Poetry

A few months back, Jack's 4th grade class did a poetry unit. His teacher said that, quite unexpectedly, this brought out a side of Jack that she had never seen before. He dove into the writing assignments, producing poem after poem, excited about writing like he never had been before. She encourage him to collect a few of his favorites, and to bind them into a book for us to enjoy as well. Here are a few from his anthology!

THE FIGURE SKATER
By: John Bruntrager

She stepped out onto the ice
Twirling and twisting she went
She looked glorious!
She danced
She looked so fragile
Dancing so carefully
Bam!
She crashed
Out on a stretcher she went
So gracefully!

WINTER ROCKS
By: John Bruntrager

Hot chocolate
Lots of sledding
It's Christmas time
Warmer bedding

Warm apple cider
Ice skating
Winter vacation
Figure 8-ing

Covered up
From head to toes
Getting presents
Runny nose

There are good things
And bad things too
Sleepy owl
Calling "Hoo"

Falling snow
And Christmas trees
Christmas shopping
No more bees

All is tranquil
Frozen locks
Woolen hats
Winter rocks!

THE POLE OF POETRY
By: John Bruntrager

In the land of nowhere
Filled with toe hair
There is a pole.

It's never been found
But it's somewhere around
And it really plays its roll.

It stops great poets
And we've got things to show it
It acts like a nasty troll

It stops them from writing
And seeing and biting
It's like a poet's toll.

But it never opens
Even if you hope it
It's like a trouble hole.


INTRUDER ALERT
By: John Bruntrager

"Intruder alert!"

"Intruder alert!"

The emergency loudspeaker calls

The siren whails

Evildoers crowd in

Children run in all directions

The school is being invaded!

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHH!"

A bed

A chair

A desk

A toybox

A dream!

A Big Week

We had an unusual run of accomplishments last week. Mattie learned to ride Elliot's old bike, without training wheels. Jack hit a grand slam in his baseball game. Elliot won the second grade bilingual spelling bee. What a week!

Summer Reading

On a recent fall-like afternoon, I was relaxing on the couch nursing Theo, mindlessly watching TV.  I caught a rerun of 19 Kids and Counting. In it, Michelle Duggar said that she tries to praise her kids 10 times more than she criticizes them, and that someone once told her that when you compliment someone, you can multiply that praise by the number of people in the room who hear it. Her words of wisdom stuck with me, so here goes.

I had the pleasure of watching a small miracle unfold this summer. Jack and Elliot became book lovers. Both boys came home with some suggestions for summer reading, and I bought them each several promising titles. But, neither boy had any interest in reading when school let out in June. Frustrated, I decided to try something completely new. I offered the boys $1 for each chapter book they finished. I don't believe in paying kids to do something they should just do in the normal course of life, but I wanted a way to encourage them to read, that wouldn't require any involvement, nags or threats on my part. I was also interested in giving them a way to earn small amounts of money, to start teaching some spending lessons as well. So, I threw caution to the wind, and announced my payout promise to the boys. In my mind, I estimated that they were likely to read between 5 and 10 chapter books each during the summer.

Upon explaining the rules to the boys, they ran downstairs immediately, demanding their pile of books. And, amazingly, their enthusiasm never waned. Jack discovered a new favorite author. He read only Dan Gutman books all summer. Elliot continued with some familiar series, and got through the entire Magic Tree House collection. In total, Elliot read 37 books. Jack read 21. (On average, his books were slightly longer.) I am so incredibly proud of them. Not only did they exceed my loftiest hopes, but they discovered a joy that no amount of bribery could buy. All summer long I found them curled up with their books, nestled in corners and on the couch. They read in the car, and complained when the trips were too short. They read in bed, before and after lights out. I was so amazed, that I made them each type up a list of the books they read. I wanted them to be able to look back, years from now, and remember the stories they so enjoyed. Here they are:

