Monday, February 8, 2010

using the snow to my advantage

Our entire region is absolutely, ridiculously snowed in. This is absurd. We do not live in Canada. We do not live in New England. We do not live in Antarctica. Although, it feels like it these days. The squirrels are starting to look more and more like penguins.

And we're starting to suspect we will never go to school again.

On my afternoon walk, as I embraced the beauty of the snow covered trees and the quietness of the neighborhood, it occurred to me this is actually a good thing for some of my children.

In order to get my special education students to qualify for summer school I have to be able to prove that they will actually lose the skills they learned over the year if they have the entire summer off. Typically we do not worry too much about this since our summer breaks were so short. But since now we are looking at a regular school summer I'm feeling a little nervous about some of my children regressing over that long summer- we've worked so, so hard for them to go so long without reading or seeing their name in print.

Right before last Tuesday's snow I was going over my paperwork and looking at what sort of data I needed to be able to prove that my children's skills actually regressed over a break. But since our children go to intersession during our breaks, this is actually harder to prove- they may have a "break" from regular school, but they are still in a learning environment.

Yet now, with what could turn out to be a very long unexpected break from school with absolutely no instruction, I might actually be able to get my data.

I kind of feel like a scientist excited about the perfect conditions for an experiment. Not that I'm experimenting with my kids- but I need this data.
It feels wrong that I have to hope they'll lose what I just worked so hard to teach them- but if it allows them to go to summer school I feel like it is worth a shot.

So, here's to my children not doing anything for a week but letting the tv eat their brains...

only so that they may have a summer filled with learning.

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