Parent's evening

I went to Queen's for Livi's parent's evening.

I can't help feeling that I am still in disgrace there after not allowing her to participate in the swimming lessons. When the older two went they were not compulsory. The parents were encouraged to imagine they weer but you had to sign your child up rather than opt out. Abi didn't have swimming lessons because she had grommits in her ears and she wasn't allowed to get them wet. Johnny did and hated every moment. It is a cold pool, the teacher stand on the side and  yell and the pool is deep. Not great for a child that is not confident and who has worked very hard to overcome her fear of swimming. We were not about to jepordise that with some dodgy teaching in a freezing pool!

There were some very bad humoured emails from the school which we replied to politely but firmly.

Then there was the concert issue. Livi asked if there were any concerts at Queen's that she could play her cello at. I didn't know so I emailed Mrs King (the head) and asked. Again - a frosty, short and negative reply. Followed by an invitation to play at assembly. I wasn't allowed to go in to accompany her and as the music teacher broke her foot the day before, there was no-one else, so she had to play alone. Her cello teacher was furious with them.

So today, I felt very harried. I was late because there was an accident. The parents booked after me were early so they went in my place and I went in theirs and it was fine but Mrs King was hurrying me out.

Anyway, the real issue is Livi and her growing phobia of maths. She loved it at her nursery. She was great last year and the year before. It is this year that things are going a bit askew. I can see where. The pace has been upped and she isn't ready for it. When I do little bits of work with her at home, learning bonds to 20 for instance, I can see that she needs to practice with the Seguin Board A making the teens numbers. She doesn't understand that a teen is a ten and  a unit. She can tell me by rote, because they are all about memorising at her school but she doesn't have the understanding.

So, I have arranged for her to go down to the "bottom set". How can they call it that? Instant inferiority complex. Livi is all for it. She knows that she is working slower than many of the other children and it is bad for her confidence so it is the right move. It helps that Johnny recently chose to go down to the middle maths set and is much happier. I think we are a slow processing family!

Other concerns are that she is day dreaming. We have never had that problem before so it is a shock. She hates it, being called back to what she should be working on. She feels ashamed. However, we wonder if we will see a difference with the other teacher. Her class teacher, Mrs Huxley, is wound up tight like a spring and she never stops talking! Her last teacher had quiet working times when she put on calming music and they worked on something and she came round to help them. Ed went to an open morning and watched 20 minutes of an art lesson and came out with a headache - she never stopped talking, reminding, correcting, reminding, reminding, reminding!!!!

There is nothing we can do about that, so all we can do is try to remind her to concentrate on her work and zone out Mrs Huxley sometimes without stopping what she is supposed to be doing.

I feel sad that her love for school is slowly being replaced by a kind of weariness and a loss in confidence. I wish I knew if it was a first sign of a problem, as it was with Abi, or if it is a clash of teaching styles. Whatever, I hope that I can catch it and help her find her way.