This is part 3 of a series about family tree assignments. Beth Waggenspeck, a communications professor at Virginia Tech, an adoptive parent, and a writer about adoption issues, kindly gave me permission to repost something she wrote about the problem with family tree type assignments.

She continues:

A child from a poor family may have no pictures or milestones ( as of last year's data, 4,350 families in my small, SW Virgina county live without indoor plumbing; 49% of my son's elementary school classmates receive free lunch; 36% are... more

This is continued from a previous post about family tree assignments. Beth Waggenspeck, a communications professor at Virginia Tech, an adoptive parent, and a writer about adoption issues, kindly gave me permission to repost something she wrote about the problem with family tree type assignments.

Here's what she said.

As an educator and parent, I have great difficulties with the assignment of the "Family Tree" or "When I was born" assignment,... more

A while back one of my fellow bloggers wrote a post about the "dreaded family tree assignment." (I cannot remember who, so please speak up so I can link to that post!) From what I remember (please correct me if I'm wrong - you know who you are!), that blogger said that although she knew that many adoptive parents objected an assignment that asked students to create a family tree or talk about their personal history, she didn't see what the big deal was. Her child would just create a family tree showing himself as part of the family, because that's what he was.

At... more

Continued from part 2.

The wealthier out-of-place suburban Yankee types don't tend to bother with me too much (mostly because they're all at work when I'm out and about) but we do run into them at the soccer field on the weekends, and this is where we've had issues. My kid doesn't tend to take the sports as seriously as their kid...or at least he acts like he doesn't (he tells me all the time he loves the sports he plays but on the field he acts like he hates it.... more

Continued from part 1.

Let me explain my community a little bit. The town that I live in is a small, traditionally rural town but we're in close proximity to Chapel Hill, NC as well as to the Research Triangle Park area of the state. For the past 10-20 years there's been an influx of outsiders to the area, and about 40 years ago there was an earlier influx of outsiders, namely abunch of hippy back-to-the-lander types. This makes for an odd mix of people: lots of local... more

Nancy, our adopt-a-sibling blogger, wrote a post about how sometimes, in public, people seem to be staring at her family or sending her messages with their glares because of the way one of her daughters is behaving. She said:

Quite often, people would then scowl at me, and their message was clear… “If you are not going to treat her the same as the kids who match you, why did you adopt her in the first place?” No one would question a family who had three “matching”... more

Recently on the EEAC PEP listserv (for parents of post-adoption, school-aged children) there's been a discussion of whether or not it's appropriate to tell your child's teacher that he or she was adopted. Specifically, the discussion is about kids who were adopted much younger than they are now (we're not talking about not mentioning to the kindergarten teacher that the reason little Alex speaks Russian instead of English is because he's adopted...)

Most of the posters so far have said they've thought it was a good idea, even... more

A while back I wrote a blog asking how I should have addressed a certain thing my younger son did and I got 18, yes 18 (!) comments. I was much encouraged by that evidence that somebody reads my blogs so I promised to do a WHAT WOULD YOU DO post every week. I did another...no response. I did a 3rd...no reponse.

So I quit doing them, at least for now. Little J's behaviors have calmed down a lot, too, so I don't want to jinx things by writing about behaviors that he doesn't have...yet!

But I'd still love some responses to my behavioral dilemmas. The two that I... more

We are just coming off about 2 weeks of vacation. First, my whole family (me, husband, kids, grandparents, and my sister) went to the beach for 6 days. We were home for a day and then I went to a 4-day writing retreat with some writing friends of mine (where a little writing but mostly a whole lot of talking went on) and my husband did an arts and crafts show with his photography. The kids stayed with their grandma for two night while he was out of town; I came back the following day.

I didn't expect much of a problem.... more

Little J has recently become fascinated with "girly" things: he likes to have his finger and toenails painted, he likes to have barrettes and ponytails in his hair (this is a challenge as his hair is not particularly long) and he's asked me if he can wear a dress. Since we don't have any girls around I don't have a dress to let him wear, but I'd do it if I did. I don't really see the harm in any of this exploration although it bugs his dad. Big J did similar sorts of things when he was this age and it didn't harm him any. He knows he's a boy. So does Little... more