Parent Teacher School Conference

This week I attended my daughter, Mallory's, school conference. She lead the meeting with me while the teacher talked to another parent in the room. Mallory has all A's in the gifted program. (proud dad) I keep telling Mal that she has boring report cards, but that we will take them. Mallory wrote a sweet note to me about how she viewed her Dad. It's one of those things that she was making excuses for but that I'll definitely keep. I met Mallory's teacher and she was super nice and held some insight about Mal. It's always nice when they say that they wish the rest of the class was like your daughter. There were two things that were interesting about this conference.

The first is that my daughter is being picked on because she is so small for her age. There are always comments about her size from larger kids (everyone but 1 other kid). But this bullying is taking on a meaner tone. A girl in her class is just rotten to Mallory. This girl was looking for someone to play a game of checkers with and no one would play with her. Mallory felt sorry for her and said that she would play. The girl replied, "I won't play if I have to play with you." She has said awful things to Mallory, she has ripped things out of her hand, she has pushed her desk so close to Mallory that it was pushing in on her belly and hurting her. She has threatened Mallory and is just mean. So on Mallory's meeting with me she brought that up, it was written on Mallory's notes. Worst thing about 6th grade - "The devil, this girl's name, upsets me because lately I've been hearing her talk behind my back to Gena and others"

I wanted to bring this problem up with the teacher because they recently adjusted the seating chart and put this girl right beside Mallory. (This is a common technique for teachers to put problem kids by some of the best behaved kids.) Anyway I wanted the teacher to see what Mallory had written. When I showed the teacher Mallory's notes and the "devil" comment she didn't blink or think it was strange. She said, "yeah, I can see that with her". I thought to myself, "wow, you think she is a devil too." Beyond defending your kids and keeping them safe, it is so important that you build your kids up because there are other kids trying to tear them down. I think Mallory is amazing, incredibly smart, cute beyond measure, sweet to a fault. By the way we also spoke with the principal about this bullying.

The other thing that came up in the conference was a paper with suggestions for parents. This will blow you away....

If you child says... "how do you spell______?"

you are supposed to say..."Use your inventive spelling."

If you child says... "Does that really spell______?"

you are supposed to say..."It's close. Remember the neat thing about inventive spelling is you're always right."

Ok, we are talking about 6th grade gifted students and you want me to tell them to use INVENTIVE SPELLING? Are you insane? There is a right and a wrong way to spell something. (period) Their boss won't accept inventive spelling when they get older. Non crazy teacher's won't accept inventive spelling either. If you are talking about creative writing or artwork or some other form of creativity there isn't a right or wrong but with spelling??? With spelling there is a right and a wrong. Wouldn't it make more sense to say, write out all your thoughts and then go back over it with spell check? I think that is much better than making them think they can make crap up and that I'll accept it. Rant over.

Ron