<p>Kelowna: Is your son tall? It seems like those crew guys are always tall.</p>
<p>Ok. hockey season + AP Lang + APUSH + orchestra = crazy life! D worked on AP Lang assignment for 8 hours yesterday. She has an AP Calc test today and at the same time is playing catch up in preparing for an APUSH test tomorrow. The fall orchestra concert is Thursday with reahearsal for two hours tomorrow before travel to the opening game of the fh district tournament. The district tournament was scheduled to conclude on Thursday(same day as concert), but the game is hopefully being moved to Wednesday permitting D to perform in the concert. Sheesh! Did I mention she also has physics and AP Lang tests on Thursday and Friday, and letās throw in an orthodontist appointment for good measure. Conclusion of field hockey season is starting to look real good to me!</p>
<p>S2 got his progress reports on Friday. Heās a little lopsided right now - 5 grades of 100, a 107, a 97 and a 62 (in precalc)! He failed one test that was 50% of the grade, despite 100s on all the homework. But, heās still got 3 weeks to pull it up for the final grade. Heās not too worried (heās a pretty laid back kid) so Iām sure heāll bring it up to something acceptable. </p>
<p>He has started to discuss college plans. I think his voice teacher is pushing him, but at least heās weeding out some of the ānot acceptables.ā He added University of Miami to the list, so I canāt wait to visit - maybe in January or Feb??</p>
<p>D is home sick today. I really hate having her miss a day of school - even a single day can be hard to make up. She missed two days last month after getting her wisdom teeth removed, and was behind for quite a while afterwards.</p>
<p>megp, maybe heāll do what my kid did ā a 67 on a BC Cal test three weeks ago (yes, despite all the 100s on homework) and last week, on a two-parter test: a 92 and a 98! I would never have believed heād turn it around like that!</p>
<p>sacchi, also take note: The 98 and 92 came three days after ds was out with food poisoning. Hope your dd feels better.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, cross-country ends this week! Woot! Looking forward to all of us sleeping in a little more.</p>
<p>blueshoe- Our AP Lang teacher is also grading on that same scale! I was confused about the arbitrary numerical grade & now it makes sense. It does not take much to knock them down to a lower grade. I have a son who just graduated & from his experience the AP grades can change from Cs to As very quickly. Our problem is APUSH. We just went from block scheduling of 4 classes per day where each class covers a yearās worth of work in a semester to seven periods that each cover a yearās worth of work in a year. In APUSH they have already covered 15 of 28 sections & we are only 1/4 of the way through the year. Too much material presented so quickly really decreases the enjoyment of History. History is not just memorization of facts, but the kids have no choice. DD is doing well but has no clue about what she is learning.</p>
<p>āDD is doing well but has no clue about what she is learning.ā That sounds like my D in IB French. She just told me she scored a 6/7on a midterm exam but she is completely reliant on her reasoning skills. She doesnāt really know French, only Spanish. She correctly answers questions based on the words in the text by using the same words in her answers without knowing what they mean! Crazy! Ugh! She scored a 5 on the AP Spanish language exam last year because of her year in S. America so she is beyond the level of IB HL Spanish B but she didnāt feel she knew enough to take the Spanish A course with native speakers. She is trying to take up French again not having studied it for two years and never having had a good teacher. In better news she did make the New Mexico state orchestra and is looking forward to rehearsing and performing with students from around the state in January. And, I finally get to see her and her school this Friday! Yeah!!</p>
<p>Apollo: Congrats to your D for making State orchestra. Having a music kid, I know how much work that takes! Enjoy your trip!</p>
<p>Amazing how different each school is. Spanish for Native Speakers is a joke here, while AP Spanish a true GPA buster.
I agree with the fact that it is so difficult to miss any school days. It is sick and should not be like that, but how am I going to change it?
Keeping DS from practice today. I e-mailed all the coaches saying that as a parent I have to step in on occasions. They are not happy with my decision but I really donāt care.
S came back from Boston around 10 P.M. last night and was still up at 1 A.M. doing homework, with a 6. A.M. wake up call. This is the week of finals, with four days (we had fall break here so of course tons of homework) spent on sports he must be really behind on the assignments. Tried working on the plane butā¦hardly any room there. Plus was sitting next to a mom with the baby on the way thereā¦plus you know how it is when they travel as a group 
So I have made an executive decision today saying that one day of missed practice is the best we can do at this point.
