School is almost out

Just a couple of weeks until school is out for the summer, for Mandy. I go year round. I am so excited. We got an email saying that Mandy is receiving the presidential achievement award this year. The awards ceremony is a couple of weeks before school is out? Before finals? The ceremony is on a Tuesday afternoon, at 1:30. I couldn't think of a more inconvenient time if I tried. What to do with Lily. How will Jeff get out of work? Etc.

Last year's award ceremony left me so mad. Mandy received many awards, including highest honor roll, physical fitness, high achievement in a variety of subjects. Every time they passed out awards the parents were asked not to clap until the end, not for each student individually but to wait until all the students had their awards and clap for everyone together. Mandy was one of the first ones called and we obeyed the teachers and didn't clap. About half way through the alphabet parents started clapping for kids. So Mandy didn't get clapped for and I felt awful. It really made me mad because I had come there to celebrate her achievement, and they didn't feel there was time for me to clap for her individually?

The teachers had plenty of time to lecture the parents. They spent over an hour telling us how to parent our kids. How now that our kids are going into high school they are going to lie to us about homework and grades, and how it is our job to monitor their behavior. Never believe your children is what they kept telling us. Check to make sure they did their homework. Check to make sure they passed their tests. If we don't keep our eyes on our kids they aren't going to graduate high school and they will be forever ruined. This to an audience of parents whose children were receiving awards for high achievement. The teachers even did a skit about a girl who wouldn't be graduating because her mom never checked her homework. Plus, this is a very small school, we had time to clap for everyone.

The lecture and the clapping thing. I am still mad. Plus, they took the opportunity to speak about politics. One teacher actually said she was so glad to live on a military base where everyone is a republican and she doesn't have to interact with a bunch of liberals. Does that mean that when Clinton was in office the entire military was democrats? Just wondering lady.

Back when Mandy was in elementary school, when I was an insecure single mom, I took what the teachers had to say to heart. And they were saying the same crap back then about monitoring your kids, checking homework, etc. I would monitor Mandy and her homework. We had these awful homework sessions every night that almost always ended in tears. And she was a mediocre student at best. I checked her homework, made her fix her mistakes. I went over the assignment and re-explained it all to her. She felt like I was telling her she was an idiot.

When Lily was born I just didn't have the time or energy to check her homework anymore. I told her that she would have to be responsible for making sure it was done and if she had any questions she could just ask me. She started getting A's instead of C's. Turns out for Mandy trusting her to be responsible for her own work made all the difference. A difference in her confidence, a difference in her grades, a difference in our relationship. To be fair she was 12 at the time and that is a big step forward in maturity, there is no telling what would have happened if I had parented her differently in elemenatry school. Plus, I could have been more patient and found a better way to conduct our homework sessions. I am just saying that trust, responsiblity and taking a step back works better with Mandy's personality.

God bless teachers. I realize that it is an amazingly hard job and that so many parents drop the ball, making their job even harder. But, I think that parenting advice and politics at an awards ceremony is in poor taste. Of course I never complained, never wrote a terse letter to the teachers or principal, so I am sure this year I will have to sit through the same crap. They do a great job and teaching and sometimes it is best not to step on toes, or maybe I am just a coward.

I love having such a successful daughter. One that always gets awards and nice notes from teachers. I don't imagine that will be the case with Lily, but I will always have the memories of Mandy's awards. Now I know that these achievements are totally her and not really anything to do with what a great mom I am, because I am a really great mom to her sister too, the one who throws screaming fits in the store and everyone gives those looks of contempt. We all need a little balance in our lives. Yeah. Mandy!