Jack's List:
My Weird School #4 Miss Hannah is Bananas
MWS #5 Miss Small Is Off the Wall
MWS #6 Mr Hynde Is Out of His Mind
MWS #7 Mrs Cooney Is Looney
MWS #8 Miss Lagrange Is Strange
MWS #9 Miss Lazarre Is Bazarre
MWS 310Mr Docker Is Off His Rocker
MWS#11 Mirs Kormel Is Not Normal
MWS #12 Miss Todd Is Odd
MWS #13 Mrs Patty Is Batty
MWS #14 Miss Holly Is Too Jolly
MWS #15 Mr Macky Is Wacky
MWS #16 Miss Coco Is Loco
MWS #17 Miss Suki Is Kooky
Honus and Me
MWS #18 Mrs Yonkers Is Bonkers
MWS #19 Dr Carbles Is Losing His Marbles
MWS #20 Mr Louie Is Screwy
MWS #21 Miss Krup Cracks Me Up
My Weird School Daze #1 Mrs Dole Is Out of Control
MWSD #2 Mr Sunny Is Funny

Elliot's List:

Nate the Great
Nate the Great and the Sticky Case
Invisible Stanley
Stanley Flat Again
Nate the Great and the Missing Valentine
Nate the Great and the Missing Key
Flat Stanley
Nate the Graet and the missing pillowcase
Nate the Graet and the hallaween hunt
Flat Stanley
Magic Tree House #18 Buffalo before Breakfast
Magic Tree House #19 Tigers at Twilight
Hardy Boys Trouble at the Arcade
Mr. Docker is off his Rocker
Mrs. Kormel is Not Normal
Miss Lazar Bizarre
Magic Tree House # 20 Dingoes at Dinnertime
Magic Tree House #21 Civil War on Sunday
Magic Tree House #22 Revolution War on Wednesday
Magic Tree House # 23 Twister on Tuesday
Magic Tree House #24 Earthquake in the Early Morning
MTH #25 Stage Fright on a Summer Night
MTH #26 Good Morning, Gorillas
MTH #27 Thanksgiving on Thursday
MTH #28 High Tide in Hawaii
MWS 6 Mr Hynde is out of  His Mind
MTH #29 christmis in camelot
MTH #30 hanted castle on hallaween eve
MTH #31 summer of the sea serpent
MTH #32 winter of the ice wizard
MTH #33 carnival at candlelight
MTH #34 seasens of the sandstorms
MTH #35 night of the new magicians
MTH #36 blizzard on a blue moon
MTH #37 dragon of the red dawn
MTH #38 Monday with a mad genius
MTH  Dark day in the deep sea

School Update

Elliot finally got into Jack's new school! Hooray! My stressed out, harried life as I know it is over. Well, probably not. I do still have four kids to take care of, cloth, feed, bathe, supervise, discipline, educate and love. But, I digress; that's fodder for another blog post. Today I'm celebrating! Life will certainly be much better and much simpler with both boys in the same school. The news came unexpectedly, after so much frustration dealing with the Family Resource Center back in September. I had really prepared myself for this to go on for months, possibly even the whole school year. Surprisingly, it was Jack who actually brought some urgency to the situation. We met with the principal last week regarding his provisional placement in the bilingual third grade program. She told us definitively that Jack could not stay in the program. His level of Spanish was insufficient. The school's official policy is that no one can enter the bilingual program after second grade, unless they are proficient (or fluent) in both languages. Because of my ability to speak Spanish at home, they agreed to let Jack try the class, but after 5 weeks, he just could not keep up in the Spanish section. The school wanted to move Jack over into the English onlythird grade class, which Ted and I would not agree to. They did, however, give us one other option - second grade bilingual. That option appealed to us in many ways, but I told the principal that we could not make a permanent move like that without knowing that Elliot also had a place in the school. She said she would talk to the Family Resource Center to see what she could find out. 48 hours later, we got an email welcoming Elliot to the first grade. So, yesterday Jack moved to the second grade classroom. Elliot said goodbye to his friends at St. John. Today, he will join Jack at his new school.

