Long Overdue Update - There's two of them now

Hi all. This is definitely a long overdue update.

I had these grandiose ideas for educational progress over the summer. I would have my almost 5 year old reading before he went to kindergarten and started to experience the whole language method, which the school would claim is balanced with some phonics. I would have also had my son writing all of his letters. For my daughter, 7, she would have memorized all of her addition and subtraction facts as well as further refining her reading skills.

We didn't accomplish all of those grand plans because we had some fun for the summer - swimming, biking and other activities. But I did continue reading with my daughter and I did get my son started with his phonics. My son, however, did not want to learn to write his letters and I didn't get as far as I wanted with the phonics.

I'm going to cut to the chase and just tell you where we are now. My daughter is reading very well. She is well above grade level and she is being much more careful with her reading, although she has some days. But our new problems are that the school suddenly does want them to memorize their addition facts and that my daughter apparently has some terrible issues with spelling when she's writing her own stories.

As for the math, the school gives a once a week 60 second test with 30 math problems. The kids have to pass 4 of these tests before the end of the school year. This was sprung on us with no guidance on how best to approach this new system. Further, from what I can glean from my daughter, there is no studying of these math facts during the school day. It's only the tests. So, we're supposed to do all of this studying at home. I don't mind helping her study at home and I absolutely agree that these math facts have to be memorized for future math success, but why aren't they also studying them at school? After home studying nad my daughter still not passing, I have finally scanned a copy of the test and have given my daughter the test multiple times, starting with 180 seconds and widdling the time limit down towards the 60 seconds. Tomorrow she might come close to passing the first one, and if not tomorrow, she may just pass next week.

As for the spelling, there are spelling tests through the year. But there seems to be no rhyme or reason for the choice of the particular words on the test. Some of the words are words that my daughter doesn't know the meaning of until I explain it to her. It just also seems like phonics has no place in studying spelling. So after focusing so much on reading and hoping the spelling would come into line, it just didn't happen. The teacher first presented this problem to me at parent-teacher conferences right before Christmas, and pretty much dropped this in my lap with a comment about some other teacher is trying to help my daughter. I'm currently trying to figure out how to address this at home. One thing I'm finding that seems to help is to have my daughter say the word she wants to spell herself, rather than me continuing to repeat it, and to have her attempt and then trying to read what she writes.

And, now my son... He can use his basic phonics to read, but he's getting exposed to the guess-it strategies. And, I have to remind him to look at the words and not the pictures. I also remind him that the picture doesn't always point him to the right word. I think I'm going to get set 3 of the Bob books and see if I can continue him in his phonics with books not sent home from the school, which often contain words he can't sound out easily because they don't follow the rules. Honestly, you should see some of the ridiculous words in some of these books that are really inappropriate to expert a kindergarten student to read.

At parent-teacher conferences, I was alerted to the teacher's concern that my son won't be able to write stories this year because he won't attempt to write words. He claims he can't spell - and he's right. But the teacher wants him to try to guess the words and write each word however it sounds. He's a little perfectionist and he's afraid of being wrong. It seems to me almost like we're throwing our 5 year old into immersion spelling, reading and writing without anything in the way of fundamental instruction other than the focus on what the word starts with. I just can't imagine sending him into an immersion weekend of a foreign language, so how is this any better? So, on top of his regular homework, I have been instructed to help him write stories at home.

I love my kids and I feel appropriately responsible for making sure they have the best education possible. I will, thus, invest the time needed to make sure whatever holes are occuring in their education are filled. But, honestly, sometimes I feel like I should prepare a bill for the school itemizing my time. I work full-time outside the home and it's so difficult finding all the time to do my household duties, educate my kids, have fun with my family and having some amount of rest. What are they really doing during the school day????? Do, I have to pay for private tutors???