to feel like a failure, but I know last year, he had a goal of about 15 for the quarter, and I think he could have done a lot more than that. If he had a goal of 25, and ended up getting 20 or 22, then he'd be doing much better than the lower limit of 15, and maybe he wouldn't be making the higher goal, but he'd be doing much better than what he was previously being slated for. And if he doesn't make it, we lower it a little for the next time, but not the super low level, because I feel he can do more. The teacher asked me if he had any food sensitivities, or things we don't give him. I told her that he did not. She asked if she would be okay with her bribing him for meeting his reading goals. I told her that I am bribing him with three packs of gum for reading Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief. She said she might like to bribe him with a full size candybar. I told her she could go for it. She seems excited! And I am too, because I know he is a good reader. We just need to get something that will get him to focus and do his reading. I am also trying to sit down and read while he is reading so that he has someone near him. The only catch with that, is that sometimes he has to read aloud so he can concentrate on what he's reading, and then it distracts me. Oh well. It's worth it.
Finally we had Ryan's conference. Ryan was in the gifted Math last year. They don't really have a separate program for the gifted math, although he participated in the Math Bowl. I am sure I will find out by the end of the quarter if he's in gifted math again this year. He is in the gifted reading program this year, so he gets pulled out of class daily to work on higher level things with reading. They are doing some stories from the Ceasars English book and they have spelling and vocabulary words that are latin & greek and roots. He's doing pretty good with them so far.
He's reading at the Fountas & Pinnell Level R. Zane's rather proud that he's reading at a higher level than Ryan, but Ryan is doing extremely well with reading big books, and taking AR test. So, each of them have their strengths in reading, but both are doing extremely well. Ryan is also in the 99th percent for math. His test scores are great, and the teacher showed us that the mistakes that he's made with his math tests are not comprehension of the math problems themselves, but just reading the problems carefully. A lot of them are word problems. She gave us an example where he got a problem wrong, where he was supposed to round numbers that were decimals, and then add those to get the estimated number. He did the rounding correctly on three of the four, and added those up correctly, and just forgot that the fourth number was in there. So he shows that he knows what to do, but needs to make sure that he's checking the whole problem.
His teacher and his gifted reading program teacher both said that they have noticed small disruptions, where he is making silly faces at his classmates, but he is reminded to stop and pay attention, and he does. But we will talk to him and remind him as well.
It took us 20 minutes with each teacher. We took the kids to the school library and asked the librarian if it was okay if they were in there to pick out books from the book fair while we attended the conferences. I told her that we knew they would be on their best behavior. We did this last year as well, and they did great. She said she knew they would be fine. We stopped in between each conference, just so they knew how much time they had. When we were done with conferences, we checked to see what books the kids picked out, and worked with them to make sure they really were choosing something they wanted. It's always nice to have the book fair going on during conferences.
Afterwards, we came home and an hour later, we turned around and went to Luigi's for their football fundraiser. I swear, Luigi's has the best pizza. So, we got to eat pizza, and I didn't have to cook!
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