Training Your Brain

Can we talk about Common Core for a minute? You know, the new standards being rolled out in public schools across the United States? The theory behind them is that they are supposed to help kids develop critical thinking and real-world problem-solving skills.

When I first started reading about Common Core, I thought, “Well, how could that be a bad thing?” and a little later on, “What are people so up in arms about?” and “What is the big deal with Common Core?”

Oh, my friends, now I know.

A quick detour:  my oldest child, Viva, has always been a good student. Her favorite subject is math. She was fortunate to have a 3^rd grade teacher who was nuts about math and imparted that enthusiasm to her class. In the 4^th grade, Viva was graced with another great teacher – a former engineer – who nurtured that enthusiasm and then “looped” with the class, teaching them 5^th grade the following year. He developed units on entrepreneurship and running a business, and created a mock medical school program. He selected Viva as one of a group of students to troubleshoot computer issues for her classmates on their iPads. He got her excited about Science Camp! All of these experiences pretty much solidified Viva’s desire to study engineering and/or computer coding when she attends college in the Great Someday.

Until this week, when she brought home a math test with a score of 83. Now, 83/100 is not a bad score. But it is not the type of grade she usually brings home, and she was upset. And when I began reviewing the test, I started to understand why. In Common Core, when you solve a math problem, you don’t just write down the answer and move on. You write down the answer and you have to explain how you got there. And if you don’t explain it exactly as the teacher wants you to, you don’t get full credit for the right answer. So if a question is worth four points, and you get the problem right but don’t explain it “correctly,” you lose a point. On nearly every question, instead of getting a 4/4, Viva was getting 3’s.

For one question, the teacher took issue with Viva writing that an explanation about the “larger” number as opposed to the “greater” number. Seriously. She took off a point for that. Sweet Dub and I reviewed the entire test with her and came to the following conclusion: you basically just have to learn the game. It sucks, because they are now changing the rules midstream, but it’s a game. And that sucks, because what it bolls down to is, you have to now figure out what the teacher wants to hear. Which isn’t critical thinking at all.

Last night, we were reviewing her math homework, and Viva was now getting stuck. Intimidated by this new challenge. She told me that she was certain now that she was going to get it wrong, no matter what she did.

I won’t lie. My first reaction, because I am from Boston and we are all filled with rage, was to be pissed. I know that middle school is when girls slide away from math. They start to think of it as a “boys” subject. And even when they have a natural talent for it, they stop excelling at it. This is why we have so few women in math and science fields. But then I stopped myself. Because I realize it is something new, and it is hard, and when I asked Viva to explain her rationale for one problem, she did. And she was right, at least from my perspective.

And I think this is good for her. She’s lucky that so far math has come easy to her, but research shows that when you realize that you can build up your abilities through effort you actually learn more.

Today, I read an article which reinforced this for me. It’s called “The Learning Myth:  Why I’llNever Tell My Son He’s Smart.” I particularly liked this:

Recently, I put into practice research I had been reading about for the past few years: I decided to praise my son not when he succeeded at things he was already good at, but when he persevered with things that he found difficult. I stressed to him that by struggling, your brain grows.

Here’s to growth, and to helping all of us persevere.

Throwing Down Some Wisdom

Yesterday after work I was sitting next to Viva on the couch. Out of nowhere and with no prompting whatsoever she turned to me and said, "You know, Mom? I think we're RICH."

"We ARE rich," I said. "Rich in love."

"No, I don't mean like that," she said. "I mean rich because we have our whole family and we're all together."

(Had I been at my snottiest, I would have said, "Same thing." I am so annoying. I am so glad I did not do that. Yay, me!)

"That is really nice that you feel that way," I said. "You are right, we are so lucky to have each other. I feel grateful every day."

And I do. Much as I may complain about things, at the end of the day I am happy. What more can you ask than that?

P.S. Also, super pleased that she is aware that she is in an unusual position and doesn't take her blessings for granted. She is happy - not in a simple-minded, Pollyannaish sort of way, but in a "I've checked it out and I gotta say, I got it pretty dang good" kind of way.  I like that she doesn't define richness by having things, but by having close relationships with people who love her. Oh, my girl. She just captures my heart afresh, that one.

