First Day, Part 2

This morning Archer and I took Bear to his first day of Junior Kindergarten.  He was nervous, so nervous that he refused to look at the camera when we tried to take a picture of him in his first day outfit.  He didn't, however, cry.  He was quiet and a bit withdrawn, but he did what we asked him.  He put his backpack where his teacher told him, and he stood in line quietly.  He did give us each about 5 hugs and kisses, but there was no drama.  I won't go so far as to say he was happy, but he was prepared.  He knew what was coming, and he did what we needed him to do without complaint.  I managed to not cry in front of him (thank goodness for sunglasses!). 

Kindergarten Dilemmas

Kindergarten has become a hot-button topic in our house, at least for Archer and me.  We talk about kindergarten a lot.  We constantly ask ourselves:

• Is Wild Man performing well in kindergarten?
• Are we doing enough to help him learn all he needs to learn?
• Is he learning enough? 
• And most importantly, where will he go for senior kindergarten?

Right now Wild Man is in junior kindergarten, which is the American equivalent of pre-K.  Ok, so that isn't exactly right.  JK is, for all intents and purposes, kindergarten.  Wild Man is in a mixed JK and SK class, which means that about half of his classmates are in senior kindergarten.  This means that they all learn the same things, but the SK students do activities that build on the skills they learned in JK.  So while Wild Man is practicing writing the number from 1 to 10 his SK peers are learning how to do basic addition and subtraction.  The theory is that the SK students help teach the JK students and, thus, benefit from teaching their peers while the JK students benefit from modeling their behavior after their more experienced classmates.  I think this system has benefited Wild Man very well, and I'm really happy with our decision to send him to JK, which is optional in our province.  Now we have to decide where to send him for SK.

You see, Wild Man's school is out of our area.  It is affiliated with his daycare, so he goes to daycare in the morning and JK in the afternoon.  In fact, he and about 10 other children walk over to the elementary school, escorted by several of the daycare staff members.  We chose this option knowing that he couldn't stay in this school, but we chose it for a few reasons.  First, I'll be 100% honest--it is convenient for us.  If we had elected to enroll him in JK in our home school (which is walking distance from our house), our day would be crazy.  For example, C would have to drop Wild Man off at JK, then drop Bear daycare,  and drop me off at CU.  Then C would have to drive back across town to pick up Wild Man and take him to daycare for the rest of the day.  This didn't make a lot of sense for us, although we seriously considered it.  Second, this elementary school is one of the top 5 elementary schools in our province.  It is an excellent school.  It is also incredibly diverse, both economically and ethnically.  In fact, the school has diversity assemblies every month in which the kids learn about one of their classmate's home cultures (the school is so diverse in large part because it draws heavily on the international graduate student population at CU).  Wild Man knows about Ramadan and Chinese New Year, about saris and hijabs, and about all sorts of things he wouldn't have learned about elsewhere.  He now says things like, "Daddy, that wasn't a very accepting thing to do."  In short, he has learned a lot about the world due to his experiences at this school.  We've thought a lot about keeping him here for SK.  In fact, we've talked a lot about selling our house and moving into this school district so he can continue to go to this school through all the elementary grades. 

But we are also considering sending him to French Immersion school.  Essentially, in a FI school, Wild Man would be immersed in the language.  70% of instruction is in French, while 30% is in English.  Most students are fully bilingual by grade 4, and if we stay in Canada, given the nature of the Canadian job market* and government, I feel that it is really important that both boys be fluent in French.  We don't, however, like the neighborhood that our FI school is in.  The school itself seems to be quite good. In fact, Archer and I attended an open house there a few weeks ago and loved the kindergarten teacher.  But again, the neighborhood is not so great. 

So we're trying to decide what to do. If we want him to go into FI school, he has to start by grade 1, which gives us another year to make a decision.  But then he'll be in a room with students who have already attended SK at an FI school, so he'll be behind the curve a bit.  I don't know if this matters at that age, but I think it might.  I know he'll be discouraged with FI curriculum anyway.  The kindergarten teacher we met with told us to expect that.  She said even kids who love school will come home at some point in the school year upset and frustrated because it is different, because they will struggle with the language at first.  I'm concerned that frustration may cause him to feel discouraged about school, especially if we wait until grade 1 to start a FI program.   But part of me thinks, he is happy where he is.  We really like this school, so why not keep him there for another year? 

I'm really not sure what to do, and we have to make a decision in the next few weeks.

*Based on the news articles I've read and numerous conversations I've had with my own students, individuals who are fluent in French often have a much easier time getting jobs in our province.  For example, people who are fluent in French and who are applying for teaching positions are about twice as likely to get hired as those who don't speak French.  I am concerned that we may be putting the boys at a disadvantage if they don't speak French and we stay in CU Land.

Oh, no he didn't!

This afternoon Wild Man looked at me and said, "Mommy, girls don't play with trucks.  Only boys do."  Yesterday he said to Archer, "Nah, nah, nah, boo-boo, you can't catch me." 

I must say I'm really pleased with all the great things he's learned after just three weeks in JK.

First Day

I just got back from walking Wild Man to his first official day of JK.  After today, his daycare teachers will walk him.  I was a little emotional, and I thought I might cry after I dropped him off.  He, however, was not emotional at all.  In fact, when his teacher met him and his classmates at the door he didn't even look back at me as he followed her inside. 

