A while ago, Mindy asked if a lack of parental involvement is a cause or effect of children doing poorly in school. I don't honestly know the answer to that question. I used to think it was primarily a cause, with of course exceptions for individual kids. Now, I'm almost starting to wonder if it has any effect at all. My brain says surely it must, but my recent experiences seem to contradict that thought.
When we were growing up, our elementary school classes were segregrated by honors kids, average kids, and those who needed extra help. On open house nights, the majority of the parents of the honors kids would show up, and they usually ended up borrowing chairs from the extra help kids' rooms. Why? Because the one group showed up and the other one didn't. Either the parents didn't care, or just were afraid of hearing bad news about their kid, or I don't know what. You might expect parents to be there especially for the kids that struggled with school, so they could find out how to help their kid at home, but such was not the case. It was a private school, the parents were paying a decent amount of money to send their kids to the school, so it wasn't like they were completely disinterested in the child's education.
Then I became a parent, and started attending the open house night myself. My son was in a school very similar to that which I had attended, except the class rooms were no longer sorted by "ability". It seemed like there were usually a lot of parents there, but as the kids were all mixed together, it was difficult to know which segments of parents bothered to come. You would think that with the cost of tuition being what it was, a parent would want to keep tabs on how their child was doing.
Then we joined the ranks of public school kids. Not only public school, but we were zoned for what is very close to a ghetto school. Most of the kids are from very low income families, live in rough neighborhoods, and it's a D-rated school. The first time they had open house, there were so few parents there that I honestly thought they'd changed the date and I just missed the notification. Seriously. It was a very sad commentary.
This year, Alex is in high school, in an advanced honors magnet program. There were something like 250 kids that applied for the 100 positions open (which is already double the 50 spots they had last year), so you know it was rigorous admission. Kids had to prove they were ready to excel in this group. Tuesday night, we had open house. Of the 180 kids in the entire program, there were maybe 50 parents that attended. I realize that some parents have more than one child, and there were possibly some scheduling conflicts. Maybe some of them have to work nights. I cannot believe that applied to 2/3 of the group, however. So where was everybody? Do they not care? I don’t understand, I really don't.
On the bright side, Alex was awarded a Skip Homework Tonight pass yesterday because I attended the open house. That was a nice surprise for him!
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Sunday, September 14, 2008
A Tale of Two Experiences
This whole wisdom teeth removal experience has been... interesting. Not fun, mind you, but interesting. The two teeth on the left side of my face came out, were sore for 2 days, and then poof! All better. No big deal, let's move on with life. And that is honestly about how I expected it to go. Somehow, though, the right side of my face missed the memo.
The upper right molar was basically sideways in my mouth, and so it was nearly impossible to keep it clean, never mind how frequently I ended up biting my cheek. This was the tooth that I knew needed to come out. The bottom right tooth is the one that only came in last year. While I wanted it to grow in before it was removed, it apparently had not really come through enough for them to get a good grip on it, and so it had to be cut out after all. What a major bummer. That side of my face is still swollen, and I definitely notice when the pain pills wear off. I rarely take medications, so to be regularly taking these pain pills every 4 hours or so is quite out of character for me. Dumb tooth is even waking me up in the middle of the night in horrible pain because the pills have worn off. The pain pills tend to make me sleepy, though, so I’m really not sure how I’m going to last at work tomorrow.
Because this bottom right tooth is taking soooo long to heal, I still can't eat properly. I'm starving! I was pretty good at first, eating yogurt and applesauce and making fruit smoothies and generally keeping it reasonably healthy after all. I splurged on some Kozy Shack chocolate pudding. Tried the rice pudding, but the rice was too lumpy for now, so I stuck with the chocolate. When I finally tired of the fruit, I pureed a can of chicken noodle soup. Since the surgery was Wed morning, by yesterday I should have been able to start trying to eat soft foods. Lump-free potatoes were edible. The mushy green beans were still too much chewing and I had to give up. Today, I've so far stuck with the fruit smoothie and going to have some more mashed potatoes again. Yippee, how exciting. I want some real food! *pout*
I also did more talking yesterday than I've been doing. It honestly just hurt too much to move my jaw before. Too much of a good thing... by the evening, I knew I had over done it. Now I'm back to not talking much, because it just is uncomfortable. I did manage to keep myself out of bed for a couple of hours yesterday to clean the bathroom cabinets and do some more throwing away. Alex doesn’t really need squirty foam soap spray cans any more, for instance. But then back to bed for the rest of the day.
So anyway, that’s my update thus far. On one side, quick and easy. On the other side, misery. Guess now I can empathize with anyone else’s experience, since I’ll have had it both ways!
The upper right molar was basically sideways in my mouth, and so it was nearly impossible to keep it clean, never mind how frequently I ended up biting my cheek. This was the tooth that I knew needed to come out. The bottom right tooth is the one that only came in last year. While I wanted it to grow in before it was removed, it apparently had not really come through enough for them to get a good grip on it, and so it had to be cut out after all. What a major bummer. That side of my face is still swollen, and I definitely notice when the pain pills wear off. I rarely take medications, so to be regularly taking these pain pills every 4 hours or so is quite out of character for me. Dumb tooth is even waking me up in the middle of the night in horrible pain because the pills have worn off. The pain pills tend to make me sleepy, though, so I’m really not sure how I’m going to last at work tomorrow.
