Immediately after Thanksgiving I attended Will's Parent-Teacher conference.  The good news is that he's doing very well in school, making friends, and behaves.  His teacher mentioned she needed to move him from group tables to a special table during study time.  I asked her if he was having trouble and she said he just needs more room to spread out to work than the other kids.  She said he takes up a lot of room and he sometimes is a little messy.  She also mentioned he has a promising future ahead of him as a hostage negotiator, but I already knew that.

I left very disappointed that he needs to have a special work area because he's too messy and needs too much space to work in the location as his classmates.  How did he get this way?  

Then, that same weekend Chris and I both realized where he gets this.

This is his mother's workspace while researching a paper.  It takes up the dining room table.

It takes a lot of space because the whole paper there is in notecards and in outline form.  So this is where he gets the need to spread out and take up too much room.

And here's his dad's office, where he must have gotten the messy from. 

So Chris and I took photos to remind ourselves that sometimes you just can't help how your workspace looks and to remind ourselves that productivity is the important thing.  Last time I was informed he doesn't hold his pencil correctly - neither do I.  I think we need to focus on what the child can do rather than how he gets it done.