Report Cards

This week the kids received their first quarter report cards. There weren't really any surprises. Katie is doing well, although her fine motor skills lag a little behind. Since she's the youngest in her class, the teacher isn't concerned. Laura's teacher called her a "model student"! She is very excited about her brand new reading skills and loves the fact that she can write! However, she isn't any where near the top of her class! (more about this in a minute) Nathan is doing fine. He continues to struggle with spelling and writing. The biggest shock was that his grades fell from A's and B's to B's and C's. I think this is primarily because of the change in expectations for the students, rather than a change on his part. The students here are extremely bright and Nathan has gone from being at the top of the class to somewhere in the middle. Matt and I are going to Parent/Teacher conferences tomorrow. We're hoping Nathan's teacher will have some ideas about how to improve his spelling!

I volunteer in Laura's class two mornings a week. The reading and writing skills of the some of the kindergarten students are phenomenal! Some of the girls in her class are already reading at a second grade level. Two in particular, have better handwriting than I do! The amazing thing is that both of these girls are native Japanese speakers. English is their second language! One of the girls will be leaving in April to attend Japanese school. Schools in Japan begin their year in April, which causes a few problems for students who try to switch from one to another. School is taken very seriously here, to the point that families chose the area that they live in based on the school rather than where the parents work. It is very common for fathers to have several hours long commutes to work or even live in another city during the week! Many Japanese students attend regular school during the day and then go to "enrichment" programs every day after school. Having a child do well in school is the primary focus of the family. Often, Japanese mothers feel guilty for any time that they spend on interests other than their children. Therefore, things like school lunches and birthday treats are taken to amazing extremes! Laura constantly complains that her lunch isn't "fancy" like her friends. I don't make carefully constructed pictures with her food! She doesn't realize that she's just lucky I remember to make it most days! :-)