@dfbdfb - I’m glad the weather is lightening up and bringing up your daughter’s mood, as well as finding something to be passionate about during all of this chaos. I am dealing with so much upheaval in my industry and it’s really exhausting to make so many changes to our marketing plans and re-strategize and change the way we have always done things…I think my daughter is dealing with the same on a different scale. All her expectations for this year have been subverted. That said, she’s doing fine. Her grades are better than fine so online learning has actually been a blessing here and taken off a lot of stress and pressure. I want her to be able to go back to school in the fall but there are some facets I wish we could keep-like sleeping later and the online math class where she’s doing so much better. For this summer, nothing much is happening here in NJ. My only real plan is that as soon as we are able to travel without too much worry she and I will go down to see my family in South Carolina and we’ll probably stay for at least two weeks. In the past, the structure of field hockey has been a summer saving grace, with a sleepaway camp in July and then preseason starts early August. Not sure how that will play out this year…
So we’re done with this school year! I thought Friday was the official last day, turns out it was yesterday lol! S23 twins turn 15 on Monday!!! Thing 2 is taking Latin 2 through our district’s Virtual Learning academy…he won’t have room in his schedule 10th grade for it so knocking it out now. I’m trying to find some relevant EC’s for him to do this summer…his interest are science & history/humanities. He’s going to do some volunteering with our city’s Teen Court (serve as a peer juror) once things start up again.
Thing 1 has started studying to get his private pilot license! Hubby is a FO with United Airlines and a certified flight instructor so he’ll be teaching Thing 1…goal is to pass his written test by mid summer so that he can get in an aircraft before school starts back up again. Thing 1 is talking about aerospace engineering so this is will most likely be his main EC. He’s a tough nut to crack…outside of marching band in school, he’s not interested in any other clubs/activities so we’re going with quality over quantity lol.
Both twins are also getting their drivers permits this summer, we do parent taught drivers ed, so they just have to pass the written test and then we’ll start taking them out in parking lots. I’m just trying to keep them engaged and motivated since there is still so much uncertainty about how school will look in the fall…all 3 of my kids are anxious to get back in an actual classroom!
Sounds like most of us are relieved that school is (or is almost) over! I am ready this time - this homeschooling AND working from home was very stressful! Anyway, DS did well to finish out the semester - I think he could have done better BUT his Q4 grades were a LOT better than Q3 so at least his semester average improved as a result. For Q4, he came out with 5 As and 2 high Bs; semester avg, he came out with 4 Bs and 3 As (that tells you how bad Q3 was lol).
Anyway, he has decided not to pursue band next year, and we are stuck with paying for a new clarinet we bought over a year ago. We have decided that when he gets a job in the Fall, he will take over the payments on it.
He is also going for his learner’s permit this summer - he started the online instruction but stopped when he found out DPS was closed. I sent him the article about the schedule to re-open, so hopefully he will jump back into it. We need for him to drive to/from school and job when the time comes.
He was also supposed to play tournament basketball but that got canceled. He is worried about his skill level come tryouts next Fall (if that even comes to fruition). Terrifying to think that the kids could be having to do without sports next year…I truly think that this all is going to go a LOT longer than original expected. I hope I am wrong.
I have to say, I am a bit jealous of all of you finishing up school. Our last day is June 23 and I can tell you everyone is pretty much done.
Twin 2 went on to win National Championship in his competition. Twin 2 is shy and is not enjoying the attention this is bringing. He also seems a little lost, he has been studying hard for this since last March and wants to find a new short/mid term goal. Right now it is being able to play Carnival of Venice on the trumpet.
Twin 1 is having minor surgery tomorrow (hospitals here have just started to re-open for elective surgery). This procedure is re-scheduled from mid-March (we delayed from January to March so he could participate in First Robotic). Well none of that happened, but good news is his required Covid-19 test came back negative and it was not at all painful, just a quick swab of the nose. I’m hoping the most painful part of this whole thing is having to be at the hospital at 6 am. Twin 1 plans to spend the summer doing on-line programming competitions.
Both boys will start on-line drivers ed Monday. They will hopefully get learner’s permits this summer.
@JaceyK have you looked into re-sale of the clarinet. Depending on the quality, instruments retain a lot of there value. I’m afraid there won’t be much band next year, I really hope I am wrong. And I agree with you, I think this will last longer then we want to believe.
@Mom24boys, another whole month?!? I don’t know if we’d survive that here!
I’m glad things seem to be progressing for y’all, though, even if it’s difficult at times.
We too have a few weeks left. Its torture for all. (Our school was right on top of transition to online school and kids had no extra time off, only the scheduled spring break).
