And here you have it. Ta-daaaa. The most-read, most-loved, most-viewed post of 2014. You like me, you really like me! Gah… 🙂
Enjoy! Oh, the post is below. It wasn’t the Sally Field thing.
heh heh.
Tag: 2nd grade
What I missed in 2nd grade…
me: Hey, don’t forget you have to study for your social studies test.
Jack: The test was actually today.
me: Oh, ok, how’d you do?
Jack: Pretty good.
me: Did you know all the answers?
Jack: I think so.
me: What kind of questions were they? Multiple choice?
Jack: Yeah some were that, and some were open ended.
me: Open ended. That’s a good phrase. Do you know what that means?
Jack: It’s when you write an answer after reading the text.
me: Text?
Jack: It means the question.
me: I know what it means. I’m just surprised you knew it, that’s all. I’m impressed.
Jack: Mom, that is so second grade. I learned that like 2 years ago.
me: I think I learned it in college haha! Good for you.
Jack: Maybe you should’ve paid attention in second grade.
me: Touché.
Jack: I have no clue what THAT means.
Apology Letter
Really? The 2nd to last day of school? The day before, Jack came home and told me he moved up to “Great Day” on his chart. I couldn’t have been prouder. I was so happy that the year was going to end on a good note. Until I went to pick Jack up at school today. They had a half day. His teacher stopped me in the hallway to give me the lowdown. Jack hung his head. I looked at him like he had 2 heads. He really knew better than to do this. I mean…really? With a BAGEL??
Sigh…
Why 2nd Grade is Bru-Tal
Jack: Can we make absolute sure we make the bus tomorrow??
me: (warily) Whyyy??
Jack: Ohhh it’s a secret and I promised not to tell!
me: Remember you can tell your mom anything…
Jack: But I made a promise and you told me that’s important to keep.
me: Okay you’re right. As long as whatever is happening doesn’t get anyone in trouble or hurt. Those promises you HAVE to tell mom.
Jack: Welllll, they’re trying to not get seen doing it so I think it must not be good but if I tell you they’ll kill me!
me: How would they know?
Jack: How about you guess?
me: Does it involve kissing?
Jack: Gasp! How did you know that??
(let me interrupt my own post to say that I’m sitting in the train station waiting to go to Philly and the myriad conversations going on around me are just… Sigh… Here’s one. Lady1: oh my god! One of the three main members of the Beegees died! Lady2: Wasn’t there only one guy left?? Lady1: But this was the main main guy I think. Lady2: weren’t they all main? Lady1: Well Suzanne Somers died! Lady2: Nooooo! Well she looked GOOD! Lady1: Not anymore…)
me: Sigh.
So back to our regularly scheduled programming…
me: How about you? Are you kissing anyone?
Jack: Noooo!
me: Have any new girlfriends?
Jack: Mommmmmm it’s the same one…
me: Gigi?
Jack: (blushes) Yes.
me: No smooches?
Jack: Let me just tell you that the kids at her table are BRUtal! BruTALLL! That kind of stuff cant go on in 2nd grade with these kind of brutal kids hanging all around!
2nd Report Card of 2nd Grade
Hmmm. I still haven’t quite figured out how to read these report cards. They used to do “S” and “N” in my day. When they carved report cards in stone, remember? S was for Satisfactory and N was for… Non. I would always ALWAYS get an N in self control. Then in the notes they would write “…blah blah…lacks self control”. It sounds like I peed myself all day or something. Wait, actually in 2nd grade I DID pee myself. But that was because Mrs. Mazafarrow would not let me get UP when I said I had to PEE. And Yes I still remember your name. Are you dead? (Okay I didn’t mean that to be mean. Mean that meanly. Whatever. That’s just a quote from the Smurfs movie. And its funny.)
So, where was I. Well now I have to pee. Sigh. Okay…so the report cards now have 17 different ways you can be graded. In 2nd grade mind you. This is in CT of course. Not sure if we’re the only weird ones out there, or if this is standard all around. On this report card, for basic things like art, gym, music, math, reading, social skills, etc, you will see “grades” such as these:
PreE – Pre-Emergent
Em – Emergent
Dev – Developing
Beg – Beginning
Tran – Transitional
EarlyFl – Early Fluent
Fl – Fluent
M – Meets benchmark
P – Partially meets
NY – Not yet meeting
V – Very good
S – Satisfactory
N – Needs improvement
4 – Meets grade level independently
3 – Meets grade level with guidance
2 – Progressing towards meeting grade level standard with guidance and wtf
1 – Not yet able to produce required grade level work with or without guidance WTFFF
OH, and N/A – Not assessed at this time.
SO, after I flip back and forth like 800 times from the front of the card where the grades are to the back of the card where the excel spreadsheet of letters, numbers and phrases are housed, and with multiple papercuts and lots of swears (cuz I swear a lot) I can then just begin to see that Jack is doing ok. Sheesh.
He did go down in one or two things from the first report card to the second. I’m not sure how far down he went because the flipping back and forth was at a frenzy at that point. So I just asked him to tell me about it.
me: Hey Jack, how come you have a lower grade on “works neatly” this time. You had a “very good” last time.
Jack: What do I have now?
me: (sigh, flip) Uh, you have an “S”
Jack: What’s that mean?
me: Satisfactory.
