The first day of school comes way too early around here and has been getting earlier every year for the past decade. Having grown up always starting school after Labor Day I am not sure I’ll ever get used to starting in mid-August. It catches me by surprise every year.
This year the children headed “Back to School” on Tuesday August 16th. Haley is now beginning High School! She has a very full schedule (which will shortly become even more full) from 8:30 to 4 with classes including Chamber Orchestra, Meridian 8 (small vocal jazz group) and 11th grade Algebra II plus all her other AA academics. She has now dropped her vocal major out of necessity; not enough time. Lindsay is beginning Jr. High, now at SCPA also. She is studying all AA academics and holds 2 majors; drama and orchestra III. I will tell you her funny story in a minute, as promised on FB. Tristan is now a third grader without a sibling at his same school, at least for this year. His teacher is Ms. Thomas who he says is the funniest third grade teacher there so he’s very happy. Lindsay informed me that she is a very loud teacher… I responded that we are a loud family and Tristan is a loud child who only responds to loud discipline so they should get along just fine. He’s happy and I’m not going to worry about “loud” in this case.
Here’s my whole crew ready by 7:30 a.m.
So on Mondays and Wednesdays now Rick takes all three to school dropping Tristan off for 8 a.m. Orchestra which meets an hour + before school begins and then he takes Lindsay and Haley with him the rest of the way. Haley begins at 8:30 so for the first time in 9 years Rick is not trying to make special arrangements for his own start time (by contract). Lindsay does not begin class until 9:15 so she uses Ricks empty classroom for violin practice instead of trying to find a practice time/spot at home. And if she hasn’t eaten at home for some strange reason she still has time to go upstairs and get free breakfast (all breakfasts are free now) which she hates doing, by the way. The other three days a week I drive Tristan in to school since he normally doesn’t begin class until 9:15.
The kids came home with arm loads of papers last Tuesday, half of which are MY homework and I feel like I’m signing for a house all over again every year with the amount of paperwork just generated by these teachers for 3 kids; mostly behavior and attendance contracts for the school and for each teachers’ expectations. This year Rick got wise and only filled out one Emergency Contact form and made copies of it. Then he filled in the child’s name, school and grade in ink and handed it in… way more efficient for us! My favorite form to sign was the one about a $3,000 to $4,000 field trip which I am NOT interested in chaperoning and don’t know how I would send my child on!!!
The kids had a great first day of school. They were so excited to see their friends again, none of whom we live very close to. We tried to cram in as many “1st day” stories as possible around the dinner table before it was time to run out the door again to YW and Cub Scouts that evening. But hands down, Lindsay’s story was my favorite. The way she tells it, it was the funniest story too, but maybe that’s why she’s a drama major. She generally keeps us in stitches with “drama at dinner”. So anyway, background to the story, she’s in 7th grade and was put into a German I class which she was very disheartened about. Apparently if she takes foreign language too early it will not give her 3 years of language in High School and so she would not get an honors diploma upon graduating either, which still makes no sense to me. So since they would not put her into German II she just decided to take as much German as she can now and then sign up for some other language in H.S. to fulfill the 3 year requirement. She even met the German teacher over the summer when she went into work one day with Rick and the two of them had a whole German conversation in front of Rick. The teacher felt confident that Lindsay would be fine in German II. As luck would have it, with all the other classes that she needed and with her majors, the only German class they could fit into her schedule was… German II. Lindsay was thrilled! Keeping up on her German is a requirement for being a German exchange student ($ is a different hurdle… but one thing at a time) and let’s not forget that Lindsay already has 5 years of German under her belt. They were doing amazing projects in German by the middle of last year.
So on Lindsay’s first day her German class happened to be right next door to her previous class so she walked right in, had her pick of seats and sat down to wait. As she’s waiting some of the other students come walking in and kind of hesitate as they walk in asking the Frau if they are in the right room for German II. She answers them that they are. Confused, they ask “well, what’s she doing here then?” The teacher assured them that they were in the right place and that Lindsay was their classmate. “But how?” This happened repeatedly again and again. Lindsay is in 7th grade and she’s a small 7th grader at that. The rest of the students are in the 10th, 11th and 12th grades. Then in class she was able to fully participate, thinking that this was the easiest class ever. The “kids” were all asking how Lindsay knew everything. The teacher explained to them that Lindsay came from Fairview. At the very end of class the teacher offered a challenge for one volunteer to come up and spell a word (which I cannot spell so you’ll have to settle for the fact that it was “a word” and a long one at that but probably on a 2nd or 3rd grade spelling test). The teacher was giving them one chance and no more to write this word on the board. One of the Senior High kids said they thought they knew how to spell it and got up to put it on the black board. The whole class agreed that it had to be the correct spelling of the word… except for Lindsay. The teacher pronounced it “wrong! I will write it up on the board.” The whole class went berserk that this was not the right spelling and Lindsay’s hand shot up. She was called on and Lindsay asked if she could have a try first even though there was supposed to be only one chance for the class. So the teacher agreed that “this time” she would allow a second try. So Lindsay, my straight A German student for years, got up and wrote the word on the board. The kids all agreed shaking their heads that this was NOT the correct spelling of this word. The teacher said “Lindsay is right”! The class went nuts all over again. The way she told the story is so funny and I can just imagine the situation. I already warned Lindsay that she would be the youngest one in the class and to try not to let that bother her. She is loving it but thinks some of the work is “boring”.
Rick is getting some of his students or former students catching him in the hall and telling him “You’re daughter is smart… in German!” (That’s my Lindsay). He’s also getting other students saying “Man! Your daughter is smart… in Math.” (That would be my Haley). Both girls are much better students than I ever was but I have a feeling that for whatever reasons I just never really reached my academic potential. I tried to give my girls a good start to learning when they were young so that they would view learning as fun and enjoyable. I hope I’m continuing to do that for my other children and that all of them will continue to do their very best.
Here’s to a great 2011-2012 school year!
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