Tonight I will dream of my new daily routine, with only two pick up and two drop offs (one on Mondays and Fridays,) time to play on the playground after school, and a wonderful new school community where our family can truly feel at home. How do I feel? Thankful!

The Year When Elliot Didn't Go To School

The school year is finally getting into full swing. Elliot is still tagging along with me everywhere I go. The most frequent question I seem to be getting from friends these days is "any news on the school front?" So, here's an update for everyone, curious or not.

Jack is still attending the third grade bilingual class at his new (public) school. He is officially enrolled in the English only third grade class, but the school has agreed to put him in the bilingual section, at least temporarily. The bilingual program consists of two classes for each grade. One classroom is English only; the other is Spanish only. The kids switch back and forth from one class to the other each Monday. The teachers do not repeat material week to week, so the kids receive half of their education in each language. They do reading, writing, math and science in both languages. The school purports to have a rule that no child can enter the bilingual program after second grade without some knowledge of both languages. Since Jack entered in the third grade, he had to take a Spanish reading test. They administered the test last Spring, which he "failed", in the school's words. (Don't even ask me about that one.) But, Ted and I have made it clear to the teacher and the principal that we are only interested in the bilingual program. We've been making that clear since last Spring, when Jack first won a spot (through the public school lottery) in the school. The difficulties started back then, when the principal was out on leave for a semester, and no one else at the school explained the policy in such black and white terms. By the time we were able to talk to her this fall, school was already starting, and Jack was there. She consented to let him sit in the bilingual section for now, but seems to feel strongly that he should not stay there. The third grade Spanish teacher asked to speak with me after the first few days of school, and suggested that we place Jack in either the English only class, or that we put him in the second grade of the bilingual program. As I have said, we have no interest at all in the English only program. We would consider the second grade placement, but not yet. We would like to give Jack a chance in the third grade, before we put him back one year. For any of you who don't know me well, I am bilingual, fluent in Spanish and English. I spoke to Jack in all Spanish until he was roughly 18 months old. Being sick and pregnant with Elliot was too much for me though, and I gave it up at that point. We have now resumed Spanish instruction. Since the first day of school, I have been trying to speak all Spanish to the boys again. It's not easy, but it does seem to be going well for the most part. All of the kids are picking up a lot of Spanish. We wrote a letter to the school explaining that we can speak Spanish to Jack at home. I offered to help him with his homework and classwork. I agreed to speak Spanish to him to help accelerate his progress. We promised that we would not let him fail. The principal listened to our hopes and our plans and said, "I know that anything is possible." She agreed to let him stay temporarily, but expressed concern over how much work would be required to catch him up to the other students. We asked her to give us a month or two. She agreed to give him 2 weeks. We are supposed to meet again next week. I don't know what will happen at that point. On one hand, he is in the bilingual class. And we are dilligently working on Spanish at home. We do vocab flash cards, we read Spanish books, I try to speak all Spanish to them. Ted even invented a new (and very popular) game called "Mamá dice." I know that there are many children in the class who are reasonably fluent in both languages at this point. But, I also suspect that there are several who are nowhere close. It will be difficult for me to hear (again) that Jack has failed another test, or is not welcome in the class. But it also seems to me that the school will not flat out refuse us, or force him to leave the program. I hope that if we keep insisting that he stay in the class, he will be allowed to continue. In the meantime, we will continue to work, and work, and work on our Spanish. It is both hard and exciting for me. The rewards of seeing my children advance in their Spanish keep me going. Cross your fingers. Say a prayer for us. Hope that the school appreciates the excitement, hard work and effort of a family striving to find a place in their school.