@mom24boys Wow, another whole month?! Yeah, I would not be looking forward to that. But it sounds like ya’ll are busy regardless. As for the clarinet, we have one thing left to do and that is to haul it back to the place we bought it from and beg for them to buy it back. LOL. Clarinets have a huge depreciation factor (either that or I am a sucker) so we would only recover a fraction of what we owe on it. We will try that soon (if they are open).
@JaceyK try eBay for the clarinet. We bought my daughter’s flute from there years ago and it worked out great. I did ask for extra pictures and how long it had been played, when had the pads last been replaced, etc.
@Mom24boys @2plustrio I cannot even imagine having to “go to school” past Memorial Day weekend. That’s just too long!
We are officially done here! Hooray! S23 took the AP World History yesterday and came out of his room dancing and singing “Done Done Done!” Who knows how they will be graded and if we’ll see ROI on that money, but at least it is over. He got Red Cross Lifeguard certified last week so we are giving him the weekend to celebrate and relax and then he needs to find a job! If not at a pool then hopefully at beach or a a store or as a manny! Much to his disappointment, playing video games all day after swim practice (6:30-8:15am daily) is NOT going to be how he will get to spend the next 12 weeks. All the volunteer ECs here were cancelled but the Gov just gave the go-ahead for summer camps, so maybe he can get a day camp counselor job… we will see.
We start school typically after Labor Day in September so we go until mid June.
My son wants a job as well but until I figure out his football schedule and my daughters dance schedule and any possible vacation plans before he commits to a job (now that the ban is slowly lifting here).
My daughter started back at dance class in person this week. I started back teaching face to face as well this week at college (I teach year round).
My son wants to take some music lessons this summer (likely a bit of voice and guitar). He has to start to learn some new music for “marching band” if it happens.
My daughter is in competition dance and they have auditions next month but all competitions are of course on hold.
Just like everyone else, I really wish I knew what was going to happen so I could start planning.
S23 is going to finish with a 4.0 for the year, which is great. This week would typically be finals week, but they are not happening this semester. His summer baseball team started practice last week and it looks like we are going to have a season, although abbreviated and limited to local tournaments. S23 is very sports driven so the past two months has been trying at our house.
He is prepping for behind the wheel (licenses at 15 here) which will be the second week of June. He will be eligible for his license July 1st!!
We have a graduating senior, so our summer plans are finding time to spend with each other before he leaves for CO in September.
Still a couple more weeks of school here. Since they are only grading work for classes where you want to improve your grade, D23 just has to finish a French project. She was also working on improving her AP World History grade (from B+ to A) but learned from her teacher last week that she missed a deadline a couple weeks ago so now there is no way she can do that. So frustrating. It’s been really hard for her to keep track of that teacher’s assignments. But still, a B+ in an AP class as a freshman is still great.
We’re also starting driving with her. No permit yet since DMVs are closed but DH has been taking her to parking lots to start practicing and she’s signed up for a 2-week class in late June. Since DMVs in the rest of the state (not Northern VA) are open, I keep stalking the website to see if I can snag an appointment time at an office 1-2 hours away.
In addition to the driver’s ed, she’ll do an online summer school class for Personal Finance & Economics (state requirement) and a weekly science news discussion through Outschool
My D23 still has a couple weeks left in two classes. She did all virtual school this year and will go to community college for the next three years, in-person (or whatever that means with COVID adaptations). She got As in her other classes (art, PE, Human Geography, American Literature Honors, American History Honors, and AP Calc AB).
She takes a Calc AB make-up June 1, then besides finishing up those two virtual courses (Chinese and Earth Science Honors) she’s done academics for the year. Her summer plans include a virtual edition of CTY’s summer program (she was very disappointed that the in-person camp was canceled), finishing a Journey for Girl Scouts, working on launching a research project, and lots of outdoor exercise.
All good news on the D23 front (plus a little light bragging):
Classes ended here a week and a half ago, and grades were supposed to be posted a week ago, but it turns out that last night was the first D23 had checked to see what she’d gotten. (As a matter of family policy, my spouse and I don’t look up their final grades until either our kids tell us to or we get the printed grade report in the mail.)
She was expecting a 3.67 or (more likely) a 3.83, but managed to pull out an A in bio after all, giving her straight As and a much-needed ego boost! (I’ve posted before about how much she struggled with everything moving online. She managed to put in the minimum required, but going beyond that was difficult for her, to put it mildly.)
