Looking Up

Well, finally things are starting to look up! Kirsten is nearly back to normal, and by the grace of God no one else in the family got sick with it. As anyone with a family knows it seems that sickness always gets passed around. It's the one thing that kids will share without having to be told!

Johnathan has had a good week at school. I think it's partially thanks to his Taekwando instructor, who is fabulous, and partially because of the new "Extreme Work". Here I was worried that he would want to do it. Nope... every day I've given him the option to do it or not, he always says no! So now I'm wondering what I'll be doing with the $30 worth of books I bought for him. I'm thinking they'll get done during the summer. :)

I am afraid however that my relationship with his teachers has been damanged. One in particular, she voiced her concern about me pulling him out of school having a negative affect on him socially. She's always been so plesent before, she'd smile and say hi, so very friendly. But the last three times I've seen her this week, that has not been the case. Now granted she very well could have been preoccupied with other things going on, but I don't know. I do love his teachers, I mean, I'll be the first to admit, Johnathan can be one stubborn boy, he hasn't been very nice to them. But he is my son, and I have to fight for him to get what he needs. If his needs are not seen to now, it's only going to lead to bigger problems in the future.

I have Parent Teacher conferences on Thursday. I plan on bringing up the fact that according to his progress report he's mastered near everything. A couple of those he hasn't, he did have mastered for his first testing before the school year. I mean really, how does a kid forget how to read three letter words? There's something going on there. If they refuse to move him up a level I want to present them a written formal request for an IEP. The thing is I'm not sure what exactly I should request. Do I simply ask for an IEP? Or do I ask that he be tested? And then tested for what? I do know that Kansas uses the term IEP for all sorts of individualized stuff, it doesn't have to be that they're slow, they use that termonology for those that are advanced as well.

Anyhow, I'm just thankful that he's starting to straighten up. Here's hoping it continues and he's gotten all this nonsense out of his system!