So last night we had our first ever parent-teacher conferences with more than one kid. It's not really a lot different with more than one kid scheduled, you just go from one to another and are there a little longer.
Ben's was scheduled first, so we all headed to his classroom and waited outside for a couple of minutes while another student was finishing with hers. Ben's teacher offered to let the other kids draw on the dry erase board, which they thought was pretty darn cool. Anyway, Ben's teacher had mostly good things to say about him. Yes, he still has occasional problems, but they're normal for his age and he's usually pretty good. And she thinks they usually stem from him being bored with what they're learning. She talked about how he and one girl in his class are going to start doing the accelerated math stuff (which usually starts in the 3rd grade, but they get to do it now). She also talked about how advanced he is in reading. He tested at 147 correct words per minute in reading, which is well above the benchmark for his grade. I looked at his report card where they list the fluency benchmarks for all the grades and they had listed the benchmark for 5th grade in spring at 145. So Ben is doing pretty well, I'd say. As far as his grades go, he got all E's and one E+ (that's A's to you and me...E stands for "exceeds standard"). We were both really impressed with Ben's teacher and how much she's doing to try to make sure he's actually learning new stuff and able to do things on his level. She even said that she will let him stand to do his work if he needs to, and that she'll let him doodle while he's listening to her, since he seems to actually listen better when he's doing something like that.
After Ben's, we went over to Alex's room. His was actually a lot faster. She showed us how he's doing pretty well. She said he usually listens and is good in class and that sometimes she needs to remind him to keep him on track, but he's usually pretty good. She will be going on maternity leave here within the next couple of weeks since she's due on the 14th, but her student teacher (who I already knew because her daughter Molly was in Ben's kindergarten class and she went in and did some work with the kids sometimes) will be taking over while she's gone. Alex's teacher sent home some letter flash cards and a sheet to practice writing his name, so he can keep improving on those.
After those conferences were over, we went into the music room where the music teacher said they're both doing pretty well and participating, and then to the gym where the gym teacher said they're doing well. She did say that sometimes she'll be talking to Ben and he'll just kind of shut down (due to frustration usually) and other times he'll jabber away, but he's doing really well. And Alex is doing well too. After we left the gym, we went to the library where they were holding their book fair and bought 3 Goosebumps books for Ben to read (and he's already on Chapter 7 of one) and another Star Wars book for them to read.
It's always nice to go to the conferences and hear that the kids are doing well and not really having problems.
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