"And Elliot?" you ask. Well, we entered both boys in the same public school lottery last Spring. On the lottery form, each family is asked to list 4-5 schools, ranked in order of preference. Elliot was assigned to a school that did not even appear on our list. We had never heard of it before. For many reasons, we decided to decline his placement at that school, and stick with his spot on the waiting list at Jack's school. He has been #2 on the waiting since the initial school assignments last Spring. Since thousands of children participate in this lottery, a #2 spot on the waiting list is considered very high. Everyone assured us that there is always a lot of movement over the summer, and Elliot would undoubtedly get a spot before school started. He did not. Then everyone told us that there are kids who just don't show up for school every year. They said it would only be a matter of 5-10 days of school, and Elliot would surely get one of those spots. Well, tomorrow will be day #9. He is still #2 on the waiting list. I patiently and quietly waited for the first 5 days of school to pass, and then went to see the principal. I was hoping to hear that someone had not showed up for first grade. She told me that she had no idea about attendance yet, and told me that the Family Resource Center handled all waiting list issues. She told me that it is not up to her, and that she has nothing to do with waiting list assignments. All public school placements are handled through the Family Resource Centers. This is where you go to enroll your child in school, make any changes, etc. I called them to check on the waiting list status after the first few days of school. They were so busy, they had forwarded all of their phone lines to a Parent Hotline. But the Parent Hotline doesn't handle school assignments, so they couldn't help me. They suggested that I go in person to the Family Resource Center. I did that. They weren't much help. The man I spoke with told me, "we can do much more if you are here in person." So, I waited three days and went back again. This time, the woman I spoke with said, "You don't need to come here in person. Just call on the phone." Ahhhhhh. So, yesterday I tried calling on the phone. After being told to call a different number, someone took my name and number and said someone would get back to me. No one did. I called again today. Another nice (but completely unhelpful) person told me that the principal is the one who initiates movement on the waiting list. The principal, she explained, is the one who lets the FRCs know that there is an opening in the school. The FRC then goes down the waiting list to fill the spot. I am sure that that is right. But, the principal made it clear to me that she cannot help me. So, I'm back where I started. Elliot tags along with me. He told the woman at the FRC last week that he doesn't want to go to school ever. I wish I could say the same thing. I'm beginning to think that this year will forever be known in our family as the year when Elliot didn't have to go to school...

A Glimpse

Several months ago, a friend of mine, who already has three kids herself, asked me what life was like with four. I have yet to find the time to reply to her question. So, in honor of her question, I'm offering a glimpse of my life with four, during these "first days", the craziest time of my year.

Most of the time life with four is good. Our days are orderly. We arrive places on time. The house is fairly clean. The dishes are done. Dinner's on the table each night, and includes at least one vegetable. The laundry's put away. The mail is answered; the messages returned. But, then there are the dark days. The days I don't (usually) write about. These are the days when the laundry has piled up so high that it overflows into the hallway. The kids have gone days without baths. The breakfast dishes (and sometimes the milk) are still on the table at dinner time. Dinner consists of something hastily defrosted from the freezer, served lukewarm, each item on the plate a different shade of tan. The keys get left in the door (sometimes the mailman is kind enough to ring the buzzer to tell me.) There's pee, poop, toothpaste, or all three on the carpet at some point during the day. The library calls to tell me I have $10 in late fines. Everything is lost in the mess. I'm exhausted and grouchy. I drink caffeine to stay awake, and eat meals of peanut butter spoonfuls chased with chocolate chips. I lose my patience with the kids. I vent my frustrations on Ted.

We arrived home from our vacation on Labor Day. Just in time for "first days", what the director of the boys' pre-school affectionately calls the beginning of each school year. These are those introductory days at every school -- the half days, the days when parents are supposed to stay and hang out in the classroom, the days when your child's grade hasn't started yet. The days that count as school days to everyone except the parent who is waiting for the REAL school days to start. This is my busiest time of year. With kids in multiple schools (and one kid still on a waiting list for school this year,) I race around from drop off, to pick up, to open house, to the school supply store, breastfeed the baby and squeeze in a diaper change and nap between aforementioned stops. I rarely make it home between the first drop off and time to make the dinner. While the boys are home with me all summer, I put many thing on hold. I make a promise to myself that I will have time again once school starts. And I will. But the beginning of school has a deceptive lure. It's not until long after school starts that I find that time again.

