D - Parent/Teacher Conferences

WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!  Annoying "My kid is better than your kid" post to follow!

If Mike and I looked as if we had gained a little weight a couple of weeks ago, it was really just our chests puffed up with pride after the glowing parent/teacher conferences that we had.  I know it can be REALLY irritating to listen to others brag on their kids, so feel free to quit reading now.  You'll still be my friend.  I just don't want to forget what their teachers said because it filled our hearts with such pride.

Our first conference was Miss Katie's.  Truly, we weren't worried in the slightest going into this one.  We already knew that we had a people-pleaser, perfectionist, smarty-pants, so we pretty much knew what we were walking into.  In addition to confirming all of this for us, her cute little teacher told us, "Katie is just a pleasure to have in class.  She's such a leader.  All of the kids love her and look to her as an example.  All of the boys want HER for their girlfriend.  She's just sooo sweet!"  She also told us all about Katie's reading level and how she has her in the advanced reading and math groups in class.  We were just so proud of her. 

When I was telling Katie some of the nice things Mrs. Winegeart said about her, there was only one thing that stuck out in her mind - ALL of the boys liking her. 

"What????  She said that????  Which boys?  Did she say 'Ryan?' I can't believe ALL of the boys like me!" 

Oh, my!  I had no idea the can of worms I was opening by telling her that.  She went on and on and on that whole night.  I think Mike may have died a little bit inside.  :-)

Annoyed yet?  I still have one more kid to go!

Noah's conference was just as great - maybe even a little better.  You see, we had lower expectations.  Noah has quite the reputation around our house for being lazy.  It is so hard to get him to do things to help out.  It's a constant nagging effort to get his shoes and socks out of the living room, his wet towels off the bedroom floor, his empty wrappers or apple cores into the trash can, etc, etc, etc.

So, we went into his conference prepared to talk to his teacher about how lazy this kid is and hoping that was perfectly normal 4th grade boy behavior and getting some sort of plan for how to motivate him.  Turns out, he saves up all that laziness for us.  Apparently he's completely worn out from being a superstar at school, so by the time he gets home he just has nothing left to give.  ;-)

Ms. Agee started out by telling us just how amazing he is.  "You just have such a great kid!  He's the class leader in AR points and has already lapped some of the other kids around our scoring track.  He's our student council rep, and I'm not surprised at all because he got almost all of the votes.  Everyone likes him.  He's making really good choices in friends.  They are all nice kids and keep away from the girls and their drama." 

And more... "He was the 2nd place AR point leader in the ENTIRE 4th grade for the first 9 weeks.  Today we had the top 3 scorers stand up during our huddle time and talk to the other students about reading and encourage them to enjoy it more.  We didn't give them any warning that they were going to do that, and Noah's talk was AMAZING!  All of the teachers were standing around with their mouths hanging open and Ms. Knapp (his reading teacher) and I were arguing over just whose student he was."

More still... "He's one of the smartest kids in our class, but you would never know it by the way he treats the others.  Some of the other bright kids like to show others how much smarter they are, but Noah GENUINELY wants to see the other students succeed.  He is so encouraging and happy for their successes.  He never looks down on any of them."

Wow!  I worked hard to not tear up on that one.  I did KNOW all of that was in him, but sometimes it gets obscured by all of that laziness.  It's always nice to hear it from someone else.  She was pretty amazed when I told her what I thought we would be talking about and said she's often surprised by what parents say their kids are like at home.

One of the things I questioned was his AR goal for the 2nd 9 weeks.  His goal for the first 9 weeks was 40 points - he got 120 points.  I was completely shocked when he came home telling me that he and his teacher decided to set his goal for the second 9 weeks at 40 points.  Huh?  Did I miss something?  Why is she letting him get away with that???  Make him not be lazy!  Make him challenge himself!!!

Turns out, it wasn't laziness there either.  Noah and the teacher recognized that he got the majority of his points last quarter from 3 Harry Potter books that had high point values.  Since he's now tested on ALL of the HP books, he doesn't have those massive points to count for him anymore.  She said they were concerned that he would start having a harder time finding books that interested him in the school library and that the librarian actually would have to start pulling books from a back room stash that they have reserved for kids reading above the school's level.  Wow.  Wow.  Wow.

Mike wants me to add that his teacher questions have never been about grades, but that he is generally most interested in how our kids treat both the other kids and the teacher.  Given the great reviews there, he couldn't be more pleased.

Here are some of the quotes from Ms. Agee's written conference notes:

Strengths:

• A real leader in class.  Motivates/encourages others.
• Noah has a firm knowledge of basic math facts which will be helpful with future concepts.
• Rises to challenges willingly and enjoys his "lightbulb moments."

Goals:

• Continue to work on automaticity of multiplication facts.
• Show mastery of math concepts by scoring "Advanced" on math OCCT again this year.
• Keep up the exceptional behavior & work habits.

And Ms. Knapp's written notes:

Strengths:

• Noah turns in quality work.  He takes pride in his work.  He has a joy for reading that has rubbed off on others in his class!
• Noah is friendly, respectful, and considerate towards authority and peers.
• Noah shows support to all peers and is always cheering them along.

Goals:

• Continue to show master of Reading concepts
• Continue to keep his positive outlook on life!

Well, I'm one proud mama, and Mike is one extremely proud dad.  In fact, he's the one that forced my hand and had me blog all of this so we don't forget it.  Hopefully you don't hate us too much for all of the bragging.  It just couldn't be helped.  Sometimes it's not good enough for parents to treasure things up in their hearts.  Sometimes they just have to see them all typed out!