Tales of a Fouth Grade Nothing...

Today was my first day tutoring for the Kirkland Homework Helpers, HH for short. I was first approached about tutoring last spring by friends from church. People who knew my background in education and thought this would be right up my alley. It is. Although, I'm tutoring a fourth grader. I haven't worked with intermediate aged students since college--a little more than 12 years ago. It was never my professed "favorite" age group but tonight was special and fun. What struck me most about my student is how ready, how eager he is to learn. He was ready with his homework, ready to start and knew where to begin. Which was more than I could say for me.

We worked on math and spelling. Ahhh, math. Those of you who know me well, know there is a reason I majored in English. Even fourth grade math is enough to give me goose bumps. Alas, it was money math. Ahhh, yes, this even I can do! I know where the decimals go, ones, tens, hundreds...yup, if it's money, I can play too! Please don't start in on the amortization of anything though. The rest, we'll see how it goes and take it as it comes. Honestly, my math skills are worse than my three year old's spelling skills. They suck. Or, so I think. But sometimes, sometimes I surprise myself.

There are times, when even I understand the math in my life--sometimes. Not very often, I admit but it happens. I wonder, how much of my inabilities stem from my lack of confidence? I have been told since *I* was in the fourth grade, that math is not my subject. My grandfather hired a math tutor for me in the fifth grade. I remained with that tutor for four years--for all the good it did me. I staunchly believe that I would not have graduated from college without the math skills of my husband. Rodney helped me with every Natural World and Quantitative Science and Reasoning class I had to take to graduate. Those were all his skills, not my knowledge. But it was fear holding me back.

My student has a variety of problems in his young life. This was clear from our first introduction. But his eagerness to learn, to come, to have a tutor, were also clear. It is not my job to make sure he gets every math problem right. Lord knows, during the course of this year, there will be problems I cannot help with. My job is to support and build his confidence. To make sure that this young student doesn't sabotage himself before he ever really begins. It is a teacher's job to make sure that he is on track, believes in himself and is given the opportunity to learn. It's going to be a great year!

German Engineering!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5ZwbDj7sQM&feature=player_embedded

Speed Wars

I love to drive fast. Exceptionally fast. Perhaps it is in the German in me but there is nothing I love more than a 6 speed, stick-shift, with wide open road and good pavement beneath me. As a teenager, there was little I liked better than seeing how fast we could get the car going down, "Roller Coaster Road." Could we possibly catch enough air to get all four tires off the ground this time? Let's find out... Duvall Road SE, just beyond Dairy Queen and leading back into Maplewood, used to be a sleepy, sparsely-populated residential street in Renton. It is now, much like every other street in the Highlands, an over-populated, over saturated street full of over priced, under lotted cracker box houses.

I was 15 when I first discovered the thrill of cruising this 25mph street at 60+, riding shot-gun, in Matthew's 1984 Peugeot. Clearly, not the BMW 5-series I covet today but more car than I personally owned in 1994. Riding in that car, at speeds that defied the law, our parents, and all facets of common sense, gave me my first taste of ridiculous freedom. It was undoubtedly a stupid game of chicken. How fast could we go without, A. crashing, or B. getting a ticket? Luckily, we never found out. My love of driving fast was only further fueled by traveling to Germany, repeatedly as a teenager. I have a long standing love affair with the Autobahn, that is, when it is not cluttered in Stau...congestion.

Given all of this, you would likely think I am the last person to bitch about the traffic, specifically the teenage traffic cruising up and down our street in Kirkland. I live approximately equal distance between the high school and Starbucks. A deadly combination. As both a resident and a teacher, I know all too well not to get in the way of a junior in need of a caffeine fix at 7am. I am, however, also 31 years old with two very small children. I would like to think I could stroll to my mailbox with my dog, or children, at one in the afternoon and NOT get hit by a car. Alas, it is that very wish, which seems to be the impossible, no matter where we live.

