Bev, you absolutely MUST go to the Butterfly Gardening forum. There is a lady on the forum (probably several), but one I know of for sure, who is a teacher, and is very active on the forum. If you tell them you are looking for seeds for a butterfly garden, you will absolutely be inundated. They LOVE to give and are so wonderful and joyous about sharing their love of butterflies and moths. Every question you or your friend has will be promptly answered. They are the most wonderful people I have ever met on the forums. They would almost have to be, to love and want to preserve some of our most beautiful creatures, wouldn't they? They will be so thrilled to help out. Please tell them that I sent you over there, and let them know why you're there. Tdogmom is one of the members, she is the teacher, and will have so many suggestions and ideas to help your friend out. This is so exciting. I love to hook people up with our butterfly group! I may even have some extra seeds they sent me for sure. Someone just sent me extra hairy indigo seeds, which is a host plant for the marine blue butterflies. I just checked the USGS website "Butterflies of North America". They have a map you can click on for your state, and it will list the butterflies that have been reported in your state by county. This butterfly, the Marine blue, has been reported in Texas, and it looks like possibly in the Lubbock area. Anyway, please go to the Butterfly Gardening forum and request seeds and info for your friend. They don't have an exchange yet, but tons of people will offer to send you some. Cool - we love adding people to the butterfly forum. If she is really interested in Monarchs, too, she can get her school designated as a Monarch Waystation, which is really cool. Susan

Hey rutgers, Back in the late 90's, I worked for the UC Berkeley Botanical Gardens. We applied and received federal grant money to teach about california native plants and animals to elementary students in urban, underfunded schools. Each class got to participate in 1 of 5 projects and had slide shows, etc. One of the projects was making a worm composting kit. Each kid got to "feed" the worms one week per year. We gave the teachers info on worm biology, ecology, etc for them to support the project. The program was called california alive, and it looks like its now taken off into some sort of educational program (google Cal Alive). Regarding lasagna gardening with the kids...I recommend you ask each child to bring in their compostable kitchen waste from the weekend in a plastic bag and then have them all dump their stuff at the base of the lasagna pile. Then cover it with grass clippings. Then have them tear up and shred used paper assignments, etc. Then convey to them that they are helping to keep land fills empty, not wasting fossil fuels by having their trash/waste driven to a landfill, etc. Then I suggest you consider growing something edible that they can plant (fall brocolli or lettuce), harvest, learn nutrutional benefits of, etc. Maybe you could also consider getting a class iguana or hampster or something and grow greens to feed the animal. Oh a million ideas are out there. Email me if you have further questions....g

Geogirl has a good point. There may be services available to your son--but you have to know about them and ask for them in order for him to get them. Again, my nephew's disability is physical, so not an exact comparison to your son, but he is also completely mainstreamed. And that has caused some problems, because he's not in a special ed classroom with a special ed teacher who knows about all the resources. There's a ton of adaptive equipment that the school has, like rulers and compasses and protractors, but no one thinks ahead that during math lessons that use these, it might be a good idea to have them in the classroom for Nephew to use. He can't hold or move a standard ruler very well. But the classroom teacher doesn't know they exist, and the special ed teacher never sees the lesson plans. So what happens is that a week is spent sending notes back and forth between home and school and finally the necessary adaptive equipment is identified and located and given to Nephew. And then the next week, the class moves on to a new lesson topic. My brother and SIL have found that they need to really be on top of some of this stuff and remind the teachers repeatedly, to make sure that Nephew gets what he needs. And this is with a school system that is really trying to work with them--from the start they have been very willing to try new things, to keep Nephew in a regular class (he has health issues so a home nurse accompanies him to school daily), to really try and get him the best education possible. I can't imagine what it would be like with a school system that had less money or no desire to really work for Nephew. My brother constantly gets, "Sure, we have X equipment. All Nephew has to do is ask for it." But it can takes days or weeks to find out the school has the equipment. My brother finally broke down and asked for a list of every single piece of adaptive equipment the school system has, so that they can ask for things without spending days sending notes back and forth. It's the little things like this--yes, the school can help, but you have to know what to ask for in order to get that help. And if you don't know the help exists, it's pretty near impossible to get that help. I would encourage you to ask about other options and find out what's out there. Pull-out sessions, one-on-one aides for certain subjects, extra tutoring, whatever the school has to offer. Ask other parents what support services their kids are getting. And when you identify a specific problem, be it that it takes your son half an hour to figure out what the homework assignment is or that after weeks of your working with him, he still is not grasping a specific concept, go to the teacher and ask what can be done to address that issue. The regular classroom teachers aren't going to know everything that's available, they have too many kids with too many different needs in one classroom, but they should be able to help you find out what's out there, or point you in the right direction.

Is this about a child who hasn't reached the maturity to take responsibility for his own work or is it about your dislike of standardized tests? I don't see what one has to do with the other. What should or should not have been done in first grade is irrelevent. This is not about past mistakes, it is about his current problems. Whether schools should administer standardized tests or not is irrelevent to your grandson's current academic problems. There might be very good points about such tests, but that debate is another post in itself. I don't think it has anything to do with this child's lack of focus. So focus on what the problem is now and how to go forward in the right direction for him to learn to be more successful. Notice I said "him learn to be" not make him. He needs to learn the skills himself because middle school will be a big change. Many 5th graders are very bright students but aren't ready for the demands that middle school will put on them emotionally. That is the part about self discipline, study skills, prioritizing, etc. If he has those skills, regardless of his intelligence, he should be able to do what the school/teacher is asking in the second half of the year. If he doesn't, he isn't ready for the next level, regardless of his intelligence. I agree with having two tests done for ADD, might as well make certain. But don't go into it looking for someone to affirm what you suspect, try to remain open minded and just wait and see what the tests determine. Then focus on those study and responsibility skills, not just the academics. Both are equally important to school and life success. I would work out a "contract" with my child listing on paper his responsibilities and his plan to fulfill them. If he forgets assignments, he needs to learn to use an assignment planner. If he doesn't complete assignments, he needs to work on the self discipline to finish before he goes on to something else. Whatever the problems are, he needs to be involved with coming up with the solution. He is bright, he can do that. Let him use his problem solving skills to solve his problem. The contract would include the final expectations, how to evaluate if they were met or not, and what the plan will be if they are not met. I would consider keeping him back if he is not able to get himself where he needs to be, he is not ready for 6th grade. Not as a punishment, it should not be thought of or talked of as a punishment. It is the solution to a problem. You don't want him to go into 6th grade with the same problems. Suppose (for example) the academic requirements for moving to 6th grade were to know 50 states and capitols, recognize certain countries on the world map, do long division, label the digestive tract, read on a 6th grade level, and, oh, label the levels of the Earth's atmosphere. Those skills would be required, not because it looks good on the school's performance charts, but because they are prerequisits to what will be taught in 6th grade. Students will be taught information and skills that build on what they should already know. If they don't know that information, they cannot learn what builds on it. The skills of responsibility, self discipline and study habits should be seen as prerequisits for the next level. He will not be able to achieve at the expected level in 6th grade if he does not have those skills. Therefor, he must demonostrate those skills before moving on. OK, that was the long winded answer for yes, if he doesn't prove those skills, I would agree to hold him back. I would do so not as a punishment, but because it is what needs to be done to ensure his success in middle school and later in high school.