the boy | matching tracksuits

Late-January Monday

Monday 23 January 2017 | 0 Comments

It's been a long time since we've had a fairly typical Monday. Last Monday, we had no school, so K and I went out and bought a new car. The Monday before that, we were out of school because of snow. Or was that the previous Monday? Going back further there was winter break and so on. So today was a normal Monday. Up early, kids ready, off we go.

The afternoon was fairly typical as well. After chess club, I arrived home late. Everyone was in the backyard. I made my afternoon coffee, poured it in a travel mug, and headed out -- only to see everyone coming in.

"I'm coming in to get dinner ready," K said. The temptation was to be lazy, but laziness is what we got all weekend, with the rain, rain, and more rain.

"I'll go down with them," I suggested, and both the kids squealed and excitedly ran back down to the trampoline/swing/hammock/bridge/hiding spot area we've been developing over the last few years.

Afterward we had dinner. Relatively uneventful -- which is really saying something. The kids lately have been bickering like mad over the slightest thing, and it turns dinner into something less than perfectly enjoyable. We decided to conduct an experiment -- the "we" being K and I, for the kids would never agree to it. Not knowing what influence was primarily responsible for their behavior (for it's not been just the bickering), we've eliminated all possible influences for a week: no television, no computer, no friends. Just a week to refocus and recharge. The kids this weekend had to find other ways to entertain themselves when we weren't playing with them. L read, played with her Legos, drew. The Boy drew, played with his Legos, looked at books. The results are beginning to show: tonight, a much calmer dinner, with no hysterics about anything. In the evening, a calmness that hasn't been in our house for a while.

Board Games

Saturday 21 January 2017 | 0 Comments

Chasing the Unseen

Saturday 14 January 2017 | 0 Comments

I know we’re entering a new phase in the Girl’s life: chasing. It’s not just that now, with her birthday last month, she’s in the double digits. There’s more to it than that. She’s not a tween, is she? Isn’t that eleven? Twelve? Yet there she was this afternoon, down on the hammock, talking to her male friend as he sat on the other hammock.

It’s not that I’m suggesting that they were discussing anything more mature than a ten- and eleven-year-old should discuss. She still says that boys are icky. (Hopefully that will last for another couple of years, when they can comfortably become iffy at best. Maybe a blossoming interest when she starts high school?) No, it’s not what topic they were chasing down; it’s that they were talking. They weren’t playing; they weren’t running; they weren’t being silly. They were sitting and talking.

The Boy doesn’t talk with his friends. They play. They play with an intensity that makes me envious, with an energy that makes me wonder if I ever had even a small portion of it. They’re talking consists only of what they’re playing.

“Pretend I’m a policeman…”

“Let’s go to the trampoline!”

If I had to bet what L and W were discussing, I’d say it’s probably Pokemon-related. That’s what they talk about most of the time. That’s their common interest. But still — talking, not playing.

We’ve started chasing her. She’s still a little girl, but that’s ending in the next couple of years. Given my shock when I look past entries from the “Time Machine” widget here on this silly site and think, “Dang, that was three years ago?!” I know that those two years will pass so quickly that I won’t even notice if I’m not careful. And then we will be chasing her. Chasing her growth. Chasing the unseen.

Later in the day, the Boy gives chase in a different way. Playing on the driveway, he crashes to the concrete as he’s chasing a ball. His palms hit with an audible slap, and I could feel the burn in my own palms.

But not a peep, only a little cry of panic as he saw the ball heading to the edge of the driveway, threatening to roll down the hill and into the creek that serves as the boundary between our backyard and that of our neighbors’ yards. He popped back up, scurried to the end of the drive only half a blink too late. Down the hill rolled the ball.

There was a time when he wouldn’t head down that far into the yard without an adult, just as L was at that early age. But today, he didn’t even hesitate, didn’t even look to see if an adult was anywhere around. He just slowed a bit to make it down the tricky part, chasing the ball with the certainty that he could catch it that only a four-year-old could hold.

