Friday, September 26, 2008

Next I'll be Taking Geritol

Pookie just came home from school. She's been at her mother's all week and now her and her brother spend this week at home with us.

As she most often does when she first gets home here she went to the cabinet where we keep the goodies.

"Hello Lucky Charms", she exclaims.

And then she pours herself a big bowl and adds milk. Organic Milk.

"I guess the organicness of the milk cancels out the unhealthiness of the colored marshmallows", she says matter-of-factly as she sits down and eats her after-school snack.

That's just one of the reasons I love her, you can never argue with her rationale.

My husband and I went to open school night at her school last night.

I haven't been to one of those since 1996 when my children were in high school. And back then my children had about 2,000 children in each grade.

Here, 4 local towns join together for middle school totalling 350 per grade.

I learned many things last night.

Did you know that students can get their text books on a disk? What is that all about? What happened to the heavy text books that they had to schlep back and forth each day?

When my kids forgot something from school their punishment was to bring home the entire contents of their desk for a week.....it always worked. That's not going to work these days.

And what is with those Smart Boards? They do look like a lot of fun, but who gets to clean the chalkboard erasers these days? That used to be such an honor in my day.

Reading that last sentence makes me feel really, really old.

But the most amazing difference between 1996 and now is the fact that you can track your child's school work, homework, projects and grades online everyday. You can even give your kids quizzes on the things they've learned that week.

My head, it was a'spinnin' last night.

I've got a lot of catching up to do if I'm going to keep up with these Whippersnappers. (there I go again)

5 comments:

Dawn said...

Yes, school has definitely changed. Some good some not! Very clever post.

The Farmer Files said...

Yikes, I have been out of teaching for 4 years. Wonder how outdated I might be when I go back?!?

come dine with me said...

..and you used to do your math 'figgers' on a shovel with charcoal, right? LOL
They hadn't even invented math when I went to school.

nancygrayce said...

OH,it would be just so stressful for me to follow my children's progress online! My sister does that with her son and I just think it is torture. Just wait until report cards come out to get all stressed! I'm glad I didn't have all that when mine were in school. Teacher conferences were bad enough!

Linds said...

The smart boards are wonderful - I have been teaching so I had to have a crash course in them, and believe me, you need a degree in the things to really know what to do! Layers, hidden boxes etc - but such fun!