Our first house, was not really a house at all, rather a condo in a high-rise in the heart of downtown Seattle. At a mere 610 square feet, it served us just fine for the five years we lived there. We did not own a parking space, instead, I did my best to find free parking and fed a lot of quarters to the parking meter gods. I never once, in all five years there, gave two snits of a nanosecond of thought to how fast people flew down Hubbell Place. Not only did it not bother me, I am quite sure I was one of the speeding offenders. Our second home, a 2,200 square foot, five bedroom house was purchased in the spring of 2003. Having looked at houses from Renton to Redmond and all parts in-between on both side of the lake, we settled on this one in the Judkins Park neighborhood of Seattle. 26th and Massachusetts was to be our home for the next five years. It was a brand new house, of the cracker box variety I spoke of before. A coveted corner lot with lots of room to "grow." And grow I did. Three years after moving into that house I was pregnant.

Almost over night I began noticing things that never bothered me before. The traffic on Massachusetts. The mind-numbingly loud trucks that rumbled up and down the street between the I-90 on/off ramp and MLK, with my abode stuck smack in the middle. The semi-trucks were so loud they shook my china and crystal wine glasses with the fierceness of an earthquake--every 3 minutes another one came rolling by. Because Massachusetts was the main through street between I-90, Rainier Ave South and the Central District, it bared far more than its fair share of traffic. None of this was new but hadn't been noticed until the imminent birth of a child. And it was, as my husband feared, even more noticeable after our son was born.

Over night, I not only had this small, wonderful bundle of joy to care for but I was home, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Home to hear what I missed during the working hours of 6:15am, when I previously left, until 4:30pm when I arrived home again. Home to hear and feel the noise rattle my son awake from his naps. Home to see the close calls of other neighbors, who dared to cross that busy street during the day. Home. As my son approached his first birthday, we began looking for a new, quieter place to call home.

This led us to where we are now, in Kirkland. A suburb. My husband came kicking and screaming to the burbs, at my insistence that things, that schools, that people, that TRAFFIC would be better here. Aren't things always greener on the other side? When it became apparent that moving back to our hometown of Renton was not an option for him, we settled on this house, a mere one mile from his office. On what seemed to be a quiet, tree lined street straight out of "Pollyanna." There is a cemetery at the far end of our street, nestled in-between the high school and the Starbucks, and with the quietest neighbors in the world, or not, I was sure this was going to be the perfect place for us.

And it is very, very nice. Except, for the traffic. I better than anyone understand a person's need for speed. What I fail to comprehend, as an adult, is why that need must be exercised by grown people on my residential street? We are a street lined with small children. There are no children over the age of 7. None. Yet, the number of times I have been flipped off, nearly run down or flat out ignored by speeding drives...well let's just say I lost track eons ago. My husband has petitioned the City of Kirkland to conduct, two, yes, count them, TWO traffic calming studies on our street. The end of the first study commenced with white shoulder lines and "25 MPH" being painted on the street. That was it. The second study has produced nothing. Nothing more than the realization by the city that our street is wide and long. Two very poor characteristics for a residential street. Neighbors have suggested asking the Kirkland Police to sit on our street. But this, as a speed trap dodger, I know is only a temporary fix. As soon as the policeman and his radar gun leave, the speeders return.

What I want are speed cameras. I would like to believe that our police have better things to do than wait for someone like me, to speed down the street. I spoke earlier for my love of driving in Germany...I also love their speed cameras. I can see you now, scratching your head, thinking, "she's lost it!" But no, I like them for several reasons. After a while you know they are there. They are a permanent fixture on German roads--especially residential roads. The cameras are no secret. You only need to get caught once to learn not to speed down that street again. They're cheap too. When you compare the cost of a policeman's salary to sit out side my house 24 hours a day, a speed camera pays for itself pretty quickly. And mostly, they work. They work well. Germans who feel they can afford to speed and get caught repeatedly, do so. Ok, no problem. Easy money for the city. Those who can't afford to speed, don't. And therefore make the neighbors happy.

If I could, I would go back to the old neighbors on Roller Coaster Road to apologize. I never gave any thought to how upsetting it must have been to have obnoxious, stupid teenagers speed down their street at all hours of the day and night. Alas, they are gone. Their homes have been demolished in order to make room for new homes. Stop signs have been installed at nearly every intersection on that street. I have heard, though I cannot confirm, that late at night there are kids who blow through those stop signs, looking for the same buzz I caught traveling down that road at 60 MPH. Perhaps, speed cameras on that street could put a stop to it?