How Others See You

Recently, we were playing this game at the dinner table. It's a fun game, can be thought-provoking, and the answers may surprise you. 

One of the questions was (and I paraphrase): "What is a quality that one of the people at this table has, that you wish you had?"

Viva looked at me and said:  "I wish I were more like you in not being afraid of so many different things. I mean, you're not afraid of anything!"

I was stunned. I said, "You mean you think I'm BRAVE?"

"Yeah, you are," she said.

Wow. That might be one of the greatest things anyone has ever said about me.

What do you think your loved ones might say about you? Ask them. You might be surprised.

School’s Out for Summer

Well, almost.

We are all groaning our ways through the last days of school. I have two children, and they are at the same school, so my end-of-year should be pretty standard. You’d think. You know, the usual end-of-year parties and “what to get the teacher” dilemma, combined with “what are we going to do with the kids all summer, OMG why is everything so expensive” (sob sob, rend clothing, shake fist at sky).

Oh, but no.

My fifth grader is graduating from elementary school. So there are extras, like a yearbook, and graduation picture, and Class of 2014 T-shirt, and end-of-year field trip day to some seventh circle of hell where they pour skittles into the kids’ mouths and give them IV’s full of cotton candy and let them drive go-karts, play mini golf and dominate on arcade games, following which they release them staggering into the daylight laden down with tiny plastic trinkets and huge twisty drink cups with the straws attached and a mountain of other plastic crap which they do not need but insist they do because they won it playing games, don’t you see, it’s not fair. Also, my kindergartener is sort of-kind-of culminating. It’s not a graduation, per se, but they’re also having a party. On a different day than fifth grade graduation.

Also: my kids seem suddenly to be performing arts gurus, because they have both been asked to perform this week – one, dancing at a Motown revue event last night, and the other, playing drums in her rock band this afternoon in front of the whole school.

Added to that, my children are changing school districts next year, a delicate procedure during which you must keep your shit together all whilst feeling the top of your head might pop off at any second. There are sooooo many forms. And soooo many documents you must collect from hither and yon – birth certificates, utility bills, report cards, copies of standardized tests, immunization records, etc. There’s the ridiculous health card you must fill out with the child’s medical history asking you, among other things, at what age your child first sat up? First crawled? First walked? Are they for real with this? I barely remember what I did last weekend.

And enrolling the kids is a multi-part process. Ceeya must visit the new school next month for an official literacy assessment, and in California they are doing this graduated shifting of the eligibility date for kindergarten which apparently also extends to first grade, which I don’t understand. Ceeya was three weeks too young for kindergarten this past year, but they accepted her provisionally and now she has blown all the assessments in her current school out of the water. (Seriously, the “good” proficiency score in phonics was 28, and she scored 112. She may have broken their test.) Now I have to go through the same thing with the new school so she doesn’t have to repeat kinder because she won’t be six years old by Sept. 1^st.

It is like having another job. I am exhausted. No Pinterest-worthy teacher crafts over here, man. I am out.

On Not Being Able to Take It On

What a week. How to sum up?

Well:  let’s go back to 2^nd grade, when Viva first started at the school she currently attends. Pretty much since then we have been hearing about two trips that fifth graders can go on each year:  a week of Science Camp in March, and a week on an historic trip to Washington, DC and colonial Williamsburg during spring break in April.

Considering we have been hearing about both trips since 2^nd grade, and rather intensely since 4^th grade, and super intensely since the start of 5^th grade, it was a no-brainer that we were going somehow to get Viva to attend. The DC trip is super expensive and is actually coordinated by another local school. They invite our students as a courtesy. As we started talking about this in the fall, we held out hope that a miracle would happen and our ship (full of money) would come in and one of us would be able to accompany Viva on this trip. Unfortunately this did not happen. We put down a deposit and began making payments on a ticket just for her. And then in January we discovered that only one other kid from her class was going (due to the huge expense) and that none of the teachers from her school were going, and that they were having trouble booking enough chaperones. We did not feel comfortable sending her 2,600 miles away with complete strangers. So we made the decision to pull out of the trip, losing a $400 deposit, but with the wonderful prospect of Science Camp still in the offing.

