Alex and I got to go to the elementary school for the first time during the 2021-22 year in April for an open house. We weren't allowed on campus this year, even outside (so no end of the year pictures with teachers and friends). I should have taken the teacher pictures at the open house... anyway, we did visit Weston and Savannah's classrooms and saw some of their projects. I helped Savannah with the Chumash tomol (canoe), which was pineneedles hot-glued to cardboard... glad I'm done with the 4th grade Chumash projects now 😀. I enjoyed reading their poems - Savannah does have a big heart and Weston uses his hands a lot to build, write, and draw. Weston became known as the class cartographer because he likes to draw maps. He tried to draw and sell some maps - not too many takers for buying them, but I think his teacher bought one. Friends asked him to draw maps for them a lot. Weston's teacher said, "His love for geography is contagious and I hope he never gives up his dream to become a cartographer."
In math during the graphing, geometry, and volume unit, Weston had to put together a 3-dimensional town called "Polyhedraville." They had to calculate surface area and create geometric shapes for their town - interesting project.
Weston and Savannah had crazy hair or hat day one day in April. Savannah's hair wasn't too crazy, but Weston chose to wear multiple hats. He's a hat guy anyway.
Owen had an interesting 7th grade year. During the fall semester, I found out that in English they were reading a book that I thought was pretty violent - the "Outsiders". I arranged for Owen to read a different book than his class was reading. In the spring semester, I opted him out of the sex education class because I wasn't comfortable with the gender fluidity, the condoms on bananas, and some other things in the curriculum. Owen's friends reported that during the sex Ed class, they split the kids up into 2 teams - the penises and vaginas... I'm not sure what the purpose of that was or what kind of game they were playing... but I'm glad Owen didn't have to participate in that! Owen joined a PE class during that time (there was one other kid whose parents pulled them out as well, so he wasn't the only kid with an overprotective parent...). I also ended up sending an e-mail to the principal concerning an instructional video they were going to use to teach kids about racism. Three of the 4 videos were fine, but I wasn't comfortable with the promotion of BLM in one of the videos. While I support black lives and finding ways to combat racism, I'm not comfortable with the BLM movement and the group's agenda, such as using violence and rioting as a form of protest, defunding or abolishing the police, calling cops racist, ending capitalism, or their views on the nuclear family. The video didn't highlight much of their agenda, but did make it look like a positive movement worth joining and had protest signs that said "Stop killing us" (talking about the police). Anyway, I asked the principal to re-consider using that video as a teaching tool. I've had to become more aware of the curriculum in the schools lately. Luckily, Owen comes home and talks to me about things he doesn't understand or questions about certain things, so we've had some good conversations. But I'm not sure that other kids are having similar conversations at home, so some of the curriculum concerns me. Owen is getting used to being the one to "stand alone" in some things at school though.
One of Owen's fun things for the year was participating in choir. He went to 0 period for two mornings a week for that class. Luckily we did a carpool with his friend Becca and only had to drive over one morning a week. The choir did their spring concert, which sounded really good (nice they didn't have to sing in masks like they did for the winter concert). Owen's friend RJ (pictured below) convinced him to try out for the song and dance group for 8th grade. He had to step out of his comfort zone to do a solo during the try-outs. He sang a version of "Israel, Israel God is Calling". The teachers hadn't heard that one before, but he sang well enough to make the group called Outburst. (He might be regretting that now that he's started the class this fall - he found out to make an A in the class, he has to choose a song from a musical to sing as a solo in front of the class! It will be good for him...)
Maybe Owen can get some singing lessons from Savannah... she sang a solo for her class at the end of the year. She sang "Part of your World" from the Little Mermaid in front of her class a cappella (no accompaniment). I didn't get to hear it, but heard she did a good job. She's pretty brave! She got one of the monthly awards (holding up a certificate in the picture below), which I think was for creativity. Her teacher said, "In all she does she provides an insightful, creative, and thoughtful new perspective."
Most of the time, I had no idea what Nathan and Jared were doing in their classes. Jared did bring home a painting of Weston that he did in his class - pretty awesome job! I framed it and it's hanging in Weston's room. Jared had a really busy spring semester. Along with the freehand drawing class and Track, he took honors English, AP Chemistry and AP World History. The AP classes were pretty time consuming. One amazing thing about Jared is that he had decided he wouldn't do homework on Sundays anymore, starting in the spring semester. It turned out to be a tough semester, and although he may have been tempted to do work on Sundays, he kept his commitment. That meant that he worked harder on other days of the week to make sure he was done by Sunday. I know there were evenings (such as Friday and Saturday nights) when we wanted Jared to watch a movie with us, but he was busy doing his work. I know it was a sacrifice for him to stick with his commitment, but he said that Sundays were truly a day of rest for him. He knew he was always going to have that day off and not have to worry about any school things those days. He was blessed for his faith and commitment, was able to get his work done, and pass those classes with flying colors. He also passed the AP exams for those classes. (I had a conversation with Jared about homework on Sundays, and I told him that he had more faith than I did when I was in high school. I hadn't made the commitment to not work on Sundays until college. He's experiencing faith and blessings early in his youth.)
Nathan had a pretty low-key last semester of high school. His toughest class was AP English. Along with that, he had Basketball, Sculpture, AP Computer Science, and Teacher's Aide. He was an aide for our church friend and cross country coach. He got to sit in the back of the class and work or do whatever he wanted to. He sometimes listened to podcasts during that class. After basketball season ended, Nathan did start working in the afternoons. He'd come home around 2:15 and work a few hours before dinnertime. He had a job at a machine shop, polishing little tubes for computers. I'm not sure exactly what that involved, but he got a base hourly pay and could earn more for polishing extra tubes. Nathan also worked some Saturdays on the side for an individual who needed help cleaning, organizing, and inventorying a house full of things that belonged to the person's mom. So school wasn't hard for Nathan, but he was busy with work and church. Nathan served as a ward missionary at church, and he had some good conversations about the church with some people at work.
Despite some challenging things this year, the kids all had another successful year!
This photo combination goes well together, don't you think?
("Never underestimate the power of a good kiss")
I'm adding this to the post as future reference - notes from my reading of "The Outsiders." This is the email I sent to the teacher regarding the book: "Owen read the first chapter, and I read the whole book today. He would like to read another book, and I don't really want him reading this one. Just the first couple of chapters talked about getting jumped, stealing, gang fights, a friend whose face was cut up/bruised/and half conscious, getting a blade held up to his throat and a gash on his head, everyone smoked to relax, hunting for action through booze/girls/fighting, father always beating a kid up, belting a stranger, picking up greasy broads, pulling out switchblades, beating heads in, talking about wanting to kill themselves... and then the attempted drowning, the fatal stabbing, pulling a knife on the doctor, the rumble with broken ribs/broken nose/blood streaming down face, and the triumph of getting shot by the cops..."
I think we can find a better book for 7th graders to read?
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