“Why isn’t your assignment here?” I looked at the SLS page, frowning deeply. My face was as black as charcoal because the son had conveniently forgotten everything about the writing assignment his teacher had given his class.

“I think I finished it on Friday and submitted it,” the son flippantly replied, with nary a trace of remorse in his voice. My blood was boiling, so I snapped, “I will be inconvenienced if you have no recollection of what your writing task is about.” (I said this line in Japanese. Trust me, my admonishment sounded more elegant than clumsy when translated into English.)

Luckily for him, I am a trained English teacher. So, I hastily put something together in relation to Curiosity Cove and guided him to write. Even empowered him to choose between “on cloud nine” and “over the moon”. (He chose the latter.) Used 2 phrases from his spelling list to reinforce his learning.

Thus ended his first writing lesson with me. I think my engine is revved up. He has a writing test next Friday.