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Sunday, May 18, 2008

2 more weeks...

Well, technically 9 days of school left.

I am closing out the school year with 2 children who continued to stay on the "A" honor roll (of course they are 6 and 8 yrs old) and 1 who may return to his current grade come the next school year.
All of the kids were going to go to the Valley this summer to stay with my mom so I can work and not worry about who is going to watch them. My commute to work is too far for me to leave them home alone daily comfortably.

Dom is skating on thin ice....again.

I've been through this last year. Only thing then was that he failed only one class (language arts) and was required to attend summer school. He was in NY at the time visiting my brother and I wasn't able get enough money to fly him home in time to start summer school. (I had actually decided that I WASN'T going to spend the money). He started the next school year back in the 6th grade. Halfway through the school year he was able to take a 'credit by examination' test that placed him into the 7th grade.

This year he is in the 7th grade and at risk of repeating it again.

Now, I ask this....when do children learn to kick in it gear and get their shit together?

This year for him is a little different. He is failing 3 classes. 3 OF HIS CORE CLASSES that are mandatory passing classes in order to be promoted to the next grade.
Science
Math
Language Arts

Here's the dilema:

We got a letter in the mail stating that they have 'reserved' a place for Dom in summer school. He is to attend from June 9th through July 3rd from 8 am-12 pm Monday -Thursday.

Which means if he is in summer school, he will be staying with me during some of the summer and at noon I will have to drive back from work to pick him up and take him BACK to work with me for the rest of my work day. Also, since there is no summer school on Friday..he will be at work with me all day.
This will be going on for 4 weeks.

Angel will be out of town working for the summer so it will just be Dom and I.

This will only happen provided he brings up his grades and passes at least 1 of those core classes.
The summer school info clearly states that he is only able to make up 2 classes. If he doesn't bring his grades up..no summer school and he will be in 7th grade again.

I know you will think this is mean but I told him that I will not allow him to take another credit by examination test in the 7th grade to move him up to the 8th. Especially since he isn't putting in any effort to bring up his grades.

I had a long talk with him about all of this and come to find out..he tells me that he "is doing his homework...just not turning it in". WTF?

Why would you do your homework and not turn it in? Defeats the whole purpose.

When I asked him about his theatre arts grade which went from a 94 to a 71...he tried to tell me that he didn't do his monologue. That the teacher handed out a paper on it one day and they did it the same day and he didn't get a paper and he didn't do it.
When asked why he didn't do it he said, "because I didn't have a partner."

Now come on. Do I look like an idiot to you? A partner?! For a MONOlogue?!

I called him on it and he realized his mistake. I busted out laughing cause I thought it was a ridiculous excuse. He tried to run from my room crying, "Stop laughing at me!"
Whatever..I called his ass back and told him he should have saved the theatrics for theater arts class cause this shit doesn't work for me.

He has been grounded since we first got this last report card. He is supposed to be grounded to his room and only come out for chores, dinner, shitting and showering. Of course he pops out of his cell as if he wasn't on restriction to the other areas of the house.
He's become very inconsiderate.

My friend Jen was visiting and she had bought some fast food and left it in a bag next to her belongings. We left to run an errand and when we got back the bag was empty. We asked him if he ate it and he said yes. We asked him why he did if it didn't belong to him and he simply said, "it was just sitting there."

So I told Jen to go into his room and grab anything from there that she would like to have because...'it was just sitting there".
He gets into everyone's things and takes them even though he knows they don't belong to him. I've tried to break him out of this but I found it to be pointless. I've done the whole going into his room to take things away from him but he continues. There was a time where he had stopped for awhile but those times seem to be over.

Any suggestion?

So much for my summer alone.

2 comments:

ShelbyAnne said...

Eek. Hmm...suggestion. It sounds like he isn't really taking ownership of anything, homework, classwork, even his stuff if taking things away doesn't bug him.

I guess I'd try to find the things that are really important to him, and either giving him more when he does well, or taking it away when he does stuff like take things he knows aren't his.

But sheesh. Egocentrism at it's best, eh? Good luck, I'll keep thinking...

Mama Dawg said...

I have no clue. Mine's only 8, so most things still work on her. Gah...it sounds like he's a smart kid but just not applying himself. Good luck (not that that means much coming from a blogger you've never met!).