Oh My Stars!!  My husband and I just survived the perfect storm: Halloween, parent-teacher conferences, and daylight savings time collided with four days off of school crescendoing into our church’s Family Fall Fest on Sunday night.  A great place for fellowship, fun, and for our teens to serve…yet also a place filled with tons of candy, games, and activity.  We may have over-iced this awesomeness cake.  

Here we are, on the other side of it all, with way too much candy and that untethered feeling you get when you don’t know how to tell time after 4:00p.m.  I gotta say these things are complex in our world.  With seven kids ranging in ages from 3-16 we get the best and worst of all the things.  I won’t start on the cost of Halloween costumes, or the cranky children, the fights, the wardrobe malfunctions, the sugar highs…and lows, or the multiple threenager melt downs. No, no, we’ll save all that..maybe forever. 😉

Instead, I will focus on some of the good.  Which amazingly, was parent-teacher conferences. I know!  Does anyone else say that with a bit of a groan and moan?  I feel worse than a kid with my eye rolling and annoyance about having to hear progress reports.  My “ain’t nobody got time for that”, attitude got checked this fall. 

Even if we don’t have the time, we should make the time.

I am so glad we made the time and effort to get to all of our kids conferences. I walked away feeling like I was killing it at parenting, not because my kids are amazing (I mean, I think they are) and doing it all right (they have their struggles for sure) but because I gave them my day.  I spent time in their world for them, not for their teachers (well a little bit for their teachers), but mostly for them.

My three younger school agers are all on IEP’s (Individualized Education Plans) and have extra support in school and amazing teachers.  I am used to checking in on their progress and I have intimate knowledge of their areas of weakness and their strengths.  Two are special needs and one is delayed in his learning because of our loss.  As a parent of kids with special needs, it is my job to advocate for them. I am prepared for those meetings and overjoyed when they give me good progress reports.  And when I say overjoyed, I mean seriously brought to tears by my first graders hand writing and my second graders work ethic and learning that my fifth grader has the most accommodating and encouraging teacher this year. These things give me hope and relieve some of that ever present mom guilt in a BIG way.

These are the amazing things we get out of parent-teacher conferences. It is what I have come to expect when I visit the elementary schools.  But what took me by surprise this year was what I got out of junior high and high school conferences!  This is really the first time since we have blended our families that we made it to the upper level conferences, and I am so glad we did. I am learning parent-teacher conferences may be even more important as our kids get older.  I want to share why!

8 things I have learned about conferences as my kids get older: 

• They still have conferences and they want you to come!  I know, seems like a no brainer, but I sort of thought they were like come but don’t come.  But they seem genuinely excited to see us and to give us feedback on our children.
• Going is a good idea. We don’t really know what our children are up to all day long.  And putting faces to the teachers they talk to us about is kind of encouraging.  As with all people, some they like, some they love, and some they can’t stand.  Meeting them in person, puts a lot of their perception in proper perspective, and every teacher deserves that. And can I get a SHOUT OUT for secondary school teachers! Not an easy job people! Not an easy job.
• They have more teachers, so these conferences will take considerably longer.  With a full class load our kids see up to 8 teachers a week.  That’s a lot of different people to introduce yourself to, and these teachers are meeting a lot of parents.  Each time you sit down it will take them a minute to flip through their images of kids they are currently teaching to find yours. But they will get there and they will have poignant things to say about your kids. 
• They aren’t scheduled, so you will wait in lines…sometimes for a long time.  The lines might make you feel better because you will know that your child isn’t the only one who is struggling with pre-algebra. But they will also annoy you because you will have six more lines to wait in.  My husband and I found ourselves standing in two lines at one point, hedging our bets.  Do what you do at the grocery store, play on your phone. Ha! 
• Teachers who don’t have issues with your child will likely wonder why you stopped to see them.  Stop anyway, they will give you good things to tell your child later…and they might even give you some of the credit for raising them.  
• The teachers perspective is excellent information for us. Our children don’t always get it right, and sometimes they tell us what we want to hear.  Our daughter is in a senior level science class (she’s not a senior) and is struggling a bit.  Her view: I’m too young and stupid. Teacher’s view: She has two missing assignments and two incomplete assignments.  Also, she is bright and capable of easily passing this class. This is valuable information and since she is our extremely gifted negotiator (arguer) it will definitely serve us well to be armed with it.
• This is a great way to learn what your kids can do to keep their grades up and to improve grades that are down.  Teacher’s offer kids lots of opportunities to redo assignments and come in for extra support before, after, and even during school.  There is no shortage of assistance in our schools and if our kids choose not to take advantage of it, that is their choice – not a lack of availability. 
• This will help you see the impression your kids make on others and what kind of person they are becoming.  This will be where you learn that they are a hard worker, persistent, driven, energetic, very social, super tired all the time, very smart, a critical thinker, creative, shy, great in groups, a good mentor, etc.  When you see what other people see it is a breath of fresh air.  I love my kids and I think they have many good qualities, but as parents we are often the ones wondering why they seem like a total spaz all the time.  We worry and wonder if they are too quiet, too reserved, too aloof, too friendly, too easily distracted.  We see them in their natural, and often feral, habitat.  The difference between sucking in your gut and letting it all hang out.  They are letting it all hang out at home because they can.  I walked away from several of my kids conferences thinking I could cut them a little slack because they are really trying to “bring it” all day long and they are done with all of that nonsense the minute they cross the threshold of safe space.  They don’t have an ounce left of “give a crap” in them some days and I can’t say I blame them.    

It may have taken us nearly an entire day to complete parent teacher conferences for 6 kids (the most we will ever have because our oldest will graduate before our youngest hits kindergarten), but it was worth it.  And I haven’t even mentioned the conversations we got to have with our kids when we got home, which were a treat in so many ways.  What an opportunity this gave us to really love our kids better.  Love is showing up.  Love is correcting.  Love is understanding and connecting.  Love is celebrating and believing. Love is parent-teacher conferences.

“Every child deserves a champion: an adult who will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection and insists they become the best they can possibly be.” -Rita Pierson, Educator

 

There are a few other things that evolve as our kids grow up.  Stay tuned for some fun topics coming up, such as – picky eaters, emotions, and conversations!