Another Year Begins!

John started PreK on Tuesday, and so far is enjoying it.  He loves the new classroom with the different toys and books than last year - and this year his classroom has a fish (he loves the fish!).  He seems so big compared to last year, but not yet ready for Kindergarten...

I am one of the unfortunate mothers who has a baby born in September.  Unfortunate, because I had to make a tough choice.  If you don't live in Virginia, you might not know what I mean, but the cutoff for Kindergarten is September 30 (as in, the child needs to be 5 by September 30 to enter Kindergarten that year).  Many families here choose to wait to send their close-to-cutoff kids to Kindergarten until the year after they're 'eligible' - some don't.  It really depends on each child's readiness.  My boy's birthday is September 28 - he is still 4 (for another almost 3 weeks) and I can't imagine him being in Kindergarten this year.  I think doing PreK this year (4 half days) will be an excellent transition.  As one friend of mine said (who has been an early childhood educator for years), we are giving him the 'gift of time' - a gift I hope he will thank us for someday.  John is a bright kid who is well adjusted, has fun with friends, loves to learn new things, asks lots of insightful questions, remembers all sorts of details about what he's learned, is very mechanically minded (machines of any description fascinate him!), and is generally 'on track' for his age group academically.  He learned to swim a year ago (enough to swim across the deep end on his own) and has been riding a bike without training wheels for 6 months.  However...he could use a little time to get more comfortable with the whole classroom scene.  He could use a year to help him better listen to the teacher and follow directions and do the classwork, even if you'd rather play or look at the fish. :)

When school started this year, we were excited to learn that FIVE of the kids in his preschool class were kids from his class last year.  His class has 19 kids and 2 wonderful teachers - it helps to have some familiarity :)  John is excited that he gets to be in a new class.  He likes that there is a stop sign for the bathroom door.  He loves that there's a fish.  Its blue.  The teacher asked him what they should name it and he said he wanted to name it John.