Sunday, June 26, 2011

First Day of School 2011





















In Korea, school starts the first week of March, after a long winter break that goes through January and February. "Plan A" was to have the children go to one year of Korean school. After spending last summer in Utah, the children missed two months of school, so we all agreed that they should go for two more months and complete a full "year"of school. They still struggle with the language and we are hoping that a few more months will make a difference. Well, "Plan B" got complicated, because Gracie went to Middle School. That meant she had to buy uniforms, cut her hair a certain length, and take school very seriously. We were up for the challenge and we bought her two uniforms. (When we bought her the uniforms the sales clerk looked at us in disbelief, like she'd never sold to a Caucasian student before. I don't think she ever has). After two months of middle school life, which included Gracie getting home from school at 5 p.m. everyday and spending at least two days in detention per week, I decided to talk to her homeroom teacher. During this conference I asked, "Does, Gracie understand 10% of what is being taught?" (I chose 10% because I thought it was conservative and I hoped that she would assure me that she understood more than that). She looked thoughtful for a moment and then answered, "I don't think she understands that much." I think my jaw dropped. We withdrew Gracie the next day. She is now working with BYU online middle school courses and has a personal math teacher/tutor. It has been nice to be with her during the day. She is learning how to make bread. She loves to cook, so we do some "cooking classes". She also is training her puppy as part of her English writing project.
The other children have done a little better with "Plan B". James has a teacher that has been very open-minded and allowed him to have a personal tutor come into class during the Korean hour. This has helped and he is learning how to read Korean. Because James teacher allowed a tutor, Miriam's and Anna's teachers have also allowed tutor sessions during the school day. We are making progress, although it is slow.

Jim took the children over to school on their first day. He came back with tears in his eyes. I said, "It's tough isn't it?" I don't think he understood it until then. It is tough. It's just so different. And they seem so alone, and so brave, and so different.



















































A Tale of Two Dogs

In February I found myself dog sitting a spoiled housedog for two months. We thought it might help Kipboom overcome his dog aggression, and two dogs cannot possibly be that much more work than one, right? Wrong. The dogs hated each other. I counted the days until we had only one dog again.
One day, while the girls were on the roof cleaning, they started playing with a ball with Kipboom. Something triggered the dogs to start fighting (I think it was the ball--they both wanted it). Miriam, acting heorically tried to break the dogs up. She ended up getting a nasty bite right above the knee. The bite was very deep, but could not be stitched because of the risk of infection. She now has two ugly scars on her left leg. We don't know which dog bit her. It all happened so fast. I like to think it wasn't our dog, but we'll never know.
Rule #1: Don't ever get a dog.
Rule #2: If you break rule #1, don't ever think that dogsitting is the same thing as a playdate for your dog.