I'm happy that this is turning out to be an easy transition for him.  I predict he will have a lot of fun and will learn a lot.  But I must also say that such transitions are not easy for me.  I have found this week to be very emotional for me.  It doesn't come as much of a surprise to me.  I tend to be emotional about changes, although I do think I adapt fairly well and quickly.  Part of me thinks it is because my own parents were not sentimental about anything.  I've responded in the opposite way.  In fact, I have been preparing for today since the beginning of July, starting with buying Wild Man a back pack and a lunchbox, as well as everything else he might need.  This past weekend he and I made a special trip to the grocery store to pick out snacks that he would like to pack for school.  My own parents were not very involved, so it is important to me to be as involved as possible.  I want to know what is going on in his life and I want him to know that his life is important to me.  I don't ever want him or Bear to feel like their lives are inconvenient or unimportant to me. 

That's my boy!

When Archer and I took Wild Man to tour his JK classroom and meet his teacher earlier this afternoon, we discovered that his teacher had misread his enrollment paperwork and had labeled his cubby, his coat hook, and his name badge with his first name although Wild Man goes by his middle name.  When he discovered this, Wild Man calmly walked over to his teacher, showed her his name badge, and said, "Mrs. Teacher, this should read W-I-L-D M-A-N.  That is my middle name, but it is what I like."  And then he continued to tell her this every time he saw his first name in other locations throughout the room. 

Wild Man and Junior Kindergarten

Tomorrow is Wild Man's first official day of Junior Kindergarten or JK, as it is most frequently called in the province where we live.  We just returned from meeting his teacher and exploring his classroom.  He was a bit overwhelmed, but he handled it really well.  I, however, was on the verge of tears the entire visit.  How is it possible that he starts JK tomorrow?  At moments like this, I wish we lived in the States, where he'd have at least another year before we had to start worrying about any sort of school.  That said, I do think he is ready for more intellectual stimulation than he gets at his daycare.  I know he will thrive, but tomorrow I will be a nervous wreck.

JK Open House and Other Musings on Wild Man

Yesterday we attended the open house for Wild Man's Junior Kindergarten program. As I've written about here, choosing the right JK program for Wild Man was not easy for us. It was complicated for all the usual reasons, but the fact that we are Americans living in Canada made it even more complex. We ultimately chose to send him to the school that is affiliated with the university's daycare. While convenience played some role in our decision (his daycare teachers will actually walk him to and from JK every day), we primarily chose the school because it is 1 of the top 5 elementary schools in our province.

That said, when C and I toured it the day we registered Wild Man, we left feeling a bit uncertain about our decision. I think most of that uncertainty stemmed from the reality that we had just registered our 3-year-old for Junior Kindergarten. Even though we have a much better understanding of the Canadian school system now, we're still finding it hard to separate what we know about kindergarten (as in, you go to kindergarten when you are 5, not 3 or even 3 and 3/4s, as Wild Man will be when he starts JK in September) with what Wild Man will experience in JK. So we went to yesterday's Open House as much for us as we did for Wild Man. We wanted some sort of understanding of what his day will be like and what the program requires of him. We met the teachers and toured the rooms. Wild Man had an opportunity to explore the room and ask questions. He also discovered that many of his friends from daycare will be attending JK at the school too. Wild Man left excited and happy, and C and I left relieved. In fact as we walked to the car, he looked at me and said, "Ok, now I know we made the right decision." I agree completely. Now that we've had an opportunity to talk to the teachers, I realize Wild Man is prepared for this, and he will benefit from the experience, even at his relatively young age. I am still somewhat concerned about how he will handle the transition come September.

While I've always been acutely aware that Wild Man is a lot like me, I've become even more aware of that fact recently. As C has told me every time I've expressed concern about Wild Man's similarities to me, this means he has a lot of good qualities. Like me, Wild Man is empathetic, sensitive, caring, and gentle. He is also assertive, out-spoken, and independent. These are the qualities I like most about myself, and I am very pleased that Wild Man shares them with me. But, like me, Wild Man also has a tendency to be overly anxious and easily over-stimulated or overwhelmed. Further, while his sensitivity and empathy for others means that he has the ability to feel for others, it also means he picks up on everything.

For example, C and I were both stressed out about the whole process of choosing a school for Wild Man, and we spoke about it in front of him several times. One night he couldn't go to sleep because he'd heard us talking. When I checked on him and asked why he was awake an hour after bedtime, he told me, "I made you and Daddy worry about my school. Mommy, I don't want you to worry about me." My 3-year-old was worried that I was worrying about his future too much. I gave him a long hug and tried my best to reassure him that it wasn't his fault that I was worried. I also tried to explain that I'm the grown-up and that C and I want him to be a kid and to not worry about grown-up things. I'm not sure he understood, but he did relax and went to sleep soon after.

On some level, I love that he wants to take care of me, but I want him to understand that isn't his job. And as I was the kid who worried about everything, I feel like I've passed this on to him. My parents never took the time to help me understand that I didn't need to worry about everything or that it wasn't my responsibility to worry about money or illness or other grown-up things. I want to try to explain that to Wild Man. I want him to be a kid. I don't want him to feel like an adult at 10, which is how I felt. I want him to know it is ok to be a little boy.