Jack: What’s Satisfactory mean?
me: That your work is acceptable and ok.
Jack: (raises an eyebrow) And acceptable is good right?
me: It’s…well…you went down…so last time you had “very good” and …it’s an “S” now… so…
Jack: I think Satisfactory is a good place to be in 2nd grade don’t you?
me: Yeah (I hang my head a little sheepishly) But you were trying much harder maybe at the beginning of the year, so maybe you can try harder for next time?
Jack: My teacher was less cranky at the beginning of the year too. Did ya ever think of that? She said we drove her completely NUTS today.
me: Ah…
The definition of “important” in 2nd grade
Jack: Mom, mom, guess what we played in school today?
me: I have no idea.
Jack: It’s very “important” (he air quotes when he talks now). And you have to play or else you’re not “important”.
me: Okay, let’s hear it.
Jack: (comes up to me and whispers something that I can’t make out) And then you say that and you HAVE to say that because it’s very important or else you’ll pee in your pants.
me: Why did you stick your butt out and put it on my leg when you said whatever you said? And what did you say?
Jack: It’s very “important” to do it that way.
me: Do what!?
Jack: Sigh, ugh, Mom LISTEN!
He comes over, turns around and sticks his butt on my leg and says “U. P.” in my ear.
me: You Pee? Or are you spelling UP?
Jack: It’s the same thing hahahahaha!
me: What’s the point again?
Jack: Geez! OB-viously when you whisper “U P” to someone then you won’t pee in your pants and THEY will unless they go around and tell it to someone else. Otherwise OB-viously you’ll pee in your pants if you don’t do it.
me: Let me guess, you started this?
Jack: Yeah. Cool huh?
me: You must feel very “important”.
Jack: Totally. It’s like the cheese touch (from Diary of a Wimpy Kid), but it’s not in a book yet.
me: Yet. Hmm…
Just another day in 2nd grade
Jack is too funny. As soon as he steps off the bus, I can read him like a book. Big goofy giant-toothed smile = good day. Head down, shoulders all hunched over and fake pout = bad day. Red-faced holding his jacket and looking frazzled = Hot day. Cranky face, still yelling obscenities over his shoulder = someone on bus pissed him off kind of day.
We had a quick power outage today, and it threw all of my clocks off. The microwaves and various electric clocks around the house were either blinking or off by an hour. I guess that’s how long the power was out? Who knows. It also seems that the two battery-operated clocks that we have BOTH decided to run out of juice today. How freaken peculiar! So therefore when I got home from work, I wasn’t entirely sure what time it was, and wasn’t entirely sure if I had a few minutes before Jack’s bus came.
I chugged down the driveway, dodging all of the branches and various storm debris, slipping and sliding on all of the wet leaves…of course my 70-degree steep driveway angle doesn’t help. But I made it to the street. Not a soul in sight. I waited and waited, the wind started howling. I looked down the street and none of the other moms were posted at their driveways. I worried that I had totally missed the bus. But then I saw the it coming. Whew.
Jack came down the steps with his “jacket off, holding a bunch of stuff, smiling, but not in the giant-toothed way, and then sort of frowned”. I checked my list of expressions. What did this mean!?? I couldn’t tell. OR he’s finally gaining his version of a poker face. Throw every emotion at Mom and she’ll never figure me out. I’m sure he’s saying that to himself.
Jack: I said a bad word in the hall and a teacher heard me.
me: (aha, it’s GUILT! This is a new one) Soo, what word was it?
Jack: Kill.
me: You said it TO her??
Jack: No, I just said it to another kid. Not like I was going to KILL him, but just in another way.
me: What did the teacher say?
Jack: To not say it again.
me: What did you say?
Jack: Nothing.
me: Good man. So that’s it? How was the rest of the day?
Jack: I got a card in music.
me: Is that like soccer? Did they throw you out?
Jack: Huh?? NO, then you have to go see the teacher at the end of class.
me: What happened?
Jack: I was singing too loud.
me: Remember this happened last year a lot? You need to sing softer sweetie.
Jack: But I LIKE to sing!
me: Well if they tell you to sing the song softer, just listen and you won’t get in trouble.
Jack: I wasn’t singing their song.
me: Sigh.
Jack: I sang “Party rock is in the house tonight!”
me: Sigh. Okay. Well don’t do it again.
Jack: But you sing it all the time.
me: It’s catchy. Kinda sticks in your head.
Jack: That’s what I TOLD her.
me: Well, just try to follow the teacher’s rules okay?
Jack: In my class I went up to Good Day though.
me: That’s good news. Excellent!
Jack: Does it all even out?
me: Uh.. I guess so. Doesn’t sound terrible.
Jack: Good, because I wasn’t sure if I had a good day or bad.
me: Yeah, too many different stories today. I think you had an okay day. Don’t say any bad words and keep it down with the voice of yours! (we both laugh)
Jack: So good day means I can watch Sponge Bob, right?
me: Aha, an agenda. Yeah you can watch.
Jack: I knew if I convinced you it was a good day you’d let me watch it. You’re the best Mommy!
me: Don’t I know it!
Sh*t My 6-Year-Old Says (but he's 18 now) 