Science Camp! A week in the wilderness! No technology! Hiking! Archery! Canoeing! Bunking in a cabin with nine of your girlfriends! Smores! Campfires! Being away from your boring parents and annoying siblings for five whole days! What could be better?!

The weekend before the trip, we were running about getting last minute items – a small flashlight, a disposable camera, extra socks. It was very exciting. On Sunday, we reviewed the packing list and taught Viva how to roll her clothes to pack for camping. On Sunday evening, after we came back from the playground and had dinner, Viva said she didn’t feel well. I touched her head. It was burning. I put her in the shower, from which she had to exit promptly to throw up.

OH WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY….

I gave her some ibuprofen and put her to bed. Sweet Dub came home from his Sunday gig and we conferred. We were both heartsick. In the morning, despite our reservations, we decided she should try to go to camp. She said she felt fine. She felt slightly warm to the touch and her energy seemed good. We agreed to let her go.

Which is how I ended up on Interstate 10 at 8 PM on St. Patrick’s Day, with one kid in her pajamas sleeping in her car seat, driving out to pick up the other kid 90-some miles away, all the hell the way out in a cabin in the woods in Riverside County, because she had a fever of 103.5. We didn’t get back home until nearly 11:30 PM, at which point I realized we didn’t have any ibuprofen, since we sent it with her and the camp staff confiscated it.  Sweet Dub had to venture out to find a 24-hour pharmacy and nobody got to bed before midnight (except Ceeya, who slept through it all and was Full Of Beans at 6 AM.)

The next day, when we took her to see the pediatrician, her doctor asked me, “Do you think it’s a virus?” at which point I wanted to punch her in the face, because guess what, I haven’t been to medical school – maybe YOU could tell ME what YOU think it is?

But I didn’t punch her in the face, and for the next couple of days we treated it as the flu until we concluded that it just wasn’t getting better, and due to Sweet Dub’s crazy schedule this week, on Thursday I ended up having to take both kids to Urgent Care after I got home from work and we stayed there for the better part of three hours. And we got a chest X-ray, and my kid had a fever of 100.8, and then they told me they thought she must have walking pneumonia, which doesn’t even make sense since usually with walking pneumonia you barely know you’re sick, and Viva at this point had had a fever since Sunday and had stopped eating and was barely moving. I have never seen her so sick and so depressed.

Over the weekend, after a couple days of antibiotics, she perked up. We are tentatively looking forward to her birthday weekend this coming weekend, during which we are having her best friend over to go to the movies, to Dave & Buster’s and to stay for a sleepover.

But I am still so sad for her. She went back to school today, and all the kids were talking about Science Camp. I had paid for a Science Camp T-shirt, which I forgot about (!) and which she received today. When I called to talk to her after school, she told me it makes her sad to look at it and she wants me to take it away.

There is nothing I can do to make this better. This is one of the worst parts of being a parent, watching your kid have to suffer disappointment – particularly over something that they have been looking forward to for such a long time. Viva was literally X-ing out the days until Science Camp on her calendar all month.

This is just a big sucky thing. My heart hurts for her. I can’t carry this for her, much as I want to. I can only watch, and sit with her, and tell her I’m so sorry for how much it sucks.

And P.S. that is why I didn’t blog last week. Tune in next time, hopefully for something more uplifting…

Scattershot

So many things to say, so many things I can't share.

It's a dilemma. So here are some random things.

Can I be boring and tell you how in love I am with Lupita Nyong'o? It just feels like I am jumping on an already over-populated bandwagon. But, oh, hell -- here I am, plopped right in here, trundling along with the mainstream media. I predict a huge uptick in the popularity of the name "Lupita"among babies in the years to come. Yeah? 

