Curriculum Night

Today was Curriculum Night at Charlie's new school. It was very informative in many ways ;-) First I got to sit through my first PTA meeting where we were expected to scan and download the PTA budget and minutes onto our smartphones to follow along with the meeting  because, well, who doesn't have smartphones? Or the scanning app that I am apparently supposed to have on my phone...? I looked over Mandy's shoulder and discovered that the 6 figure annual budget for the Elizabeth Lane PTA is approximately 20 times what the PTA budget at Charlie's old school was. This means that the third graders have iPads and the fourth graders have laptops, with more of both to come. 

After the forced PTA meeting I got to go to Charlie's classroom and listen to his home room/science/math teacher and his literacy/social studies teacher expound upon the third grade curriculum. Which it turns out, is awfully extensive and includes science content on the scientific method, mass, energy, forces in motion & the solar system, social studies content on citizenship & government, civilization through time, etc ., cursive writing( which they do NOT teach in Quincy) and of course he'll be doing multiplication and division this year in math. This is all in contradiction to what Charlie tells me, who routinely answers "Nothing!" when I asked what he learned in school today...