Conference Week

On Monday, I had a conference with Youngest's teacher. It went really well. He is reading where he should be, his math is a little behind (not major behind, only because she is having trouble testing him because he claims he is 'tired') and the writing is progressing (he's on an IEP for fine motor). She said he has lots of friends and enjoys kindergarten.

I was a bit more skeptical for Oldest's conference. His teacher wanted him to lead the meeting (seriously, as in 'lead' the meeting, following a plan of information that he worked on and 'lead' the meeting). Oldest has autism, his medications wear off at 3:15, we couldn't get a sitter on the days she could meet. Are you sensing how this would go? All of us would have to go.

However, I was pleasantly surprised. Oldest said his favorite subject was Math (he doesn't really like Math and he's not really good at Math). He wrote the subject that he is not good at is Writing (because it is hard...which is so true, it IS hard for him...he has motor planning issues like Youngest). He said that one of his goals was to read a harder book with Mom. That is something we can totally work on...he read to me part of a book this week that is difficult. I feel like there is so much more in there (now that we got the medication thing under control) that we still need to find out about him. He also had to grade himself. He gave himself low scores on things such as paying attention and finishing his homework. These are things that I am sure he does, but I could see his thought process. All in all, his teacher is so pleased with his progress.

Yesterday, he had to give a presentation with a group of peers and he, evidently, did an amazing job. I was worried because on Tuesday, he was struggling with his paragraph on Aztec clothing and then, Wednesday morning, when he woke up, he walked into the hallway and he started reciting it. Go figure. I said to The Hub, "that's his Aztec report" (in a very tired way, it was 5:30 in the morning!).