March 9, 2012 - I missed my first school conference ever

As I mentioned the previous day, one drawback to the timing of Tokyo Here and Now was that it conflicted with the elementary school conferences.  I thought about asking for a refund when I found out about the conflict, but Drew convinced me to go ahead and attend while he took care of the conference.  Before anybody responds that it must have been a learning experience for Drew (or something along those lines, as one of the Tokyo Here and Now organizers did), I should point out that Drew always attends school conferences. 

We scheduled Cooper's conference for Friday as that was an easier day for Drew to stay home.  I headed off to Tokyo Here and now on my own, and Drew prepared to drive to ASIJ without a navigator, unless you count Cooper.  He gave himself plenty of time, and they did make it to the school without a major hitch.  The drive home, however, proved a bit more challenging, and I don't think they ended up saving any time over what the train ride would have been.  But he definitely gets extra credit for doing it on his own!

Conferences for third, fourth, and fifth graders involve the student as an active participant.  The first 30 minutes (took less than that for Cooper since he hasn't been here since September) of the conference was just Drew and Cooper.  Cooper went over certain accomplishments for the past few months, following a schedule that covered all his subject areas.  He also talked about goals for the remainder of the year.  Then the teacher joined Drew and Cooper for the last 15 minutes of the conference.

I was disappointed to miss as this was a new kind of conference for me.  However, Cooper gave his presentation to me a few days later.  He wasn't able to show me everything (there was something on the computer at school), and he didn't take as long as he did with Drew (he admitted he did a better job when he was in his classroom), but I still thought it was interesting and showed that the students spent time preparing for these conferences.  Also, Drew had used his iPhone to record the part of the conference that included Cooper's teacher, so I got to hear that as well.  It was almost like I didn't even miss the conference. :)

I must say that the part that stuck with me the most from the teacher's comments was her talking about Cooper's hair.  Although she kept saying his hair didn't bother her, clearly, from the amount of time she spent talking about it, it did bother her.  Had I listened to the tape earlier, I probably would not have taken Cooper for a haircut a few days later.  The contrary part of me (very familiar to my parents) would have made me want to let him grow his hair even longer.  And you know how much I don't like his hair!  (But I dislike it even more when other people make an issue out of it.)