Walter and I met with Maestra for our first parent-teacher conference to go over Lulu's first report card together. It was a nice coincidence that we were both horribly ill with the stomach flu the day before so that we could attend the conference together (I was afraid it was just going to be me if Walter had to leave work early b/c his work has been kinda crazy busy lately).
The state of California does things a little differently than the state of Texas, so I figured I would explain what's going on and what all the little marks mean before I get to posting the report card. Apparently, California schools assign grades on a trimester basis, so we will get two more report cards for Lulu's kindergarten year. However, parent-teacher conferences are only required with the first report card....conferences later in the year are to talk about why your child isn't performing up to state standards. The elementary school was on "early dismissal" schedule all week long (meaning the kids got out of school at 11am), so that parent-teacher conferences could happen after lunchtime.
So, Lulu was at Arden Manor's after school program a LOT last week and she was not present for our conference with her Maestra. Her absence meant that we could speak to her Maestra in English so we were all on the same page. But it is really funny to hear Maestra's English accent now that I'm used to hearing her speak Spanish all the time!
Maestra started off by telling us that she was really proud of how far Lulu had progressed this year, from her first days when she would put her hands over her ears and not want to communicate with Maestra at all. She said that Lulu now tries to use the Spanish that she knows with her to communicate in entire sentences and sings songs and plays games, all happily in Spanish. I said that this matched up with what we had observed at home--that she sings songs to herself in the car in Spanish, etc.
She also said that Lulu was a very special little girl in that she was very caring (which warmed this mama's heart!). She reported that Lulu was very concerned with others' feelings and comforting them if they were sad by rubbing their backs and trying to make them feel better. We try very hard to stress being kind to others and thinking about how our actions affect those around us, so it was nice to see that some of those lessons are sinking in. :)
Then Maestra pulled out Lulu's folder and started showing us how she had assessed Lulu to come up with the grades on the report card. She stressed that ALL of the assessment was done in Spanish, so this is how well Lulu is learning what she's supposed to in her non-native language. She was able to count up to 49, but Maestra stopped her there because she didn't know the Spanish word for 50 (cincuenta). And she was able to easily cut puzzle pieces out and then glue them together (Maestra was amazed that Lulu is doing 100 piece jigsaw puzzles at home, so this 6 piece puzzle was a piece of cake!). And she was able to write her numbers from 0-10 and recognize and complete simple patterns. So, this is what you're seeing on the righthand column of Lulu's report card below:
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| her math skills assessment |
In terms of her language arts skills (which would be harder to assess in someone who's still learning how to read, write and spell!), she showed us the picture that Lulu drew and the sentence she tried to write underneath it talking about what was in the picture: A mi, gusta feliz Lulu mama. I don't remember the slightly wonky, phonetic spelling (especially for "feliz"), but Maestra pointed out that she understood some language conventions like sentences start with a capital letter and end with a period. And then she said that she read the class Goldilocks and the Three Bears and had them do various exercises related to the story and Lulu performed those like a champ (things like drawing out what happened in the story in the order in which it happened, etc). These things are analyzed in the lefthand column of Lulu's report card below:
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| her language arts assessment |
And you'll also notice the Classroom Efforts category--the S stands for satisfactory and the O stands for outstanding. Maestra reported that her only problem with Lulu is getting her to keep her hands to herself and giving other students their personal space during carpet time. (There is a big rectangular carpet with smaller squares and each student has their own assigned square to sit on during group activities. You can see it
here). Well, that and not showing her panties when she's sitting on the floor. She said that Lulu's good about correcting her behavior when you point it out, but that she forgets and has to be corrected again. Hence, the S and not the O rating on some categories. But, Maestra did say that Lulu is very good at accepting responsibility for her actions, especially if there is an accident, and helping to clean up her messes.
And to help make sense of what the numbers assigned as her grades mean, I present you with this lovely grading scale:
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| the official grading scale. |
Now, I did ask what exactly each number stood for, asking "Is the 4-3-2-1 like an A-B-C-D scale?" and was told no, that we should think of a 3 as an A. So, I have no idea what a 4 is supposed to mean?
Using the traditional definition of "a gentleman's C" and the descriptions presented next to each number above, here's my own interpretation of what that grading scale means: a 4 is equivalent to an A on a traditional grading scale, but a 3 could be anything from a B to a C (depending on the +/- assigned), while a 2 is a D and a 1 is clearly an F.
I had no idea that grade inflation started in kindergarten--although I guess parents don't really like to hear that their child isn't golden either (hence the pressure to say 3 = A). And I don't know if these numbers will continue throughout her schooling or if they will switch over to an A-B-C-D-F system later on when she's older?
She was not evaluated in English this time, but Maestra did say that her English teacher (they have 30 minutes of English instruction a day) will evaluate her next time based upon the sounds that are common between English and Spanish and vocabulary that is used in math (like the names of shapes, mathematical actions like sum/minus, etc). She is learning that vocabulary in Spanish as well (and Lulu knows those words like a champ!), but apparently the standardized testing for math is in English, so there is a concern that dual-immersion kids know those terms in both languages pretty quickly in their academic career.
I didn't take a photo of the second page of her report card, but Maestra showed us the comparison between the skills that she should know at this point in the year and the skills that she already knows. The comparison is pretty striking. For example, she should know 7 of the "high frequency words" and Lulu already recognizes 11 by sight. She should be able to count up to 30 and she can count up to 49. She knows all of her upper case and most of her lower case letters, including ones unique to Spanish like "ch" or "ñ" or "ll."
The only category where she needs some help is in her penmanship. We are struggling with correcting really bad penmanship habits picked up by inattentive/lazy preschool teachers last year. Her preschool teacher would just have her trace the letter, but she never made an effort (that I can tell anyway) to help Lulu learn the right way to write the letter. So, Lulu starts writing her letters from the bottom up and doesn't understand the idea of tracing back over a line to make the "bump" from the "chimney" on the letter "h." She makes the bump first and them draws a line from the bottom to the top next to it. So, we will work more closely with her at home on her penmanship skills.
The other things I've done to help supplement what she's learning in school are two apps on my iPhone. I purchased an ultimate Hangman app that allows me to create a custom list of the high frequency words that she sees in class. She can't necessarily figure out what the word is based on the number of spaces, but if I say, "Oh, I think that must be gusta," she can spell it out correctly. And she loves it. I also purchased another app that teaches algebra using abstract concepts (day/night cards rather than positive and negative signs, figures rather than letters, etc). She really enjoys playing that one, too.
So, I'm hopeful by the end of the school year, that she will be exactly where she needs to be and will know exactly what she needs to know....if not more!
