Anticipating Christmas

Robert is flying to Fargo on Saturday, December 23rd and returning on December 28th. I'm not sure what we'll do for Christmas Eve or Christmas day. It's going to feel weird with just me and the girls here. I've got some of their presents already, but need to get a couple more things. At least they're easy to shop for.

The guy I described in my last post, the Homeless Liason guy, met with Jessie on Thursday morning, to get ready for the meeting we had yesterday (Friday) morning with Joann, his mom, and the bus driver that suspended him. We have this thing in my class where we listen for our vocabulary words and when Jessie got back to class he let me know that Mike had said "incredible" two times and "capable" once. So the big meeting was okay---this capable, courageous, incredible child tells the truth and apologizes for everything---including one thing nobody (except me) even knew he was involved in. Joann was nice enough and the whole thing only lasted about 1/2 an hour. I'm sure Mike has no idea how critical his prescense was to the positive tone that Joann maintained. I still question all her decisions in the whole situation: he shouldn't have been suspended from the bus in the first place, he absolutley should never have been suspended from our after school program, and I don't think she has any idea how much Mike and I did to make sure this meeting happened and that our policy regarding the YMCA and after school program be officially revised. I guess, in looking back, maybe he should have been suspended from the bus. I think he ended up learning a valuable lesson. But there is the whole "with love" part of discipline that is so missing from Joann's approach---but I think between his momma, me, and Mike, there was enough love to make the consequence about learning and "we know you can make better choices" and not about "you're a terrible kid."

We picked out the classrooms we're going to move into in the new building. If we really get the rooms we picked, they are the best rooms in the whole building. It's going to be a fun February this year. We're going to have Valentine's Day, move out of Lowell, have President's Day, and come back to our new building, all within one week.