I soaked some horribly stained stuff in OxyClean the other day, and it was amazing. I was pretty sure I was going to have to throw the stuff out.

And covered with pollen.

And ash, if there's a fire nearby.

And mud, if there's a dog...or maybe that's just one particular dog.

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This was a total of 45 minutes hearing and being shown evidence of how smart, hard working, well behaved, sweet, nice, good and funny my children are.

Our parent/teacher conference was yesterday. Emmett is smart, not particularly hard working, somewhat behaved, fairly sweet (when talking about the baby), nice enough, pretty good and very funny. The gist was: should be an A student but really cruising along at a B+ pace.

Very "clever" (teacher's word) and "sneaky" (parent's word). Emmett's behavior and goodness is basically predicated on going right up to within a hair's width of what's allowed without going over the line. But he always knows where the line is.

Our task is to get him to internalize his motivations. Right now he's very carrot ("What do I get for doing this?") and stick ("Will I get in trouble if I don't do this?"). We need him to care enough about his work to research subjects that are assigned instead of whatever catches his fancy (i.e., baseball, U.S. Presidents, state capitals), check his work for sloppy errors that all indicate that he rushes through his homework at a breakneck pace and study for tests instead of presuming that classwork and homework is enough. Also, he needs to think more about benefiting the group as a whole instead of What's Best For Emmett.

Fairly subtle, but mostly good. Ultimately, Emmett isn't motivated by good grades and test scores at all. He can sort of blithely do all his stuff and be Very Good and that's about all the attention he wants to give it. He's not a perfectionist - in fact he's sort of the opposite. Careless and indifferent and sliding by on innate smarts and charm.

Still, had the highest reading score in the class on the state tests.

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Those are my favorite conferences ever. I love telling parents great things about their kidlets.

It is a pretty sweet way to spend an afternoon, as a parent.

Julia's teacher is the one Ben was uncomfortable with, in second grade. It is interesting to compare their conferences (Ben's well behaved and an excellent student and the teacher is a good, professional teacher -- it was just a chemistry thing), because I can tell how fond she is of Julia.

Chris is in a class of hellions. His teacher all but told me he is the best kid in the class. He got to first grade already reading at a high level and doing math, and he adores science. She does a lot of extra stuff with him too, because she doesn't want him to get bored.

I wash a lot of toddler clothing and diapers. Which means I use hippie laundry soap

We use All Free and Clear, because we all have ridiculously sensitive skin.

I am so NOT surprised that Cindy's kids are awesome.

Aw thanks, Robin. It's still nice to have the good conference. We've had all good ones, all year. I missed Ben's second conference, because that's when both he and I were sick. He got a mid-term progress report a few weeks later though, and was getting all A and B grades, so I expect next week's report card won't have any surprises.

Our task is to get him to internalize his motivations. Right now he's very carrot ("What do I get for doing this?") and stick ("Will I get in trouble if I don't do this?"). We need him to care enough about his work to research subjects that are assigned instead of whatever catches his fancy (i.e., baseball, U.S. Presidents, state capitals), check his work for sloppy errors that all indicate that he rushes through his homework at a breakneck pace and study for tests instead of presuming that classwork and homework is enough.

With the exception of when they did a unit on angles in math last year, I think all of Ben's mistakes, ever, have been sloppy ones that come from working at a breakneck pace. He doesn't quite get the idea of studying for tests yet, either. I don't think this is atypical for 10 and 11 year old boys.

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I just had a conference with Christopher's teacher, and then one with Julia's teacher. This was a total of 45 minutes hearing and being shown evidence of how smart, hard working, well behaved, sweet, nice, good and funny my children are.

Awesome! They must have some good parents.

Fairly subtle, but mostly good. Ultimately, Emmett isn't motivated by good grades and test scores at all. He can sort of blithely do all his stuff and be Very Good and that's about all the attention he wants to give it.

This was me as a kid. Mom still has a play I wrote freshman year, on the bus, that got really high marks and praise and a big fat A+. She always bitches about what I could have written if I'd actually, you know, spent time on it.

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Fairly subtle, but mostly good. Ultimately, Emmett isn't motivated by good grades and test scores at all. He can sort of blithely do all his stuff and be Very Good and that's about all the attention he wants to give it. He's not a perfectionist - in fact he's sort of the opposite. Careless and indifferent and sliding by on innate smarts and charm.

That was me. In fact, in many ways, that is still me.

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Emmett is me! My mom would sympathize, Hec.

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Careless and indifferent and sliding by on innate smarts and charm.

The kid's either going to be content in a McDonald's somewhere or ridiculously happy and successful.

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I was definitely and underachiever in grade school, high school and (to a lesser extent) college. I was thinking about this the other day - I was wondering if some people just have less motivation than others. Like, for everything.

I've been known to work hard at certain hobbies, but I've also been known to just suddenly lose interest and drop them.

Is laziness just a lack of motivation?

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~ma for your grandmother and mother, Kristin.

Amber Benson appears to be making a movie about keeping cabana boys: [link]

I am intrigued.

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Guess who went and confronted ExBoss for lack of response to her request for two months severance??

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