At the last Parent-Teacher Conference, my son’s teacher mentioned “some concerns” that she had with him. Specifically his behavior in class. I don’t want to go into the details about what she said, but I don’t agree with her. Today a small plastic bag was sent home, containing a stack of flash cards and the following letter:

Parents,
In this bag are words your child needs to know to help them be successful readers in Kindergarten. Please practice these words with your child as much as possible. When your child is able to read all of the words listed below and on this set of flash cards we will send home a new set of words to practice.

Thank you for your participation!

all, am, are, at, ate, be, black, blue, brown, but, cat, came, dad, did, do, dog, eat, four, get, good, green, has, he, into, like, love, mom, must, new, no, now, on, orange, our, out, pink, please, ran, red, ride, saw, say, she, so, son, that, there, they, this, too, under, want, was, well, went, what, white, who, will, with, yellow, yes

The words in bold are the words he missed. Keep in mind that he only had to read the words and not the accompanying letter.

There are the words on his flash cards, which he got all correct:
million
opposite
therefore
cover
various
wouldn’t
general
doesn’t
method
beyond
would
ancient
we’ll
century
shook
believe
capital
where
especially
necessary
temperature
attention
kitchen
electric

I really need to get his reading level tested because he is in Kindergarten and has no problem with the vast majority of words that he comes across. Unfortunately, when he is in the classroom, he doesn’t do any work. He’s not rude or combative about it, he just experiences a work stoppage and stares into space. No coloring, no using scissors, no using glue sticks and if he doesn’t feel like it, no writing. We cannot figure out why he just stops, but he does.

I would be a lot more worried if he ever got that unresponsive like at home. However, he has no problem engaging with other people and regularly has intelligent conversations with people who older than he is. I will admit that he has a problem playing with kids closer to his age, but he finds them boring. He would much rather play computer games or with his trains.

I am not one of those people who confuse the ability to learn in a classroom setting with intelligence. So while I may worry about his ability to sit down in a classroom and do the assigned work without someone wanting to label him with a learning disorder of some sort, I have absolutely no concerns about his intelligence.