Journal

Well, its that time of year again. I have been feeling physically well since the dose change on the sulfasalazine a few weeks ago, so I can't complain much. Something about the change of season has an set off some emotional upset. It happens every year. I get depressed and lazy. Them comes the holidays! The busiest time of the year and I don't want to do anything.

Tomorrow is my youngest son's 4th birthday. Its hard to believe he is 4 already.

This afternoon I meet with the school psychologist and my oldest son's teacher to discuss what's been going on with him. She will be the one doing the testing so she wants to hear what we are concerned about.

Meanwhile, I have been volunteering in my daughter's kindergarten class since the last time I visited I was commandeered to help. What a zoo! There are 24 kids in her class and one teacher. She used to be a 1st grade teacher and doesn't seem to know how to teach kindergarten. It seems she is still in first grade mode and doesn't take much time to explain the basics like ABC and 123. She had kinders copying sentences off the board! Half of them don't know how to write their letters and were overwhelmed to be asked to write sentences. She doesn't show them how to form the letters so they all just try to copy the shape as best as they can. It was so hard to watch, I ended up staying for a couple of hours just to help out some of those kids and try to show them how to make the letters in the words on the board. My problem was that she knows that some of them don't know their letters but makes no attempt to instruct them. She is so busy trying to get the work done that she has no time to help the ones that need it. Now here is the real kicker. This was my son's teacher last year. The one that told me he was just immature and lazy and that if we were had on him, he would eventually get with the program. After spending time in her class and seeing what she considers teaching, I'm not at all surprised by how he got behind. I has put me into quite the tizzy this last week. I'm not exactly sure what to do about her. I don't want to get her all hostile since my daughter has 6 more months in her class and I still have one that has to go through the school after her. So I told her I would help out a few times a week in hopes that I might be able help some of those kids that are getting left behind. I may talk with the dean again and see if I can get him to check up on her more.

On second thought, I think I can complain plenty! 

Yep, it is the end of the first trimester of school for my kids. My son's teacher has been blowing me off lately when I go in to talk to her. She has been saying "we'll talk at the conference". Well, the time allotted was 20 minutes and there were three teachers there to talk to. It was not very encouraging. The teacher just kept saying she couldn't get him to do his work by himself and had no ideas to put forth so she brought in some other person to evaluate him who didn't really present anything new either. So three months later, we are still at the "try this and see if it helps" stage. No forward progress on their part so my kid is now even further behind. They want to send all the work home with him that he doesn't finish at school which is at least half of what he is supposed to be doing at school. So after 7 hours of school, I'm supposed to sit him down to work for another 1-3 hours. He's 7 years old! How can anyone in their right mind expect a 7 year old to have an 8-10 hour work day? He is so done by the time he gets home that it's almost impossible to get him to even look at home work and quite frankly, if I have to make him do the work at home, what is the difference in that and homeschooling him?!

I haven't been feeling to great this week. I don't think its RA. It feels like I'm coming down with a nasty cold, but it is toying with me. I feel crappy but it hasn't progressed to full on sick and it hasn't gone away either. So my bad mood has darkened a bit more. Just in time for the holidays!