Confrences

Today, after Eden's meeting, I had conferences for both of the older girls. Our school system has conferences with the parents 2 times a year. I think this is great, this way we can be on the same page as the teachers, when it comes to concerns and expectations. I am so very proud of my girls, so I felt I need to share what happened.

Tanya's year started out rough because her teacher as the other teachers she had noticed some problems with her reading. After the first meeting, we had a plan to get her eyes checked and also try a few other things to maybe help her. Turned out her eyes were alright, but she did have weak eyes that got tired easily. The eye doctor gave her glasses to use all day during school and to use at home whenever she did anything that strained her eyes; like tv, reading, or playing video games.

When we saw Tanya's teacher, she was so happy. She told us that Tanya has made huge strides in her reading. She had to move Tanya up a reading group because her reading has improved so much. Her math skills are great and she is her fathers kid and loves science. Her writing and spelling still needs some improvements but her teacher also said that as she reads more that may come in time. Her teacher said that Tanya was her "Star Pupil" this year. She is so proud that Tanya calls herself a "Reader", which is a far cry from the first of the year when she went to read to her teacher and told her that she couldn't read very well. Tanya is much more confident and proud of herself for the hard work she has put into reading and we are too!

Carly's meeting went wonderfully too. Her teacher asked us to bring her to the meeting and we were her last ones. We got there for Tanya's meeting and when she saw Carly she gladly told Carly she could hang out with her in her classroom. It's always a good sign when the teacher likes to spend time with her. Carly's teacher approaches conferences almost like a review you would get for work. She has the students go through their work before the conference and pick out some of the work they are proudest of. She went through her work and you could see she was proud of the work and she did work hard on it. Her teacher said that Carly is doing very well in her writing and reading, but where she see's Carly favorite subject is math.

Carly grasps concepts very easily and applies them in all of her math problem solving, which is a very mature concept. Some children have trouble with that even in middle school. She tries to visualize things or works out problems on paper. You could see how much Carly enjoys math as her teacher was talking about her work. Carly has really tried hard to be a stand out student and it shows. I am so happy that she loves school.

My girls have been very lucky to find really wonderful caring teachers that are proactive when it comes to my children. They call me when they have a problem or drop me an e-mail. I also try to let them know when I have a concern or if they are doing something that really helps. I wish there were more teacher like that around.