Back at the Homeschooling

We spent Christmas at my mother's in Phoenix, Arizona where temperatures averaged 70 degrees. We arrived back in Denver where the plane was one hour late because DIA (Denver International Airport) was three below and under a blizzard watch. I was not a happy camper. I had left my winter jacket in the car so while standing waiting for the shuttle I was really not a happy camper. When we got home our electricity had gone off because of the blizzard warning, it was 15 degrees below and my dish washing soap was frozen solid. I was not a happy camper.

Now we are back homeschooling. I had to work this morning so I spent the evening before writing out explicit, line-by-line instructions on what Ian had to do. Apparently when I wrote "use colored pencils on your map" they were not explicit enough; he used pen. When I wrote "trace a path that ancient Hebrews traveled" they were not explicit enough; he used a magic marker, black, large tip, and traced a line around the oceans - I guess he thought the ancient Hebrews traveled only by boat. When I left a taped, yellow piece of paper on his computer screen that said "Ian - please shovel the snow off the front and back decks and dump the garbage" they were not explicit enough - he feigned ignorance, "What note?"
"The note you flipped back over your computer so you could play  Operation 7."
"Oh, I didn't know anything was written on that."

He told me this evening that when he becomes a ninth grader he's going to become neat. I told him that brain transplants have not been invented yet. He thinks they might be a good idea and he has now decided that he should become a brain surgeon - I'm going to make him read "Flowers for Algernon."

He informed me that when boys become high schoolers they change - all the things that are bad now are gone. Sounds like a Virgin Mary kind of miracle to me.

He gets his report card in two weeks. He's excited. He thinks he's going to get all A's and B's. Before we homeschooled he hated report card time; teachers would write things like "Ian needs to get and stay focused," "Ian needs to spend more time studying and less time socializing." I remember when I used to write things like this on report cards. I'm sorry for that. I now have a kid who, although he can't pick up his clothes and sleeps in the same things he wears and can't find the colored pencils (in his desk drawer) he's finally excited about his report card.

I think that's a good thing. I think all the things that were bad are now gone - a Virgin Mary kind of miracle.