Today is National Day of Unplugging! ....Oops. Oh, I guess you are supposed to be unplugged from electronics from sundown tonight until sundown tomorrow. Unfortunately that is not going to work as we have some serious family medical shit going down right now (see above re: can't share). Blah Blah Fail.

In related news, we have undertaken the task of getting Viva a cell phone for her eleventh birthday, which fast approacheth.  She will be graduating from elementary school in May and moving on to middle school in August. I want her to have a way to keep in touch with her old friends since she will be switching school districts and it is highly unlikely any of her friends will be at her new school. I also want to have a way to contact her because I anticipate a variety of after-school activities and needing to pick her up hither and yon. We plan to have a talk with her about our expectations for her usage and care of the phone and to provide her with something along these lines as reinforcement. 

Wow, do people have a lot of opinions on whether YOUR kid should have a phone. Sweet Dub and I are both rather sensible most of the time. I said, most of the time. And Viva is fairly mature and responsible most of the time. I said, most of the time. I am aware that she may abuse her privilege of having a phone. And she will be aware that she will be in Huge Unspeakable Trouble should she abuse the privilege. There will be consequences, and then we will move on. 

Have I mentioned how much I adore Viva? Perhaps not lately. (I mean perhaps I haven't mentioned it lately, not that I don't adore her lately.) I love this age. She is fun to be around, and we have long talks and just enjoy hanging out with each other. I will always love her, but I also really *like* her as a person because she is so thoughtful and funny and insightful. 

Oh, and to head off any friction in the event her sister reads this someday: yes, I also love Ceeya. How can there be any doubt?? 

And finally: I think the laundry hampers in our apartment are being filled by fiendish elves while we are out. Why is there so much laundry, always? What is to be gained?

Happy weekend. Peace out.

A Hot Mess

Big sigh. This hair issue has gone from bad to worse.

My sister-in-law wanted to make Viva an appointment to get her hair done this Saturday so she would be set for Thanksgiving. I responded that Viva doesn't want to get her hair pressed again, so I wanted to make sure the other stylist, who doesn't press hair but does "braids" (i.e. cornrows) was available.

"I thought Viva doesn't want braids, she said they made her hair hurt," Diva said.

"She doesn't want cornrows, she wants individual braids," I said.

"Well, that takes forever and that is really expensive," Diva said. And then she fixed her mouth to tell me that she was through with my child, that she didn't even know what she wanted to do with her hair, that she was trying to do something nice and that before she started doing this, Viva's hair looked a hot mess and she never ever saw her even look in a mirror and that she just can't be doing this etc., etc. and by the way YOU'RE WELCOME.

I remained calm (although WHAT THE F? You are THROUGH with my child? My child, who you just said looks A HOT MESS?! And then you are going to imply that I am ungrateful?) and said (as I had already said multiple times) thank you for doing this for Viva, but since it's not what she wants, it doesn't make sense to keep doing it, so why spend that money and time.

And then I prevented myself from having some kind of cardiac infarction, wished her a safe trip for Thanksgiving, and as I was saying it, realized she had already hung up on me.

Happy frickin' holidays. If you took my blood pressure right now I think it would be off the frickin' charts.

Long, Flowing Locks - Revisited

Yesterday, I told you about Viva’s excursions to the beauty shop over the past couple of months. Her braids were too tight, they were hurting her head and potentially damaging her hairline, and I asked the stylist and my sister-in-law Diva (who’s been facilitating this process, as well as providing financial backing) to give her scalp a break and put her hair in a loose style. I suggested box braids.

Instead, Viva came home with her hair pressed straight:

At Auntie Diva's, making krispy treats before coming home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And I am deeply conflicted. I am better off than Sweet Dub, who was furious, but I am conflicted, and here is why:

Since Viva was very small, I have told her how beautiful her natural hair is. I never wanted her to get caught up in the whole stupid “good hair” vs. “bad hair” ridiculousness that rears its ugly head when it comes to discussions of black hair. I try to take good care of her hair -- to trim the ends when it needs it, to keep it well-moisturized and in protective styles. I am a big advocate of loving what God gave you and rejecting any nonsense that your hair, the way it grows out of your head, is somehow “less than” if it is not straight and long. I love naturally curly and coily and kinky hair and I have made a decade-long effort to convey that to my baby.

