Here he is with his school group (there are several kids not pictured that didn't make it to the end of year ceremony). In a nutshell my Max ended up at this little school because our school in the neighborhood has been under construction for the last two years. It's created a lot of chaos and stretched teachers to the breaking point. I think that the teacher Max ended up with this year wouldn't have been a good match for us no matter what, but adding in the construction and chaos and she was a lost cause. She didn't like me and she didn't like Max and I had no communications with her except bad notes home and parent teacher conferences full of complaints. Finally when Max wasn't able to do his math homework as we moved through the curriculum and he started saying he was BAD at math I knew something had to give. When I took him home for a couple of days and had him go through a 2nd grade math computer program and he became an expert I knew something was wrong. Anyway, we went through lots of different schooling options for him and settled on this little school just barely opened by a teacher that actually used to work at his old school until she got fed up with the system. It's a one room school house with kids from 5 to 12. She doesn't usually have more than 10-12 kids there at any given time. People can mostly homeschool and just supplement with her school, or mostly do her school and do some supplemental homeschooling. It's flexible, she communicates and she loves the kids. And I love her. There was such a huge difference in Max's demeanor the moment we changed classrooms. It actually made me feel guilty that I hadn't done something to change things for him earlier. We're going to stick with this school for next year and then we're going to see where we go from there. I know for a fact he's doing so much better than he would've been doing at his old school.
The kids all did self portraits for the end of year party. I think they turned out awesome. They all had "positive affirmations" on them--the kids chose their own.
Here's Max's. It says "I have lots of energy!" SO TRUE! And so positive.
We're so proud of our big boy! And bring on summer. We'll see you at the pool.
4 comments:
We're proud of him, too. I really like that teacher - I think she was smart to go off on her own, and I know she's making more money and finding more satisfaction with this little group than she ever could have done at the school. But you know how I feel about teaching and bringing up children in herds. Glad you found this place and even gladder that you have the power to take things into your own hands. I wonder where you got it?
I love looking forward to summer vacation. And I get to go to the pool with you this year. See you there!
Oh Ginna. I didn't know that you were having so much trouble with Max's school, and here I was having trouble with Alex' school and feeling all alone in the world, lol. I'm really happy that you found a workable option and that he's doing so much better. I can see from his self-portrait that he's quite happy there. Good job Mom!
Ugh! What I would give for something like this for my kids!
I miss homeschooling my kids....
I'm so happy you were able to find this for Max!!
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