Thursday, September 11, 2008

First Day of School

The day arrived. This year it was a little more bitter than sweet, for me that is. Lily was looking forward to school, excited to meet new friends and be in her "big girl 3's classroom." I really like Lily's school because it is play focused. I've been feeling a bit of a failure lately. I read an assessment that said Lily should be able to count to 50, write her name and identify the alphabet. None of which are true. I don't think her failure to do these things means she's not smart but that she's a 3 year old. Gosh before I had kids I thought 3 year olds were just learning to talk - clearly that isn't the case. It gives me peace of mind to know she's in a loving place that allows kids to be kids.

There were two crying episodes, though not ones you'd expect. The first was because we couldn't head to school for 30 more minutes. And the second one happened because she had to leave school without being able to go on the playground. Not too bad. Of course, today was visiting day, which means a shortened day and parents stay. So who knows what will happen next week.

Lily stuck to doing things by herself today. I always feel bad when we go into a situation where kids already know each other. In this case the school is run in a large church, most of the families are members of the church and the kids know each other from Sunday School. Lily seemed to get left out from the pack. She wasn't the only 'outsider' and frankly she could careless. This is an area I'm never sure how to navigate because I don't want to feed her shyness or tendency to isolate herself. But I know as they get to know one another, she'll be running around with the kids so I don't want to push it either.

Today Lily did a project, played with my little ponies, drew on a chalkboard, cut up play dough, dressed dolls and ate doughnut holes ("a lot of doughnuts" = 4). In an effort to not be shy myself, I signed up to be a room mother. I'm not sure what a room mother does and am regretting my gun-ho attitude a bit. But I'm sure it'll be fine, err, I mean fun.



Here are two pictures of the girls, ready for school.

Lily picked out her outfit...not too bad.

1 comment:

Darcy said...

Znader didn't know his letters or his letter sounds and all my friends kids did. Zander was 3 and these kids were 2. One of the moms let me in on their secret so I will share it with you... leapfrog video Letter Factory and Word Factory. they are 9.44 at wal-mart. In 3 weeks zander learned his letters and their sounds...his preschool teacher didn't believe me that he knew them all because she had just tested him and he new "a." What is your moms blog again I saved it on my mom computer but not mine?