Raising Boys

Harry Potter, Triwizard Tournament, Mad-eye Moody….. November 22, 2005

My son Dylan happened to read the great big sign on the roadside near the Ayala Center in Cebu City that said “Now showing: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,” while we were on our way to meet with a friend from Australia over the weekend.

My husband and I had initially considered going by ourselves to watch the movie but because Dylan already knew it was showing, we decided to bring him along as well. Since Lennon is only 2, and his capacity to sit still through a 2 1/2-hour movie suspect, we thought it best to leave him at home.

Having read the printed version of this Harry Potter film, I went into the moviehouse not really expecting much. But I was pleasantly surprised. The film was great and I consider it the best among the Harry Potter films. Needless to say, the special effects were spectacular.
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The shepherd’s role November 20, 2005

I was looking through my files and found a photograph of Dylan taken in preparatory, during the class Christmas play. He played one of the shepherds. I remembered having to create a shepherd’s costume for him the night before the event from the Grim Reaper costume he used during Halloowen. I cut the hood and made it into a shepherd’s headpiece. Thankfully, it turned out okay.

I’m not really looking forward to the first grade Christmas party this year. I don’t think I can stand exchanging pleasantries with his first grade teacher.

A day in the public school system November 18, 2005

Finally, my son’s exams are over. The whole thing was very chaotic. I don’t know what made me decide to accompany my son to his classroom but I’m glad I did. I would have remained ignorant of the manner that the tests were given out.

First off, the teacher was not there but left her househelp and her 7-year-old daughter in charge. As can be expected in a scenario like this, the exams were disorderly, with many students stopping to answer to play, mill around, or look at their classmates’ answers.

Now, I know why this teacher told parents during the meeting held before the start of classes that those in the top 10 in the preparatory level would not be the same ones in the first grade honor list.

She knew from the start she would not be teaching, her househelp would be, and that she certainly would have no way of determining who are excelling among her students. The exams would not be a correct gauge because of the disorderly manner that these are given, with students allowed to copy from each other. She’d be picking off the names for her top 10 from her magic hat.

I’m glad my son, despite everything that’s been going on in that classroom, has resisted the urge to join in the bandwagon and cheat.

Looking forward to Constantine’s show November 15, 2005

Karen says she has two tickets to the Constantine Maroulis show this Saturday at the Ayala Center in Cebu and that we should go. I said yeah, we should. This is so cool (pardon the word). He was my favorite American Idol male contestant before I gave him up for Bo Bice.

It’s going to be a hectic Saturday because I plan to cram into the day dinner with a friend from Australia and of course the latest Harry Potter film The Goblet of Fire. I don’t know if I’m going to survive the weekend but my fingers are crossed.

Missing notebooks and lousy teacher

It’s exam week and my son Dylan will be going to his tests unprepared. Unfortunately for him, his teacher only informed them yesterday that she will be holding the second periodical exams from Wednesday to Friday. She has not given her class pointers, has not taken time to review them, or made any effort whatsoever to prepare her pupils.

She is the typical Philippine public school teacher. No, change that. She is worse than the typical public school teacher. And all this because her husband is giving her a hard time. Why not leave him for heaven’s sake. To think her daughter is also in the class. I can understand not caring if other people’s children won’t learn anything but her own kid? That seems to me selfishness at its greatest.

I guess I can’t do anything but grumble. Even with my litany of complaints against her, I cannot risk a confrontation because she might take it out on my son. Since the school incorporates the grade on a child’s character with a major subject, it would be easy for her to say my son misbehaves in school. He’s the most behaved of the lot, though, and I am not only saying this because I’m his mother.
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Blood–what’s your type? November 11, 2005

My husband and I picked up the results of the blood typing tests on our sons Dylan and Lennon at the clinic this afternoon and learned that Dylan is AB+ and Lennon is A+. That’s to be expected I guess because blood type is inherited and I’m AB+ while my husband believes (he’s not sure) he is B+.

We had the tests done on our children because we thought it would be handy information to have.

I wanted to learn more about blood types so I looked it up on the Internet and found out that a person has two blood alleles, one each from the biological parents. A tutorial on the University of Arizona biology project website said “an allele is one of several different forms of genetic information present in our DNA at a specific location on a specific chromosome.”

There are three different alleles for blood types: A, B, and O. It was Austrian scientist Karl Landsteiner who classified blood according to the distinct differences he found when he examined samples under a microscope.
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