Julie- that sucks! I am always afraid my cat meows too much, but my downstairs neighbor is happy I don't have loud parties, and people over and such-- she laughs because my kitty and her kitty meow at each other through the wall! My former neighbor complained about me all the time and called the police once! I wish you good neighbor ~ma.

{{{ }}} everyone who's had the weird family issues and insensitive teachers. I had my own and the ghosts of them are coming back to bite me on the ass right now. At least I live 350 miles away now.

I'm having to figure out what to do about Nate. He's the quintessential bright kid who doesn't like school, who has his own way of processing information and has horrible handwriting to boot. Plus, my sensitive boy as well. I don't want to coddle, but I don't want teachers stomping on his creativity and humor and the self-confidence he does have.

Weekend has otherwise gotten off to a good start. Went out to dinner for the birthday girl (she can put away a NY Strip with the best of them, lemme tell you) and then Kilwin's ice cream for dessert where she had a vile flavor called "Superman" that was unnatural shades of blue, red, and yellow and allegedly fruit-flavored. The Barnes & Noble.

Oh, and Hec, the X-Men books were a HUGE hit-- thanks for the advice!

oh, my brother and his girlfriend are visiting next weekend. The giggly duo who stay up to four in the morning. Hello eviction!

::Loves kitties in bathtubs::

msbelle, my friend who also has a son from the same place as Mac also had the "baby pictures family tree" school project this year, and also had to write the note to the teacher. She was just ranting about it a few weeks ago.

I definitely remember a baby picture project, from 5th grade - because the teacher brought in hers and it was on black and white! But divorce was fairly normal in my school; I was the only one of my close friends with divorced parents in the early 80s, but it wasn't considered freakish. We'd all seen the made for tv movies.

Seriously. Are family trees that crucial to elementary education?

One of my few memories from Bridge Street School (1-2 grade) was choosing and writing about one of our grandparents. I was the only kid who didn't have any. It never really bothered me that my grandparents died so long before I was born, but it did bother me that I was different from everyone else.

IOdepressingN, it looks like I got Poison Oak on my trip. It must have been about a week ago in Grand-Staircase Escalante. I just hope it's only around my ankles.

Boo poison Oak!

ION, I have a purring cat on my lap and don't know what to do. I've tried everything I can think of... petting her, scratching behind her ears, rubbing her tummy, but she won't leave....

From a teacher perspective, family and self based projects are really good at 1)Helping to teach context (i.e.-that there are people and things that came before) and 2)Helping to teach diversity (i.e.-that different people have different experiences). Relating things back to students' own lives is one of the easiest ways to make things compelling for them

I will, however, join the "boo"ing of teachers who are not open to coping reasonably with said diversity.

ION, I have a purring cat on my lap and don't know what to do. I've tried everything I can think of... petting her, scratching behind her ears, rubbing her tummy, but she won't leave....

Stand up?

2)Helping to teach diversity (i.e.-that different people have different experiences).

That does seem like the key missing piece in some of these stories.

I must say I really try to notice this in our textbooks and make things more inclusive. But it's not always easy.