Category Archives: Home & Family

Our daughter is taking an intensive Spanish class at the
University of California at Santa Cruz
Summer
Session. This program was recommended to us by a friend who
volunteers with
Habitat for Humanity, building
houses in Guatemala every year. We decided to do this because Jessica is interested in studying international relations when she goes to college and four years of classical Latin will not be much help in that field. We hope
that she can test into the second year of Spanish for her senior year in
High School.

Jessica is the only high school student in her class and the only one
in her dorm. She is having a good time being on her own for half the week
even if it can be lonely. The experience is giving her some excellent ideas
on what she wants in a college besides academics. Living in a redwood forest, daily encounters with deer and the campus mascot, the
Banana Slug,
and eating in a cafeteria are all new experiences. We
expect her to come home wearing a Fiat Slug t-shirt.

Next week, Jessica also begins an SAT tutoring session three nights a
week with Excel Test. The first
time she took the
SAT, she got a perfect score
in English but her Math score may not be high enough to get Jessica
into some of the more technical colleges. This tutoring company
was recommended by her college advisor.
The advisor said that frequently the more imaginative students had trouble
getting the highest SAT Math scores because they kept interpreting the
questions instead of answering the simplest way.

Sadly, the day has come when my youngest child is taller than me.
My son Paul will be 14 next month and is in a major growth spurt.
At the start of June, we were almost the same size but now Paul is
noticeably taller. He is only gloating a little because we told him
that the taller of us has to wash dishes.

It is beastly hot this week. It hit 106 degrees Farenheit (41 Celsius)
today in San Jose, with no breeze. We were missing the pool we took out
to put in a caboose rail line, so we filled our outdoor spa with cold water.
Paul has been enjoying paddling around and splashing the plants to keep
them cool too. Our
neighbors are sleeping in the cellar to get away from the heat. We
were at the hardware store on Sunday and listened to a frantic woman
complaining that she had been to five stores and all were sold out of
any size of air conditioner or fan. We are watering all of our plants
daily, spraying the dogs with water, and discussing shaving the cats.

Paul is very excited that the whole family and his best friend Zach
are going to Raging Waters water
park this Friday. Going there was one of his special requests for this
summer. In this heat, it will probably be very crowded.

Just for fun, here our two of our pets, Valentino and Garbo.
Tino is one of the prettiest and friendliest cats we have ever
had but he is also very dumb. He purrs when you turn him over
to rub his tummy. His sister Garbo is much smarter but does
not like to be picked up. Both are grey
and white with green eyes.

Valentino and Garbo:

Tino at the Window:

Images by Katy Dickinson and John Plocher (Copyright 2006)

While my daughter is one set of final exams (next week) away from
being a Senior in High School, my 13-year-old son
is almost a High School Freshman. Jessica is going to
Harker, a private college prep school
but Paul will go to Palo Alto High School
or “Paly”, an excellent public school. Paly is better able to
support Paul’s learning disabilities than Harker would be.

We are in the middle of Paul’s IEP (Individualized Education Plan) discussions
now. The IEP is set of documents in which the school, parents, teachers,
school administrators, and the student himself write down their needs,
expectations, and the support needed for a disabled student. Since we will
be moving from a superb 3-year special day class
at Jordan Middle School into a
new school in September, we want to be sure that we put together the
best possible set of classes and services so that Paul can succeed at Paly.

The discussions about classes next year for Jessica and for Paul could not
be more different. For Jessica, we have passionate talks about whether taking
Solo Vocal Performance or AP Biology-Environmental would be more interesting. That is, discussions are about how many hard classes Jessica can squeeze
into her Senior year.

For Paul, we are trying to balance his social and behavioral needs
against his academic and intellectual needs. Our discussions for Paul
are around whether he should take 1.1 Algebra
(the first half of Algebra I, a much smaller class), or Algebra I (closer to
his academic capabilities but a bigger and faster-paced class). Harker’s
Freshman High School math class is Algebra II (most Harker students having
completed Algebra I in 8th grade), so even if Paul takes Paly’s harder
Freshman math alternative, he will start High School a year behind his
Harker peers. If he takes the recommended math class (1.1 Algebra), Paul
will only be able to complete three years of Math in High School unless
he takes a summer school course. Math is Paul’s best subject,
where his test scores are in the Superior range. Imagine our discussions
about writing and spelling, where Paul is still working toward grade level.

Paul himself does not seem very interested in these discussions. His
focus this summer is getting confirmed in the Episcopal church,
reading as many books as fast as he can (he is currently
finishing Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring), trying to talk
me into allowing him to play video games all day (no way!), and growing
taller than me. Paul and I are almost exactly the same height today so
that last achievement will come all too soon.

My 17-year-old daughter Jessica is taking her SAT-II tests
right now in Math and Biology. I dropped her off at 7:45 a.m.
at Lincoln High School here in San Jose. The Junior year of High
School at Harker is all
about creating objective evidence of who you
are and how good you are so that you can have your choice of
universities. So far, Jessica has taken Advance Placement (AP)
European History, the SAT-I (Writing, Reading, Math), the SAT-II
in U.S. History and English Literature. After today, she has
one more big test this year, in AP U.S. History (or “A-Push” as
she calls it). She will take her SAT-II in Latin and maybe
Chemistry too next year, plus two more APs.

When I was Jessica’s age, I too went to a good college prep. school
(Burke’s in San Francisco)
but there were fewer standardized tests available. I only took
SATs (like the SAT-I today – in Math and English) and one
AP (in English). I think it was the only AP class my school had.
Harker offers AP courses in at least a dozen subjects, plus as
many honors classes.

Jessica (who takes mostly honors classes) tells me that the
material for an AP class and an honors class is about the same
level of difficulty but that an honors class has tests all through the
year while an AP class is aimed at one test given by the

College Board national testing company. Ironically, many
colleges have started treating High School honors and AP classes as
the same. Because of this, some students take the AP course but
not the test. In my own case, my high SAT and AP scores got me
out of at least a year of boring Freshman year survey courses at
the University of
California, so the tests were well worth the trouble.

I know I never studied as hard as Jessica does. She has a stack of
large format SAT and AP prep manuals that she carries around. At
most meals lately, she has one in her lap unless I take it away from her.
She has gotten very high scores on the tests so far but the pressure
and expectations are still intense. If Jessica wants to go to Princeton,
Georgetown, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Brown, Tufts, Oberlin, or any other
top school, high standardized test scores seem to be an unavoidable
entry requirement. It is a painful and stressful process and I can only
admire how well she is handling it.

[Jessica came back from taking the SAT-II tests on Saturday and said they
went well. She also patiently reminded me that she had already taken her
A-Push exam. She is waiting to take the first of her four
final exams at Harker this morning. After the last exam on Wednesday,
Jessica is done for this year!]

We have a new niece! My husband John’s youngest brother Marty is now
the thankful father to his 4th child and 1st daughter, Mashayla Catherine
Plocher, born on Tuesday night. Mashayla and her mother Jill are
healthy and home in Peridot, Arizona with big brothers Malachi,
Zachariah, and Isaiah.

My own daughter Jessica at 17 is the oldest in her generation of
14 children (on both sides of the family). Mashayla is now the youngest
and one of only 4 girls.

Jessica at 17:

Mashayla at birth:

Mashayla’s Image by Martin Plocher (Copyright 2006)

Jessica’s Image by Katy Dickinson (Copyright 2006)