These busy days, I am caught living moment to moment. As I come and go, I walk by our only partly unpacked suitcases. I dare not hope to accomplish something each day. I cannot find the few moments of mental peace needed to formulate a to-do list. I know that I will only be able to do the urgent things that come up -- the boo-boo's that need doctoring, the lunch to be packed, the form that must be returned to school today, the food we need for tonight's dinner.

This morning I picked up my toothbrush and put toothpaste on it. Then, someone needed my attention right away. I put the toothbrush down on the counter. I didn't see it, or think about it, again until I was headed out to parents' night tonight. Oh well.

The general tone of our family life is still upbeat, even in these busy times. But, I do sometimes feel like a hamster on the wheel. Or, to be more accurate, I feel like I'm swimming in a beautiful pool of deep water. I love being in the water, but the pool is so deep that I can't reach the bottom. I have to swim constantly to stay afloat. At some point, long after dark, someone tosses me a soft, comfortable raft. I climb up onto it and rest, falling instantly to sleep. Sometime early the next morning, while still deep in slumber, the raft is yanked out from under me, to the tune of someone crying. I start swimming again...

My Homeschool

I can't believe I haven't blogged about this at all yet. It must be a symptom of denial. Between the ephemeral last days of summer, and our lengthy (vacation) absence from home, my mind is elsewhere. But, ready or not, it's coming. Next week brings the annual back to school ritual in Boston.

For the first time this year, I will have three boys in school. I find myself strangely, and uncharacteristically sad about Mattie starting school. I feel like a first time mom all over again. He is set to attend the same pre-school that Jack and Elliot went to, which I wholeheartedly adore. But, for some reason, I am dreading our first day separation. We have been away from the school for the last year, with Jack and Elliot both in elementary school. Mattie does not have the same familiarity with the school that Elliot did, having dropped off and picked up Jack countless times during the year before he started there. Mattie's first day will be next Wednesday, the day before elementary school starts. I will be doing the drop off with everyone in tow. Perhaps that will make it easier.

Jack and Elliot will also be attending a new school this year. We decided to give the Boston Public Schools a chance for the first time. We selected a school just 2 blocks from our house, which offers a bilingual Spanish English immersion program. But, this switch is not without a set of hurdles still to conquer. Jack will be starting third grade. The other kids in the immersion program have had 3 years of Spanish already. Jack has had none. So, the school wants to start Jack out in an English only classroom. On the surface that doesn't sound problematic, except that the English only program has been eliminated in the school. Jack's grade is the last one that still offers it. The program, having been phased out, has no future in the school. It has no one with an interest in promoting, improving or pouring energy into it. For reasons owing to the workings of the BPS lottery system, the English only classroom is also purported to be full of kids whose parents have little interest in their children's education. It is also rumoured to have more discipline problems. So, we told the school that we are only interested in the bilingual program for Jack. The principal was out last semester on family leave, so we have not gotten any assurances from the school concerning his placement. If Jack isn't offered a spot in the bilingual program, we're not sure whether we'll send him to the school. We also don't have anywhere else to send him. Elliot is in an entirely different, but worse, situation. Elliot was not offered a spot at any of the schools (4) that we listed on our lottery form last year. Instead, he was assigned to another public school, farther away from our home, that we had never heard of. We opted to decline his spot at that school, and instead placed him on the waiting list at Jack's school. He is currently second on that list. So, right now, he does not have a spot at any school. Jack's school has assured me that they typically see lots of movement on the waiting list, but not until after the school year starts (and they figure out who is a no show.) So, what will we do next Thursday? The current plan for Elliot is homeschooling.

Given my personality (obsessive compulsive, type A, etc.) it's even hard for me to believe that we're in this situation. But, I'm surprisingly ok with it. I guess the truth is that, on some inner level, I feel like everything will work out fine. And if it doesn't, I'm confident that we'll be able to pull something else together quickly. After all of my frustrations with Jack and Elliot's old school, and my fears about their new school, the idea of temporary homeschooling doesn't actually sound that scary. And maybe, if things don't work out, this will be the final push for us to move. Whatever it is, I'm actually looking forward to letting fate take me for a ride.