Teacher Talk

I went to parent teacher conferences for both boys yesterday. Peter's teacher talked very little about academics and quite a bit about behavior. Cooper's teacher spoke almost exclusively about academics, which is funny since she and I have been in communication about Cooper's behavior choices.

Peter's antics have been documented, at least in part, on this blog. His behavior has improved immensely in the last year. Yes, he still does and says things that make us wonder what on earth he's thinking, and his impulsiveness shows up more than we'd like, but it's so much better than it was.

I have not spent as much time writing about Cooper's choices. Well no, I guess I've written about his culinary adventures, but those feel mild in comparison to some of the other stuff he's been doing. At home Cooper is a screamer. He always has been, but now there's more anger behind it. I'm usually the target of the outbursts, but occasionally the others feel his wrath as well. What makes it really hard is that he'll scream and call you a mean name, then he'll immediately want to give you a hug. Call me mean, but that doesn't really fly with me.

At school he's discovered the fine art of being the class clown. During the first few weeks of school his teacher pulled me aside when I came to retrieve him at the close of the day and let me know that he'd been standing on chairs. The next day, after a talk with Cooper, I asked if it had been better. She said, "Well, actually, today he climbed on my desk."

What?!

So given how the boys have been acting around me, I was kind of surprised at what each teacher talked about.

Peter's teacher does seem to understand him, which is good. And even better, she said that she can see that he's a good kid who is trying hard and she loves him and wants to see him succeed. And that she doesn't let him get away with anything. That's what he needs, someone firm and consistent who loves him. She also said he's so far ahead academically that she's not concerned about that at all. Maybe that's why we discussed it so little?

And maybe the reason Cooper's teacher focused on reading, writing, and arithmetic is that we've already talked about how he acts in class. She did say she thought he was turning a corner. It would be lovely to see him turn that corner here at home as well.

As far as the schoolwork, she said she could tell that we read a lot at home. I confirmed that we do. I learned that the kids in his class have been drawing pictures and then writing short stories to describe those illustrations. Except, most of the kids will draw one thing and then write about something completely different. Cooper always writes about his picture, and he writes more and includes more details than his classmates. This was delightful, though not surprising. She said that the whole class was at the same reading level, which didn't sound quite right. Then I learned that they haven't done the official reading assessment yet, so they don't really know. That made more sense.

I have new things to work on with both boys, so I guess I have homework now too.