Because this bottom right tooth is taking soooo long to heal, I still can't eat properly. I'm starving! I was pretty good at first, eating yogurt and applesauce and making fruit smoothies and generally keeping it reasonably healthy after all. I splurged on some Kozy Shack chocolate pudding. Tried the rice pudding, but the rice was too lumpy for now, so I stuck with the chocolate. When I finally tired of the fruit, I pureed a can of chicken noodle soup. Since the surgery was Wed morning, by yesterday I should have been able to start trying to eat soft foods. Lump-free potatoes were edible. The mushy green beans were still too much chewing and I had to give up. Today, I've so far stuck with the fruit smoothie and going to have some more mashed potatoes again. Yippee, how exciting. I want some real food! *pout*
I also did more talking yesterday than I've been doing. It honestly just hurt too much to move my jaw before. Too much of a good thing... by the evening, I knew I had over done it. Now I'm back to not talking much, because it just is uncomfortable. I did manage to keep myself out of bed for a couple of hours yesterday to clean the bathroom cabinets and do some more throwing away. Alex doesn’t really need squirty foam soap spray cans any more, for instance. But then back to bed for the rest of the day.
So anyway, that’s my update thus far. On one side, quick and easy. On the other side, misery. Guess now I can empathize with anyone else’s experience, since I’ll have had it both ways!
Monday, September 8, 2008
Wise... or not so much?
Wednesday morning at 8am, I'll be having all 4 wisdom teeth removed. Yes, I'm a little old to be just getting this done, but the last one only grew in within the last year. I'm not that keen on doing this in the first place, so I certainly didn't want to have to have them slice open my gums to get out the teeth that hadn't come in. That excuse is now finally invalid, and the dentist complains every time he sees me, so my oral surgery is going to be this week. At least they will knock me out, so I won't have to listen to the teeth being ripped out of my head. Whee!
This of course puts me on a cold-food, liquid diet for the rest of the week. I have a sneaking suspicion the calorie-watching activities will be conspicuously absent for the next little bit...
This of course puts me on a cold-food, liquid diet for the rest of the week. I have a sneaking suspicion the calorie-watching activities will be conspicuously absent for the next little bit...
Friday, September 5, 2008
Labor Day weekend
I have all this stuff everywhere that is there from ages past and nobody uses it anymore but still it sits there cluttering up the place… and I'm tired of it. We spent most of our weekend cleaning out and throwing away. We even got up into the garage attic a little bit, and I can't even hazard a guess at the last time I was up there.
Our big outside trash can was literally overflowing, and we had more trash to go that just didn't fit into it. After they picked up the trash this week, Alex hauled the rest of the stuff out to the can and promptly took it right back down to the street since it was full again! I probably could have just stacked it up next to the can, but I know they have an arm on the truck to pick up the can itself and I figured the guys would have enough manual work to do this week with everyone cleaning out the stuff that got wet from the tropical storm, so I waited. The same thing happened for the recycling. I have a huge collection of clothing that I still need to sort into little boys, bigger boys, and ladies clothes so I can take them to our women's shelter. We also have a large collection of books to take to the library. And that's just a fraction of the junk in the house that needs to be removed. Maybe there's hope for some uncluttered space in this house after all!
Coming from such a packrat family, actually getting rid of some stuff was a challenge. It's funny, though, how I would be chucking this and tossing that and then come across some silly little thing that I suddenly wanted to keep for no good reason except that I have it and I might want it some day… Alex - an even bigger hoarder than I am - would look at me like I was crazy and tell me to throw it away. aaahh, the power of teamwork. *laugh* He even finally conceded that some of the stuff in his room wasn't really necessary to keep any more. We didn't get to his room yet, so I hope that attitude is still in place when the trash bags show up!
On a side note, I had Alex replace the toilet seat in the hallway bathroom. It's not a difficult job, but I thought he should learn how to do it. Instead of just a plain white seat, it's now an oak seat. It's truly amazing how that picked up the gold streaks in the counter and really brightened up the room. I never realized what an impact a toilet seat could make to one's décor.
Our big outside trash can was literally overflowing, and we had more trash to go that just didn't fit into it. After they picked up the trash this week, Alex hauled the rest of the stuff out to the can and promptly took it right back down to the street since it was full again! I probably could have just stacked it up next to the can, but I know they have an arm on the truck to pick up the can itself and I figured the guys would have enough manual work to do this week with everyone cleaning out the stuff that got wet from the tropical storm, so I waited. The same thing happened for the recycling. I have a huge collection of clothing that I still need to sort into little boys, bigger boys, and ladies clothes so I can take them to our women's shelter. We also have a large collection of books to take to the library. And that's just a fraction of the junk in the house that needs to be removed. Maybe there's hope for some uncluttered space in this house after all!
Coming from such a packrat family, actually getting rid of some stuff was a challenge. It's funny, though, how I would be chucking this and tossing that and then come across some silly little thing that I suddenly wanted to keep for no good reason except that I have it and I might want it some day… Alex - an even bigger hoarder than I am - would look at me like I was crazy and tell me to throw it away. aaahh, the power of teamwork. *laugh* He even finally conceded that some of the stuff in his room wasn't really necessary to keep any more. We didn't get to his room yet, so I hope that attitude is still in place when the trash bags show up!
On a side note, I had Alex replace the toilet seat in the hallway bathroom. It's not a difficult job, but I thought he should learn how to do it. Instead of just a plain white seat, it's now an oak seat. It's truly amazing how that picked up the gold streaks in the counter and really brightened up the room. I never realized what an impact a toilet seat could make to one's décor.
beach photos
After promising pictures, I was then quite remiss in not actually posting them. Sorry!
Full moon reflected off the water:
Here comes the storm... 
Best.Jumping.Waves.Ever. 
Rain bouncing off neighbor's roof:
After the storm:
Starfish found by Morgan and Valerie:
Full moon reflected off the water:
We found this jellyfish on the beach when someone accidentally stepped on it (and was thankfully not stung). It was too dark to even see it so I literally "took a shot in the dark". It came out pretty nicely, I think.
Generators finally powered the island:
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