She’s not sure how much of this was mercy due to difficult circumstances on the part of her bio teacher—easily her favorite teacher of the year, despite hating the subject matter—and how much of it was her own achievement, but at this point she doesn’t care and will take it. I think, FWIW, that part of it probably was mercy on his part, based in him being able to tell that she was clearly struggling (they had a weekly short reflection essay in the class) but she also clearly kept going anyway, and since they had moved pretty quickly and already effectively covered the district’s biology standards for the year when the switch to online happened, those last few weeks were all just gravy from a course content standpoint anyway.
In other news, this weekend she started after me to start building her a college choice spreadsheet like I built with her older sisters, so now I’m in the process of compiling a “long list” of music programs that have the specialties she wants (read: not straight-up performance), which I’ll then turn over to her to research and fill in details for over the rest of the summer.
Congrats to your daughter, @dfbdfb!!
D23 was able to submit her make-up AP Calc AB exam today. She is happy to have that over with. She got an A+ for the course and is hoping for a 5 on the exam.
She still has two more classes to finish up, then she has a bunch of plans for the summer that thankfully can happen in spite of COVID-19.
Hello all. I haven’t posted recently. Everything has been so chaotic the last few months.
Today was the last day of classes for my D23. She’s been having synchronous online classes Mon-Thurs in the mornings. I think she’s got a few projects to finish up for next week ( no finals) but she’s basically done. She’s still working on a computer class through our Virtual Learning academy but should finish that soon now that other classes are done. She has struggled a bit with the move online - particularly with science and math. Our school is still doing regular grades with minimal modifications, and D23 will see a small dip this quarter. It is what it is.
This summer, she’s planning to take her second PE requirement online. Her Guidance Counselor reached out to her about next years schedule. She got most of her first choice classes but had one spot that none of her alternates would fit into. After going through all of the classes offered during that time she opted for Intermediate Guitar. She’s never taken guitar before so she will also be taking Beginning Guitar online this summer. She’s an accomplished musician already who has had some experience with viola, trumpet, French horn, piano, and voice so I think she will be OK. And my husband has a guitar, so that works.
She could have added PE in that spot and taken 0 online courses this summer instead of 2 but she’s been adamant about not wanting to take PE at school so she decided to go this route. Frankly, I’m not sure what else will be a available for her to do this summer so why not? Her dance studio will most likely start summer classes online. She’s waiting for her placement letter for next year to decide what she wants to take, but it will definitely be less than usual. The summer job program for the city that she worked through last summer has been cancelled and the summer day camp where she works for a few weeks as a counselor is still unsure if it will be running (they won’t go online).
At least now we know what her schedule will look like next year. She’ll have Drafting I, Creative Writing, and Spanish III in the Fall, AP English Language, Band and A Capella choir all year, and Honors Algebra II, Intermediate Guitar, and Honors Biology in the Spring. She’ll also take a History class online - she is still deciding which one. She’s got 3 options to fulfill the 10th grade requirement. So we have a schedule but we don’t know yet what school will look like in the Fall. Nothing has been decided here, but we don’t start until the end of August.
I see there are some parents here working on driver training. We are starting that as well and it’s not as scary as I expected!
Hope everyone is having a good end to the year. I am happy to close the books on this one!
S23 Twins officially got their drivers permits today…DMV approved!!!
Y’all pray for me lol!!!
@Momof3B My twins are finishing their on-line drivers ed class today and hopefully will pass that test.
They aren’t eligible for learner’s permits until mid-July. I don’t know how back up the DMV will be, it hasn’t re-opened but is making plans.
Also, we planned to buy a car for them to share, which should be interesting since we almost never leave the house.
Ack, D23 will be allowed to start driving with a parent in the car in September. I haven’t yet gotten used to her older sister driving. This all makes me very very nervous. :neutral:
Doing the parent taught driver’s ed with the older two (they graduate college 2021 & 2023 respectively) gave me the gray hairs I have! I can’t imagine having two do it at the same time! S23 is doing the parent taught class with his dad this time…'bout time! 
He is scheduled to get his permit on 6/24 (we had to schedule it 3 weeks in advanced as it was all booked up).
ON another note, he starts life guard training next week for his life guard job. He needs to do something this summer!
Kids can get learners permits at 14(!) up here, and the moment D23 turned 14 she was after us to get one. We didn’t let her—that early still seems weird to us, and we told her to wait til 15—and by the time she turned 15 a couple months ago her interest had waned, and we haven’t heard anything from her about it recently. Not sure if we should bring it up with her, or wait. (Though it occurs to me that it’d probably be a good idea for her to get one by the fall, so she can get in some winter driving time.)