{V-U-L-C-H-E-R}

I realize that some blogs you read probably have an order to them.  The ones I read do!  There are Menu Plan Mondays and Works for Me Wednesday.  Better yet, Wordless Wednesdays when all that is posted is a picture.  Ok, those usually get on my nerves.   But around here, you get RANDOM because I am random and you chose to read.

There are reading groups in Kindergarten.  Again, I am just able to piece together information from the tiny shreds that Ellie choses to share, BUT from what I gather...at some point each day, the children in each group gather and do literacy related activities.  Ellie's group usually work on a letter.  They divide their paper into quarters and they all participate as the teacher talks about words that start with the designated letter of the day.  They also come up with one word on their own and write it on the back of their paper.

The teacher writes the words and draws a picture on the "active board" (this is a new-fangled chalk board that is somehow connected to the computer).  Last week they worked on "V" words.  We had valentine, violin, vulcher, vampire and vowel (Ellie came up with this one on her own and wrote A-E-I-O-U as her picture!).

Now you're looking at vulcher and thinking "GAH I wish that girl could spell."  However, my dear readers, I can spell.  I actually pride myself on my ability to spell.  So when I was looking over Ellie's work, I was somewhat confused.

Vulcher?  So I say to my dear sweet husband, "Honeypie, how do you spell vulture?"  My sweetie replies "V-U-L-T-U-R-E?  Isn't that right, Snookums?"  I respond, "Yes, dear, that's what I thought. Oh well."

And seriously, I was over it.  WHO knows how this vulcher thing transpired.  Good grief!   Ellie's teacher has been teaching for years.  The woman is tired.  She slipped.  We all slip.  Lord knows I do not want the responsibility of teaching these children to read and write and spell.  Who am I to criticize or question?

But then there's my sweetie.  My love muffin.  My Honeypie.  Some people might just call him a stickler.  Your shaking your head.  You can hardly believe I would say this.  Yes, I know...he seems laid back, even easy going.  Not one to correct others or point out flaws.  But behind closed doors, well.....OH WHO AM I KIDDING???  He was really born to be in law enforcement.

Given the prospect of forever hindering Ellie's ability to spell VULTURE, well, my dear one just could not sit by and let this mistake be looked over.  He needed answers.

We started with Ellie.  I suggested that perhaps she had sounded it out phonetically.  Because really, ya'll, I just COULD NOT imagine that her teacher had done this.  I really couldn't.

As we dug deeper, we found that the teacher was out that day.  And the student teacher did reading group that day.  Ah ha...

So my Love Muffin says he's writing a note.  He (and Barney Fyfe) cannot sit by and let this wrong go unanswered.  He felt this needed to be brought to someone's attention, lest they go through life spelling Vulcher wrong.

I requested that he call his dad, a veteran teacher who is also married to a veteran teacher.  My thought is that my dear father-in-law would talk some sense into his son.  he could talk to him from a teacher's perspective.  I was sure he would make him see that this was not a hill we needed to collectively die on.  He would tell him that note writing about mistakes might be saved for later in the year when Ellie has written an essay on some intense subject matter that gets graded badly.  THEN he can go talk that over with the teacher.  But why bother with vulcher?

And I should have known how it would all turn out.

Brandon and his dad feel the same way about pretty much everything and Brandon's dad thinks it's kind of funny that Brandon gets so worked up about most matters.  You know how Andy always thought it was funny how worked up Barney got over Otis' antics?  I mean Andy agreed that Otis shouldn't be going around in that condition, but he might not have worried about it as much as Barney did.  And when Barney would haul Otis in and go over the rules "here at the Rock" with Otis, Andy would kind of sit back and chuckle to himself because....OK. You get the idea.

And how did a kindergarten story turn into a story about town drunks and Andy Griffith?

My father-in-law told Brandon he "wasn't surprised" and that a note probably "wouldn't hurt, but wouldn't make much difference."  Brandon took that as "GO AHEAD SON.  I AM FULLY BEHIND YOU ON THIS ONE."  And then my father-in-law kind of chuckled.

The note was quite mild.  He basically said that we saw the paper and weren't sure if Ellie sounded it out or copied it from the active board.  And he requested some explanation.

THE RESPONSE
So how would you respond?

Ellie's teacher responded with "LOL!  Mrs. X responded on Ellie's group work paper."

Mrs. X (the student teacher) responded with something along the lines of "I am soooo sorry!  I guess I've never written "Vulture" and I sounded it out phonetically.  Thanks for pointing that out!"

I breathed a sigh of relief.  I mean L O L indeed.  I thanked my stars they would not start Ellie on long division and then give her F's when she wasn't able to do the work.  And I chuckled.  I also breathed a sigh of relief that they took my "Barney's" note as a note from a stickler.  They were lighthearted about it.  They didn't get their feelings hurt.  Whew.

Barney didn't completely agree.  He said they seemed to take it a little too lightheartedly.  Because WHO can go through life not knowing how to spell vulture?  Right?

I hope they are ready for their year with Barney's kid in their class!