100's Day.
It's a special day celebrated by children in the early grades at our local school. When Intrepid was in kindergarten we helped him count out 100 pennies, which we placed on a piece of construction paper. He then wrote '100 Pennies' on it and we sent it in.
It cost us about a dollar.
Duh.
Other children brought in 100 Cheerios, or 100 paper clips, or 100 candies (I bet that particular piece of construction paper didn't have 100 things on it for very long).
Personally, I wanted to get inventive by taping on 100 dead ants, or 100 cigarette butts collected outside the seedy bar down the road, but Geekster said no. He's such a spoil sport.
I was just trying to be a good mom and liven things up a little, that's all. I mean, these projects can get so dull and repetitive. Does the teacher really want to see the same 100 things over and over? No. Creativity is key. As a mom, I want to help my little demons succeed in the world by rising above! Cigarette butts make a statement that cereal does not. Even an art gallery would consider buying such a masterpiece!
It's certainly not uncommon for parents to want to help their children with their projects. Why have a home project with no parental input, right? If we were not meant to assist and guide our gremlins, it would not see the inside of a school bag until it was completed and graded.
However, some of us don't need to help our kids. Some kids come up with masterpieces all on their own. I mean, look at this beautifully decorated bristol board by a little boy in grade 1 named Tracker:
Grade 1! Can you believe it? Look at the detail. Ten different types of dinosaurs all roaming the prehistoric plains. Predators with predators, herbivores practicing the pack mentality. It's amazing. I was completely floored when I saw it. I doubt even my braniac boys could come up with something like that at the age of 7.
Tracker wrote down all the different types of dinosaurs: 10 spotted, 10 green, 10 longnecks, and the like. And he put this at the very top:
That's right. On that gorgeous work of art you have 100 dino... sews?
Hang on a second. Something is not right. How can a child who paints a landscape in perfect brush strokes, sponges on trees that would make Michaelangelo weep tears of joy, and glues all the dinosaurs in the upright position without making any of them do lewd things to each other... How can a that child write like the font for Elmo's World? He writes like a normal first grader, and this is definitely not the work of a typical child.
Unless... No. That's unthinkable. And yet...
This is looking more and more like the well-meaning but overly-involved parent who has perhaps become a wee bit obsessed with her child's homework. It suspiciously resembles something that might even have been finished, say, when Tracker was at school. Perhaps the parent even stopped at her good friend's house with some dinosaurs she picked up at the dollar store so she could glue them on before proudly walking the finished 100's Day project into the grade 1 classroom. "Look, Tracker! Here's your project you, er, left at home this morning because you... um... didn't want it to get ruined on the bus. So Mommy brought it in for you! Isn't that nice? Why don't you come up here and show your friends? ... No, sweety, it's not that one. It's this one over here. The dinosaur one, remember? I just fixed it up a little for you and added some paint and some... dinosaurs... and stuff, but you did the rest! You wrote on the cards, remember? You did such a great job!"
But, of course, that's pure speculation. I don't know anyone who does stuff like that. Not even that blonde beauty, Pixie. I mean, if she were to do something like that at my house I would have documented proof to catch her in the act, right?
Right.
Oh, Pixie!
It's a special day celebrated by children in the early grades at our local school. When Intrepid was in kindergarten we helped him count out 100 pennies, which we placed on a piece of construction paper. He then wrote '100 Pennies' on it and we sent it in.
It cost us about a dollar.
Duh.
Other children brought in 100 Cheerios, or 100 paper clips, or 100 candies (I bet that particular piece of construction paper didn't have 100 things on it for very long).
Personally, I wanted to get inventive by taping on 100 dead ants, or 100 cigarette butts collected outside the seedy bar down the road, but Geekster said no. He's such a spoil sport.
I was just trying to be a good mom and liven things up a little, that's all. I mean, these projects can get so dull and repetitive. Does the teacher really want to see the same 100 things over and over? No. Creativity is key. As a mom, I want to help my little demons succeed in the world by rising above! Cigarette butts make a statement that cereal does not. Even an art gallery would consider buying such a masterpiece!
It's certainly not uncommon for parents to want to help their children with their projects. Why have a home project with no parental input, right? If we were not meant to assist and guide our gremlins, it would not see the inside of a school bag until it was completed and graded.
However, some of us don't need to help our kids. Some kids come up with masterpieces all on their own. I mean, look at this beautifully decorated bristol board by a little boy in grade 1 named Tracker:
Grade 1! Can you believe it? Look at the detail. Ten different types of dinosaurs all roaming the prehistoric plains. Predators with predators, herbivores practicing the pack mentality. It's amazing. I was completely floored when I saw it. I doubt even my braniac boys could come up with something like that at the age of 7.
Tracker wrote down all the different types of dinosaurs: 10 spotted, 10 green, 10 longnecks, and the like. And he put this at the very top:
That's right. On that gorgeous work of art you have 100 dino... sews?
Hang on a second. Something is not right. How can a child who paints a landscape in perfect brush strokes, sponges on trees that would make Michaelangelo weep tears of joy, and glues all the dinosaurs in the upright position without making any of them do lewd things to each other... How can a that child write like the font for Elmo's World? He writes like a normal first grader, and this is definitely not the work of a typical child.
Unless... No. That's unthinkable. And yet...
This is looking more and more like the well-meaning but overly-involved parent who has perhaps become a wee bit obsessed with her child's homework. It suspiciously resembles something that might even have been finished, say, when Tracker was at school. Perhaps the parent even stopped at her good friend's house with some dinosaurs she picked up at the dollar store so she could glue them on before proudly walking the finished 100's Day project into the grade 1 classroom. "Look, Tracker! Here's your project you, er, left at home this morning because you... um... didn't want it to get ruined on the bus. So Mommy brought it in for you! Isn't that nice? Why don't you come up here and show your friends? ... No, sweety, it's not that one. It's this one over here. The dinosaur one, remember? I just fixed it up a little for you and added some paint and some... dinosaurs... and stuff, but you did the rest! You wrote on the cards, remember? You did such a great job!"
But, of course, that's pure speculation. I don't know anyone who does stuff like that. Not even that blonde beauty, Pixie. I mean, if she were to do something like that at my house I would have documented proof to catch her in the act, right?
Right.
Oh, Pixie!