King's Blog

It was a little bit of a panicked morning compared to usual. We drove down the road on the way to school and my pre-preppie exclaimed, "I forgot my bag!". Indicator on, ready to pull over, I exclaimed, "I didn't get it either!" Then, a calm six-year-old boy's voice said, "It's OK...I've put what she needs in the boot!" Like I always say, my kids are not perfect but I my six-year-old is one of those kids who is thoughtful and organised FAR beyond his years.

My kids have a fantastic book on resilience called “Jilly and the Bully”. But after reading it SO many times (they love it!) I’m wondering if a better title is perhaps: “Jilly and the child that made a really bad choice, but who improved his behavior after she and he spoke and subsequently shouldn’t really be labelled as a bully”?

Last weekend I was assisting my son to do some research on his laptop. I would love to say he was cooperative, but that wasn’t quite how it played out.

I asked him to show me the topic he was researching, in this case a biography. I looked on Haiku for the scaffold for the task and the child simply had to simply look through what information was required for each paragraph and find the research. Simple enough I thought - however, occasionally it doesn’t seem so, and in my case, my son didn’t want to look beyond web page one, let alone actually read what was on the page.

Each week our children get three randomly chosen coins for doing a set list of chores around the house. 

Dear Teacher,

I’d love to come to parent teacher interviews, really I would, but I need you to know that I’m scared.I’m unsure of what I’ll hear. I don’t know much about school and I don’t know the right questions to ask. Frankly, I struggle to pack a healthy lunchbox and get through the morning routine without the usual fights about makeup and tidying her room, so I don’t think I’d have any idea what to say about my child’s schoolwork!

I have a general weakness for all things pink, vintage and nostalgic.  So when all these features appeared before my very eyes recently, in one adorable little package, a 1950’s vintage Noddy clock became mine. 

Actually, I justified the purchase on the grounds that it had clear numbers on the face and that it would be an excellent teaching tool for helping our six year old to learn to tell the time.