Catching up...

Sorry I went missing...lots of thinking and trying to get back on track and not a heap to report. ;) So. Lest I get even further behind in this brand new year, I'll try to catch up:

Ziggurats. I had a whole post in my head about this. I was worked up, lol. Then, current/world events made it seem insignificant and it got pushed aside. In short, though, Noah had an assignment for his history class at LEAP. It was an end of term sort of larger project thing and was assigned at least a month in advance of being due. (It was due December 12.) Since I've been really working on getting boys to take responsibility for their own due dates and to apportion their time accordingly, I struggled and told myself to only remind him once a week. And that's what I did (including the week during that time that we had "off" from our own schoolwork...a perfect time to work on a project, wouldn't you say?).

So. Of course, the boy waited until the very last minute...asking me on Monday to go out to get the supplies he needed to build a model ziggurat, spending Monday working on that and then telling me Tuesday that he also needed to write a two page paper about ziggurats. It was all due Wednesday. Did I mention that we still had our normal schoolwork planned for those two days and that we had a gathering with friends in there as well? Yeah. I ended up rescheduling and reworking all my own plans (and telling him all about it so he'd realize how much he was inconveniencing us all, lol). There was also much frustration about how to get the darn thing to stay together, upon realizing that hot glue would not work (something he could have figured out sooner obviously). (Packing tape and stick pins, btw, were the answer.) In the end, here's what he went to class with:

He was going to paint it. We found this awesome spray paint that gave it a sandstone look/texture. (We opted for spray paint because certain eldest sons are a bit anal and we knew that painting by brush wouldn't work so well, as brush strokes drive him crazy.) But. He didn't allow for enough time to test that AND have time to adjust. And our test piece showed that the spray paint had something in it that dissolved the adhesive keeping the foam board together...which obviously was not going to work. So. He left it white. 

Oh, and that paper that was supposed to accompany it? Yeah, he didn't finish that before Wednesday. He told me he'd work on it during class and that would be fine. Right. I was secretly a wee bit happy about this, as I envisioned him learning his lesson and realizing the error of his ways. But. The teacher decided to give Noah an extra week to finish the darn paper! The nerve! And then the teacher was out the following week, so I couldn't even go talk to him about making sure to grade Noah off for lateness. Sigh.

(Just so you know, I actually have gone in and spoken to one of his other teachers about this...making sure they're not cutting him any slack and that I'm totally good with them marking him off for being late. Thus far, I find that the teachers at LEAP are more willing to cut my boys slack because we're homeschoolers and because they're pretty nice boys and know how to look all sweet and like it wasn't their fault...and probably some because I know other parents get upset if you don't. I don't think that's doing my boys any favors, though, so I've said as much.)

Anyhow. That was my ziggurat story. It was longer when I was really worked up. ;) And, to be fair, Noah does seem to have realized the importance of planning ahead a bit more since then. 

Hmmm. This got longer than anticipated. I'll continue catching up in separate posts...