The smoke has made its way to Colorado, which just blows my mind. The smoke has made its way to Colorado, which just blows my mind.

That's LA smoke outside here in Utah? I thought it was smoke from our own big fire south of here. So you may be breathing Utah smoke as well.

Mount Wilson might've made it! After the Mt. Stromlo disaster, I'm all eyeore, but that may have been a near miss. Heart sank when the webcam went out after some scary pix.

Trying to explain fire season to a UKer. Just doesn't map.

Owen is ADORABLE! Seriously DH and I were admiring that first day of school photo for yonks. And Isaac will be seething with jealousy about the Bakugan in his hand. So cute! As is the Casper note! I have all these notes by Frances that I just cannot get rid of. Too precious.

but I think part of the problem with high schools/dropout rates, etc is that the kids in less wealthy neighborhoods who in the past might have completed high school but not college don't see any benefit to just completing high school (in terms of jobs/income).

This is so true. Two years ago the College Board did a study and broke it down by income and ethnicity. The difference for Latino or African American Male who complete high school versus those who dropout is actually less than $300/year. If that's the income difference, then there is NO POINT in staying for a high school diploma. (The AA, BA/BS, MA/MS, Doctoral differentials are of course enormous).

Of course money makes it easier. But giving money to schools does not even kind of automatically make a better school. And again, I'm at a program improvement school, new campus, etc. etc. We have a beautiful site, decentish technology if we want it, innovative scheduling etc. And we still have a crappy test scores/grad rates etc. In part because we have crappy students.

The hotword in ed circles these days is intervention. In fact, the big problem is answering the question of WHERE to intervene when a kid's needs are in every area and are so great. When I get a 12th grader who is in an AP class, has a 3.8 GPA and still only gets 380 verbal on the SAT, what does that mean? Especially if the last book he read was Matilda (not to knock Roald Dahl).

Kids in my neighborhood school start years behind. Probably most of the Buffista children already have a love of books, of being read to, of singing songs and playing games. They've been exposed to more than just a blanket covering the stroller. Kids I've nannied for have been places and seen things that knocked my socks off, used words like marsupial correctly at age 3.

If you have never been exposed to the basics, if you come into Kindergarten without knowing your own name (hand to god, I've heard more than one Kindergarten teacher tell me that) or without knowing what a book is or how to count, then how does that teacher make up 5 years of parenting? And that differential between kids who have been engaged with the world and those who haven't grows each year.

Moreover, when I would turn around to a kid who would not be able to do 9th grade level work, who was on the path of dropping out, and I got a parent's response of "well, at least he's gone to more school than I have." what do I do with that?

I'm not saying this is all the fault of the parent or the child or the community, but a child's failure in school is more than just a school failing the child.

t /soapbox

This obviously chaps my ass.

Bless the responsible teachers for doing what they can.

Anyway, what would be a reasonable price for a used Wii console? And used games? I tried to look at ebay and saw a HUGE range of prices. I'm clueless.

Emmett bought a Wii with money he made from umpiring. He paid about $200. He got the Lego Star Wars game for Wii (he'd already had it for the computer and DS) and loves it. We also do the Wii Bowling fairly often.

We're looking forward to the Harry Potter Legos for Wii what with all the wandwaving etc.

One of the interesting things in the Freakanomics books was that having books in the house was a good indicator of how educated and successful the kid would be. But you didn't have to actually read them to the kid, or have regular story time or anything like that. There just needed to be books in the house for the statistical correlation. I'm not sure why. Maybe just that knowledge is valued and available.

A lot of the stuff Kat is talking about we try and begin to address with our preschool story times at the library. Free.

And watching a kid go from no english - to singing in english and even telling stories -- amazing. no guarantee of success, but one more push in the right direction.

Before I started doing story time I had no idea the difference it could make .

A lot of the stuff Kat is talking about we try and begin to address with our preschool story times at the library. Free.

LOVE storytime and at our public library, they have a great senior/preschool program where seniors read to kids. And, yes, kids make HUGE strides. But again, storytime is once or twice a week. What are the kids doing the other 166 hours?

The truth is, I find most of my students totally amazing because they are resilient and smart and motivated. Many overcome some overwhelming obstacles just to be in a seat. They all overcome some level of peer indifference to education. So they amaze me.

And then I despair because (many started college this week or last) I realize I taught them the same stuff I was teaching to the 7th and 8th graders I had who ended up at USC on a full ride. So those 7/8th graders had so many more years to practice than the seniors who have been dumped into college without enough time to master the skills they should have mastered 5 years before.

The upside of my day? Noah had a blast at the San Diego Zoo. We've been reading Not the Hippopotamus and we got to see Hippos at the zoo (along with polar bears, the new elephant exhibit which kind of rocks, koalas who were actually awake, lions (and the backstage area of the lion enclosure), monkeys, apes, and, his favorite flamingos! The zoo exhausts me. I'm glad we have a membership because it means we can go back.