This evening I took Anabelle, along with Ava, to her “Academic Night.” I am not sure what the point of this was. Parents got to watch their kids work a math problem in their classroom (I think Anabelle finished before all the others), and the rest of the time the teacher kept asking, to no avail, if anyone had any questions.
There were several interesting things I got to take note of, however. First, her teacher had the good idea of having all the kids write on a poster-sized piece of paper a few things about themselves. She then hung these around the room. While the kids were working the math problem (the other kids, that is, since Anabelle finished very quickly) I read them all. It was interesting to me that Anabelle is the only one in the class that wrote that she liked to play with her mom and dad. This doesn’t necessarily indicate that we are the best parents, but I think an objective assessment of this would have to include a strong implication in that direction.
Second, Ava has become very schizophrenic in terms of her public relations skills. Case in point: Last week we went to the park and Ava took the initiative to strike up a conversation with a total stranger at the park who was the mom of a girl in Anabelle’s class that was there playing as well. Ava enjoyed talking to her so much that she was still talking to her as I was pulling her away and getting her in the car. Tonight, this mom was there and said “hi” to Ava and Ava put her head down without saying anything. I said, “Ava, do you remember Mrs. Fedra from the park?” She nodded her head in agreement, but had a look of extreme tension on her face and started hugging my leg. Fedra again tried to make small talk with her, to which Ava proceeded again to nervously slink away from her. I don’t get it. Sometimes I wonder what the people think who are on the other end of these diametrically opposed conversational styles that Ava seems to embody.
After the classroom time was over we went to the cafeteria and got cookies, looked at the kids’ art, and then went out to the playground to swing for a bit. This leads me to my third interesting observation of the evening. While we were playing a father (or some such male guardian figure) and a couple of little boys came to play. At one point, one of the boys about Anabelle’s age ran away from the playground area into the middle of an open field (still in the fenced in playground area) where he proceeded to relieve his bladder of unnecessary pressure. He was, thankfully, facing away from the swings, but he was also facing the road where lots of cars were driving by. Now, I am no prude about this kind of thing. Outdoor urination is a classic pastime of good ole country boys, and it is good to see such a practice passed on to the next generation. On the other hand, this was at a playground where this kid presumably normally plays at. Does he do this during school? Do the teachers on duty have a laissez-faire attitude about this kind of thing? Perhaps more troubling was that the father was watching the whole thing, and he not only didn’t discourage it in any way, he also didn’t blink an eye.
All in all it was a fine time at the Watson Elementary School at Huntsville, Arkansas. Right now it is moments before I announce bedtime, and Anabelle is finally smelling Ava’s stincky sock after much pleading on Ava’s part for her to do so. Anabelle may be brilliant, but there are still some things she has to learn (like you only smell someone else’s stinky sock if they agree to smell yours at the same time).
