There is a story in Edwards family lore that is often repeated at family gatherings and special events. Poor Dan, he will never be allowed to forget this, because, well….it’s just so darling. He was quite young at the time, and was in trouble for some thing he had done. My parents asked him quite sternly, “What makes you think you’re so smart?”
Dan paused, pensive, contrite, then raised his little head, looked my parents squarely in the face and replied meekly, “Because I have a good brain?”
Yeah, we all still get a laugh out of that one.
The other night, Trey provided a new and improved version of the story that I’m sure will be passed down through the ages. (And yes, it’s right up there with the “Yeah, but can you whistle?” story, Angie)
On Tuesday, Trey brought home his first progress report of third grade. McKinney schools do not use letter grades, they use a rubric scale. We look for scores of 2’s and 3’s to indicate that he is working at grade level, 4’s to indicate a real area of strength.
With this particular progress report, Trey had earned all 3’s except one: writing. That one was a 2+, which means it is still “developing”. We mentioned to him how proud we were of him working so hard and doing such a good job at the beginning of third grade, but told him there was one area of concern. The following is the conversation that ensued:
Mom: “Trey, your progress report was great! You got all 3’s except one!”
Trey:Â “I know, I know…writing.”
Mom: “Yes, you got a 2 in writing. Can you tell us about that? What seems to be the problem?”
Trey: “Well, I don’t write half a page. I only write like 2 or 3 sentences. I’m supposed to write half a page.”
Dad: “Why don’t you write half a page? Is it that you don’t understand, or is something else going on?”
Trey: “I daydream a lot. One time we had like 35 minutes to write and I only wrote like 2 things.”
Mom: a bit shocked “Why didn’t you write more?”
Trey: hanging his head, and very contrite “Well, I started writing….and then I started daydreaming. My inner voice kind of wandered off.”
And that was the end of that.