Back to School Night

Last night, I attended Back to School Night at Northside Elementary School. This event was not intended for children, so Sterling stayed home with Madison and Emma. We were spoiled by our now college students from Clear Lake when it came to babysitters. Not only did they adore our girls, and our girls adore them, but they babysat for FREE! They are amazing girls, and we look forward to them visiting us in New York, so Sterling and I can go on a date! (Just Kidding Girls!) Anyway, I was the lucky one who got to visit Madison's classroom. I enjoyed being there so much. I even got to sit at Madison's desk while Mrs. Leung went over important details of the class and school year. Madison had neatly cleaned her desk that afternoon, before leaving school. And a booklet she had made was sitting on top, entitled "Back to School Book". One of the pages was "All About This School Year". She had to write about several of her favorite things about school. I thought I would share them with you, because they were so cute! Of course like a lot of kids, she thinks her favorite subject so far is "GYM"! Her favorite lunch is soup. (she was very excited to take a thermos of soup to school!) She said this year she wants to learn about science.......but most of all what she really wants is to "do hard math"! Her favorite place in school is Art Class. And last, but not least, she responded to the statement In school, it would be very strange if: "Somebody yelled!" :). I really like Mrs. Leung. She is very structured and organized, and loves to read. She is very big on the kids understanding how important it is to be a good reader. She also wants them to understand, every grade on every test and paper will not be 100%. No one is perfect. The most important thing is mastering the subject....which she considers 80% or higher. They do not receive letter grades on Report Cards. Instead they are scored developmentally on a scale of 1-4. Different from what I remember, but I like it much better......because Madison is already concerned about making an F! :) I assure her she won't, but this makes it even better. The best thing I like about Mrs. Leung is the way she deals with behavior. Every Friday, grades 2-5 have Fun Time Friday the last hour of school. The criteria to participating is you must have all your classwork from the week done, all your homework done and brought back, and of course behaved in class. There are a few rules that automatically mean no Fun Time Friday if broken.....one being misbehaving during emergency drills. Madison came home last week saying how sad it was that a certain classmate was the only one who did not get to go to Fun Time Friday from her class. She went on to tell me that they had an emergency drill in the school, in which they are to be silent. Apparently the teacher left the room for a minute, when this classmate yelled out "Fire! Teachers gone! Ya hoo!" :) I laughed and laughed at that story. Anyway, that was an automatic rule breaker with no warning. After I stopped laughing, I asked what the boy did. Madison said "He was very sad just sitting there instead of going to Fun Time Friday." Then she added, "It is not Mrs. Leung's fault". "It was his choice to make." (Something Mrs. Leung always says). I was very impressed to hear her say that, and even more impressed at how Mrs. Leung is teaching her. I reminded Madison how much that applied to our entire life. How God gives us free will, and we always have a choice to make....right or wrong.....and that our choices determine our consequences. Now I hear Madison telling Emma whenever Emma does something wrong, that she makes her choices. I love it! I pray so much for Madison to make wise choices. Sorry for such a long blog, but I had a lot to share. Continue to pray for Madison, Mrs. Leung, her classmates, their families and her school. Thank you! God is so good to me.