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

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