Candy Land

Wednesday 11 January 2017 | 0 Comments

Helping with the Zurek

Monday 09 January 2017 | 0 Comments

The little man, helping as always.

Snowy Sunday

Sunday 08 January 2017 | 0 Comments

Even after a second day of sledding, this time in even colder weather, the Boy was ready for a bit of ice cream.

If only he could get it out…

First Snow 2017

Saturday 07 January 2017 | 0 Comments

Like most snow storms in the South, this one was the talk of news and neighbors for almost a week before it hit. The possibility of snow grew into the certainty of snow, and the depth of that certain snow increased as well. By the time I went to bed, meteorologists were predicting six inches for our area. That's like three feet of snow in northern climes -- something of note.

The kids grew increasingly excited as the projected storm's intensity promised to be greater and greater. E was squealing on a regular basis Friday night with excitement about the impending snow.

What we got in our area was somewhat more restrained, though. Probably an inch, maybe an inch and a half, of icy, hard snow greeted us this morning. The Boy was ready to go, though.

"I'm going to eat half a bagel for breakfast, then get dressed, then check the street, then go to R's house." By nine, he was out. Shortly after that, the Girl joined him. Shortly after that, the neighborhood joined them.

In the afternoon, with such a gorgeous blue sky, we had to go for a walk, and with the roads clearing, we decided to go to Conestee Park. Wearing his gum boots, the Boy had to walk through as many puddles as possible, and both of the kids had to grab, fling, kick, and toss every bit of snow possible. The result: two wet, tired kids. Exhausted.

Until we arrived back at the house and saw the neighborhood kids sledding. Amazing what that will do for one's energy.

Gone

Tuesday 03 January 2017 | 1 Comment

The Boy was playing CandyLand with K, and after he'd won the first game, he was eager to play another.

"I'm going to win again!" he proclaimed, and for a moment, it looked as if he were going to do just that. He shot ahead with double color after double color. Then K drew the gum drop and zoomed ahead.

"Oh, I'll never win!" he proclaimed, frustrated.

"Yes, but you might draw another candy piece and move ahead, or Mama might draw the candy cane when you're way past it and have to go back many, many spaces," I reasoned. But as I often remind The Girl, there's no reasoning with a four-year-old. He continued playing a bit halfheartedly. He drew a candy piece eventually, but K had shot so far ahead by then that his chances of winning really and truly were gone.

And with that loss, his desire to play was gone as well.

I remembered the whole time they played the new buzzword in education: grit. It's really nothing more than perseverance in the face of difficulty and setback, but educators and researchers in education like new jargon. (I suspect it's mainly from the latter.) And so "grit" is thrown around in education blogs and educator gatherings quite often these days. It was rewarding to see The Boy showing some of this perseverance. It took a good bit of encouragement, but he finished the game, learned the lesson (?), and we had a nice close to the afternoon.

The next night, The Boy and I are working with Legos. I was building a jail for him, and he was building a mystery. Not having a plan, he found the process a little slow-going and frustrating.

"I just can't get it," he fussed as he couldn't get two pieces joined. He threw them down, and for just a moment, I thought the chances of a relaxing evening of Lego-ing were gone. But just for a moment. Seeing everything as a teaching opportunity -- or at least trying to -- I showed him how to get the pieces together, then pulled them apart and had him try again.

"I got it!"

Two opportunities to teach that could have disappeared but didn't. The trick for me, though, is to transfer that to my students. Everything can be a moment to teach, a learning opportunity, for the at-risk kids in my charge. They lack social skills, patience, anger management methods, volume control, grit (there it is again), a growth mindset (another edu-speak jargon term that's hot now). Every teaching moment can't bloom -- I'd never get to the curriculum some days. The balance must be there, but there's so much they need before they're gone off to high school...

Inspired by the Daily Post’s prompt of the day: Gone.