Not smarter than a fifth grader

January is winding down which can only mean two things. One we are covered in at least six million inches of snow which is sucking my will to live and B it is time to cram and finish Thing Ones monthly book report. I recall being in the fifth grade and believe it or not book reports had in fact been invented by that point. I recall writing several compelling essays about the inner workings of the babysitters club. Even at that tender age I knew that  Kristy sounded like a real jerk. I remember things like this because after reading the stupid book I was required to write a synaopsis of the thing. Another booky word I learned from writing reports. Apparently there is a new consipacy a foot becuase now that my child is in the fifth grade writing a book report is not good enough. Nope now we have to spend an ungodly amount of time creating visual learning aids or some other pretend word that they use to trick me into believing that it is valid.
The process is always the same however.

• The genre  is issued at the first of the month and Thing One tries to convince both of us that instead of getting a grade appropriate book he is going to shoot for the moon and get a thousand pager. We have a minor melt down in the public library and try to avert prying eyes away from our circus. Do you know how hard it is to freak out in a quiet voice? Turns out it is impossible don't worry Thing one has demonstrated it month after month
• By the 5th of the month Myers is reminding Thing one to read. This leads to another melt down about how insert what ever subject matter is really stupid and he already knows everything about it blah blah blah
• The 15th comes and we again ask how the book reading is coming along. The response is equal in pain and punishment to chasing a badger down a hole. 

• The 27th rolls around and then it is crunch time. This usually results in the table being covered in all manor of craft supplies, thirteen emergency trips to the Walmart for some vague supply that we have to have, a lot of tears and door slamming and finally Myers and myself staying up way past our bedtimes to finish our Thing ones report. 

This months "report" was a five player game that did not include anything about the plot, theme or anything else that would elude to its purpose.
This is how Thing One handled it

This is what we were doing

After some inspired crafting on my end and a lot of erasing on Myers end we pulled it all off with exactly zero help from the student.

To add insult to injury when it was all said and done he came up to Myers and asked him the following question.
So Dad exactly when was it that you went through puberty?
I don't think he would have time to formulate these questions if he was instead focusing on subplot. Thanks for nothing fifth grade!