In the meantime, Sweet Dub’s side of the family has been pushing for years for us to straighten Viva’s hair. “It would look so beautiful!” my mother-in-law would say.

“Her hair will look beautiful no matter what she does to it,” I would respond. “She has beautiful thick hair.”

“I am not teaching my baby that B.S. self-hatred,” Sweet Dub would say to his mom. “Leave it alone, there is nothing wrong with her hair. We are not teaching her that.”

And then we would speak of it no more. Until the next time. “Why are you so invested in this?!” Sweet Dub would say. “We are done, stop bugging us about it!”

But still the pressure kept on – not on us, as it turns out, but on Viva. “Do it for Granny,” my mother-in-law would say. “I just want to see it one time.”

So you see where this is going, right?

It really feels that this whole exercise of taking Viva to have her hair done for weeks was just a very well-laid plan, the culmination of which was:  Viva had her hair pressed straight without even understanding that’s what was about to happen. Now, they didn’t put chemicals in her hair, because I really would have gone off about that. But I hate that they did this without our true consent.

And here’s what has me more conflicted:  Viva loves it. She has been combing her hair, and brushing her hair, tossing her hair out of her face, keeping a scrunchie on hand at all times so she can pull it into a ponytail if she needs to, and even wrapping it, pinning it up, and wearing a satin bonnet at night. When her hair is natural, I have to remind her Every. Single. Night. To put a satin sleep cap on. Or to wear a shower cap when she bathes. It is infuriating.

And worse:  Ceeya sees all the attention this new hair is getting, and she now says she wants her hair “done” at the salon. This, from the kid who fights me every time I want to comb her hair into braids or puffs, or even just finger-comb it out into an afro. Yes, this, from the kid who loves to wear her hair “wild.”

Did you hear that loud scream? That was me.

Long, Flowing Locks

(Okay, so here’s the recreation of the post I lost yesterday.)

A couple of months ago, Sweet Dub’s sister, Diva, offered to take Viva to the beauty shop to get her hair done for the first day of school. Viva is getting older, maybe she needed a change. Diva is an empty nester, with no one at home to spoil. She offered not only to take Viva to the beauty shop this one time, but to take her regularly and pay for her hair to be done – to free up my Sunday hair-doing time and to spare us the added expense, since we are on a tight budget.

All well and good. Viva came home with her hair in tiny cornrows in a lovely way pattern across her head, with tiny braids spilling down her back. She looked very different, much more like a tween, and she liked having her hair in a more sophisticated style:

 

 

So every three weeks, we would drop her back off at the shop and Diva would pick her up, pay for her style, and take her out to eat. It was nice for them to have their own one-on-one time together.

But as time went on, the braider put Viva’s braids in more tightly, even though I had asked that she put the back part of her head in loose braids (she completely ignored that request). Viva complained that her head hurt, that it itched, and when I investigated what was bothering her, I found she was getting large red bumps at the nape of her neck. No, no, no. I do not like that. That is a one-way ticket to traction alopecia. Bumps be gone!

So I took the style down (a three-hour undertaking, as it involved tiny cornrows criss-crossing her scalp and intersecting in some places), deep conditioned her hair with a cap overnight, and then the next day restyled in some double-stranded twists, similar to this:

 

Image credit:  naturallycurly.com how-to video

 

I told Diva that we wanted to take a break from the cornrows because I was worried about the health of Viva’s hair. She said she was sure they could find a loose style which wouldn’t hurt, so Viva’s hair wouldn’t be clamped down to her head so tightly. I suggested box braids as a compromise (without the eyeshadow and...er...chestiness of the model below):

Image credit:  naturallycurly.com style gallery

 

Do you know Viva came home with her hair blown straight and pressed?!  Sweet Dub was furious. I was less than happy. 

 

Can you guess why?  Stay tuned for part two, coming tomorrow.