5th Grade Recognition Night

Tonight was Helmut’s Fifth Grade Recognition night. I cannot believe my baby has finished Elementary School. It seems like just yesterday that we slept through our alarm on his first day of kindergarten and the poor boy had to literally run to catch the bus (that hasn’t happened since)! He is definitely not a baby anymore.

He wasn’t too happy about having to wear church clothes to the awards ceremony. It is a good thing I called the school to verify what he was supposed to wear, or he might have pulled one over on me. We got there 20 minutes before the kids were supposed to arrive (40 minutes before it was supposed to start) and there wasn’t one real seat left. We ended up sitting in the back at the lunch tables. The room was set up for about 200 people and there were easily 350 there. To top it off the air conditioning was broken, and Josh informed us it hadn’t been working all day. Josie came with us and was a real trooper, she didn’t complain once during the entire hour and fifteen minutes.

The ceremony started off with an interesting rendition of Mariah’s Carey’s “Hero.” Then they handed out a few awards before all the 5th graders received their completion certificates. Helmut received the Presidential Academic Achievement Award (I can’t remember the exact title, but it was something like that). He was pretty happy because he didn’t think he would get it. In order to receive the award, a student had to have a composite score of 90 or higher at the end of the 4th and 5th grade and receive a 2200 or higher on the Math or Science portion of the TAKS test. Helmut has already requested we frame the certificate (which he is sure President Bush signed personally) right next to his D.A.R.E. certificate. The ceremony ended with an encore presentation of “I Will Dare” (originally performed at the D.A.R.E. graduation on Friday afternoon…snoozeville!). Big Helmut loved the song, be sure to have him sing it for you the next time you see him.

It was a good night and I was really proud of Helmut for all that he has accomplished. It isn’t easy to move back to the US and into a new school with only two years left. Many of his classmates have known each other since kindergarten. He hasn’t skipped a beat and is enthusiastically looking forward to Junior High.