Nostalgia? Perhaps.

An Artist's Soul

Little girl,

How would you have felt

If you had known

An artist’s soul

Lay deep within you?

Still and silent

Watching and waiting

For the perfect moment

To reveal herself to you

Perhaps the busy life

Had to pass you by

To allow time for the quiet, contemplative moments

An artist’s soul requires

So grateful

She found her way through you

Tugging all that is within her

To the surface

Challenging Times

This is my grandson.  And yes, he is sitting on a foam roller with his papers taped to the window, working on  ANOTHER homework assignment while the sun shines and the outdoor calls to him.  This is approximately hour number 8 spent at home on this assignment.  As you can probably tell from the  picture, Kai is not your traditional learner.  He has trouble concentrating and staying on task, has been designated ADHD, and has trouble doing the same thing as everyone else in the same way.  Those of you not in the education system might be surprised how MANY students are not 'traditional' learners.  I have no problem with homework.  Okay, that's a lie.  I do not have trouble with SOME homework that serves a particular purpose and requires a limited amount of time for students and their families.

There have been many defining moments over my years in the classroom and as an administrator that served to remind me that school does NOT need to be a child's whole life.  One of those moments was when a parent came to see me when I was a principal.  She was obviously upset and had not been able to resolve the situation with the teacher.  Her words were, "The amount of work that my son is required to do at home is starting to ruin my relationship with him and we are not doing it anymore."  Who could blame her? 

If you are an educator reading this, remember every day to see their gifts, to work from their strengths, to understand their challenges and to not lose sight of the child EVER!  If you are a parent in this situation, have a voice and DON'T STOP until your child's needs are met!  Watching our boy struggle, knowing there is no need for it, makes us angry and sad and frustrated.  Wishing that his teacher could see the creative, intelligent, hilarious, determined, caring (oh, so caring!) miracle that the rest of us see!

This is the blog about our boy heading to kindergarten with enthusiasm, curiosity and a love of learning.

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Lunch With Ava

     

     

This is our Ava!  She is in grade one and lucky for me, we go to the same school.  Retirement took a left turn when I was called back to the school I worked at for many years to fill in as a learning assistance teacher.  There are many things I like about going to school Monday - Thursday but my favourite thing right now is my Tuesday lunch date with Ava.

We almost always go to Subway.  If you're from our wee town you will know that our options are limited.  At Subway we almost always share a toasted ham/white cheese/bacon sandwich and a chocolate milk.  Ava is in charge of the conversation and every now and then she even lets me talk.  It took me a long time to find a lunch date who could out-talk me :). Tuesday is Ava's Show and Tell day so often she brings along a parcel to fill me in on her treasure of the day.  She notices things around the room that she hasn't noticed before and she is VERY observant.  She likes to tell jokes and she laughs a LOT during our times together.  If it is spring, summer, or fall we usually go back to the school and then go for a walk.  It is winter time right now so we go back to my room at the school and play games or colour or read books or do whatever it is Ava likes to do.  Today we played OUCH and Ava was very good at it.

I do encourage her to choose wisely at lunch but I would never say no to whatever she wanted and we both like it this way.  Today Ava decided that it was time to switch up Subway for A & W.  When I asked her what she wanted she couldn't remember what they had there.  Pretty sure the motivation for A & W was the root beer sucker and that the lunch was not a priority.  She ate a bit of lunch (pretty much she just took the bacon out of the bacon and egger) and then ripped the cover off the sucker, stuck the wrapper in her pocket (she needed it later to re-wrap the sucker if she didn't finish it) and went to it.  Today, Ava was particularly lively.  She was full of energy, was up to her usual shenanigans and more and laughed and laughed and laughed.  I taught Ava how to blow the cover off a straw (a biodegradable one) so this was a 'must do' today.  She wanted to go back for another straw so she could try to blow the cover into my open mouth.  I convinced her that we should save this for next time.

I feel very fortunate to live so close to Ava and her family and these Tuesday lunch dates are one of the blessings of having them so close by.  Thanks for wanting to hang with your Gramma, Ava.  Thanks for making every single lunch time a happy time.  Thanks for your silly jokes.  Thanks for sharing your Show and Tell with me.  Thanks for all of the laughter -yours and mine!  We are pretty lucky, aren't we?