Flaming Hypocrite

This blog has been edited. I'm impulsive much of the time. Perhaps if I thought my words through a little more, they would have a stronger and more positive outcome. It's all a learning experience--and I'm at the beginning.

I find myself at an interesting and confusing juncture in life. I grew up poor. At times, my mom didn't have two quarters to rub together, let alone any extra cash. It was my grandparents, particularly, my grandfather, who kept me well supplied with toys, extra-curricular activities, and spending cash as a teenager. Mom moved to Renton when I was seven and in the second grade. We lived in a very modest two-bedroom apartment in the Renton Highlands. My mom remained in that apartment for nearly 18 years. I struggle at times to make sense of the life I am currently living. The sheer luxuries I have now, that I never, ever, had growing up. I pinch myself, asking if I really live in this house? At my age? Is this real?

Renton takes a lot of heat from people who live outside our city limits--especially our schools. It pisses me off to listen to people who have zero connection to my hometown talk down about the schools. Best way to put me on the defensive, start belittling the school districts you're not apart of. My husband and I are proud graduates of Hazen and UW; Rodney works for Google, for crying out loud! BOTH my in-laws work for the Renton School District. My talented and loving mother-in-law has been a Renton teacher for over 30 years. The reason I became a teacher--the teachers I had growing up--all from Renton. I am proud of where we grew up, the tremendously special and successful friends we've made and largely still keep in touch with. Sure, it's not all Polly Anna. I have friends who hated being in Renton. Did poorly in school, blah, blah, blah. But could those bad experiences have happened in a more pretentious district too, say, Mercer Island? I'll get to that later.

I am a hypocrite. I don't live in Renton anymore. I don't get to visit as often as I would like, my mother's not even there any longer. But please, don't kid yourself, it is still very much my, "hometown." I live in Kirkland now. In a house that I would have been afraid to touch anything in as a child. I am living a life foreign to the 15 year old in me. AND, the real catcher, part of the reason we moved to Kirkland...the school district. Sigh. It's true, we moved here for three reasons: it's less than a mile to Rod's office, it's close to my mother and finally, the school district. It's no secrete that the Lake Washington School District is one of the best in the state. And I make no apologies for moving to a district I know has the resources to help produce successful students. BUT, and here's the kicker, I would never knowingly belittle another district for having less. Because as a student, and now as a teacher, I recognize it has so much more to do with a family's involvement, than a district's image. You want your kids to be successful? BE THERE FOR THEM. Period, end of story. Don't blame your lack of involvement, your kid's teachers, your kid's bad attitude...your kid's whatever, on the district. Because kids who are loved and supported at home--regardless of where that home is, will do well anywhere. I learned this lesson the hard way.

Five years into my teaching career and before I had my own children, I left my beloved job at Kentlake High School for a one year leave replacement contract teaching at Mercer Island High School. My initial hope was that it would turn into a longer contract and it shortened my commute time by 50 minutes--one way. Mercer Island. The Golden Rock. A mere miles from where I grew up, I found an unbelievably privileged community. A group of children who had everything at their finger tips. Unfathomable wealth, parental connections, luxury and privilege. I found fun-loving kids, snotty kids, smart kids, dumb kids, special education kids, fucked up on drugs kids. You name it, the Island provided it. But the most memorable thing I found teaching at MIHS, was that parents who played the largest, loudest role in their student's life, had the MOST successful kids. Hmmmm...reminds me a little of my life in good ol' Ren'in.

I credit my mother and grandparents for my successfulness in school and life. They were, no matter how poor, always there for me. My mother kept strict tabs on my life..."Who are you going with? Where are you going? Do I know their parents? Do I have a phone number? How late will you be gone? Where is your report card? Who's driving? How late will you be out? You need to be home by 11:59pm, sharp. No, so and so may not stay past 9pm." The litany of questions this woman asked made me believe that she believed in me and told me I mattered to her. These are the questions and answers that create a strong foundation for successful kids--no matter the district. No matter the money. No matter the prestige. No matter which side of Bellevue you live on. Parents make the difference. And so it will be in the Lake Washington School District, with my two kiddos...in the not so distant future.