Now off to cook a nice and nourishing dinner , praying that he will get 8 hours of sleep tonight.</p>
<p>Not very tall, about 6ā1āā</p>
<p>Kelowna, 6ā1" is four inches taller than the average U.S. male. :)</p>
<p>Really excited. Ds met with an adcom today who he really liked. This is a first. He hasnāt liked any of the ones heās met. I donāt know why heās so picky, but it definitely colors his perception of the school.</p>
<p>Have your kids decided on a major yet? My D is an excellent musician who has won many competitions & made all State Chorus every year & performed as the lead in many musicals. She makes excellent grades & loves to write. Iām worried about job prospects in Creative Writing or Music. Should she follow her passions & worry about job prospects later? Job prospects seem slim for many majors these days.</p>
<p>Got another email from one of my sonās teacherās. His project was due yesterday and he didnāt turn it in (20% of the qtr grade). I asked my son why and he said that he thought his project partner was going to print his portion and turn it in. Needless to say, project partner did not but project partner did turn in his own work. When I asked him why didnāt he tell the teacher so that he could print it out real quick and turn it in, he said it was already late so what was the point. Aaaarrrrgh!!!
I have an annual IEP meeting with his school today and Iām not even seeing the point in going. Too little too late it seems.</p>
<p>Reeinaz: I feel for you. I just found out that my S has to bring up his failing math grade to passing by Nov 5 or he wonāt be allowed to compete in state choir competition. I reminded him that he had set a goal of being first chair this year and that he needed to do everything possible to achieve that goal. He said ānot if it involves going to tutoring.ā So frustrating. The teacher even said that sheād work with him one on one. But for him, tutoring = loser. Fingers crossed for all of these stubborn āunderachievers.ā</p>
<p>OMGā¦megpmom. I thought it was just my son who felt that way about getting extra help. Iām considering briberyā¦err ummmā¦positive motivation :)</p>
<p>Iām with blueshoe just looking forward to the end of the fH season. we are all sleep deprived and grumpy. Unlikely to advance in regionals but now I find out that win or lose we host the semis and finals and the moms are supposed to provide food for coaches and refs and our girls are the ball girls so another two weeks of games that run from 5-10pm?! Last night D was up until 12 and set alarm clock for 6:30 to go get some help in math at 7:15ātoo tired to go to school so over breakfast asked me for helpā¦thank god I was able to help but better to get a private tutor if you can afford it because math help is suddenly overlaid on top of mother daughter issuesā¦she accused me, when I sighed over a difficult geometric series problem, that I donāt approve of her eye makeup?! Daughter antenna had picked up on my (I thought) private reservations about her outfit/makeup for the day. Amazingā¦like something from āthe twighlight zoneā ā¦ we never did finish the problem (answer was 12/7 I realized on my ride to work) ā¦</p>
<p>My D also so sensitive this year. āWhy are you looking at me like that?,ā she asks in the car when I am not even looking at her, just looking for cars before I turn. She is under such stress & looking for encouragement from me. APUSH is giving her fits even though she has a 90 & 10 points will be added at the end of the semester to AP classes. Of course the colleges will take those 10 points right off. The 10 points only help with class rank so that kids who take easier classes donāt get ranked higher. Class rank is such a crazy game.</p>
<p>Just adding my support to moms of daughters. The little interactions between moms and daughters at 7 in the morning and at supper time (or later for a lot of you) can get sticky. I am right there with you. (Me yesterday morning: Did you shave your legs? and immediately wished I had not asked.)</p>
<p>I actually found myself calling my own mother on Friday and apologizing for all of the things I put here through as a teenager. All I could hear was a slight chuckle and āI love you dearā.</p>
<p>And can someone please explain to me what āNo Shave Novemberā isā¦speaking of not shaving legs!!!</p>
<p>Iām so glad I have boys. 
My relationship with my mom was rocky in the teen years. I feel horrible about the way I treated her.</p>
<p>Do yāallās schools have Naviance? Two of the schools ds is interested in donāt have enough data points to register on the scattergram. The college counselor was nice enough to send the graphs to me privately anyway. One was good news; the other bad, which is what I expected.</p>