Darin's Awards

Darin worked very hard to get on the A Honor Roll! His first term Science grade was an 88, he had to work very hard on his other terms to bring up his average to a solid A. An 88 is not a bad grade at all, we aren't the type to demand straight A's out of our kids either. It's just that Science is one of Darin's favorite subjects and he normally does much better, and it was worrisome that he has not been as enthused. So we immediately wondered what was up with that.

It turned out that:
1. His teacher isn't very into science and was mainly just reading through the textbook and worksheets.
2. That Darin was speeding through his work so he could read.

So in response to that we(Ken and I) have been:
1. Helping out his class by coming in and coming up with science experiments. And getting Darin more hands-on. (I could seriously write-up a whole post about how the educational system is failing boys by not being hands-on or allowing them to be physical)
2. We also bought Darin a book light so he can read in the dark. Darin promised to not rush through his work, and he would double and triple check his work before he turned it in. And in return we would let him stay up later a few nights a week to read.

Also Darin received an Award for reaching his AR Goal. Each year the kids are tested for their reading level, and set an AR goal with the librarian and their teacher based upon how well they read. Then they read books throughout the year, books are assigned a certain amount of points for their difficulty. They take a test after each book and if they pass they receive so many points.

Anyways, Darin's goal this year was 110 points. However, after Halloween Darin decided to talk to his teacher about raising it because he thought it was too easy. So his teacher raised it to 140 AR points, but then after Thanksgiving Darin talked to his teacher again and said he wanted it to be 150. According to Darin the average for kids in his class is around 50-60 points. Anyway, Darin made his AR goal with just "1.something extra" (those are his words not mine). If you ask him he would tell you a good long 10 minute story about the whole process and why AR is easy-peasy.

And I'm left standing around looking at Darin in awe, like how did he become so grown-up, independent, and completely comfortable telling adults what he wants.
Then he runs off, leaves his shoes and all of his stuff spread all over the house, wrestles with his brother, wastes time messing around while he's doing his chores, and I realize he is still my little boy! Thank Heavens!