1st grade update

First day of school.

Well, I can't really catch up on anything in my life, because it just seems tacky and too personal to do it here. Not that I would want to talk about it in person though. So, um...don't ask, but pray for me instead.

Some happy things:

1st grade seems to be going really well so far. Honestly, from I.'s perspective, school will always be going well. Or great. Or fantastic. But from my perspective it seems to be going well, too. She just got on the free hot lunch program (remember, we're poor--really, really poor). I have been trying not to use any financial help programs, but we had to succum to this one and to WIC.

Anyway, she really likes doing the hot lunch thing. At first I was worried that she wouldn't know where to go, what to tell the lunch lady about paying, and what food she'd pick. But she acts like she's always been doing this. I told her I was concerned about her throwing away all the left-over food, but she told me that it was OK because they use the food for the gardens (composting). That made me feel better.

The homework is SOOOOO easy. This will NOT be a problem. She has to pick 3 items a week to do, until all the items are completed by the end of the month. Her teacher is so laid-back that she was sayig that if it's too hard on your schedule and family life, let her know and your kid doesn't have to do the work. OK, people, the things to choose from are like: give your parent a hug and tell them 1 thing you like about them. Easy!!! Admittedly, it might be more of a challange when she's a teenager. But I can't even imagine telling the teacher, "Sorry, we just don't have time for hugs in our family. We're too busy." Another assignment was to share your favorite book with the class (she was going to share Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse, thanks to Chantel, but we couldn't find it yesterday morning). She brought in The Hiccupotamus, a hilarious, fun story that would definitely show some of I.'s personality to the class. But they didn't even read it. Anyway, I was worried all last year about the homework, but I have absolutley nothing to fear. She even did the math homework in 3 minutes without even being asked. What a relief!

Yesterday was my first time volunteering in the class. I'm going to help out every Monday at writer's workshop from 8:45-9:55am. Yesterday my mom watched the kids because she was there anyway to take me to an appointment. I have no idea who will watch the kids for me the rest of the year. There isn't enough time between dropping off I. at 8:30 ,taking the kids to someone's house, and then being back by 8:45. So, A. is going to try to take them to work on Monday mornings, until I find a better solution.

Anyway, I had a great time volunteering. I wanted to do this all last year. I am so happy about this. It's great to see all the kids and to get to know the class--and especially to see the teacher in action. It was fun to see I., who could care less about even raising her hand to be called on or to participate. But then the teacher asked something that she was suddenly interested in, and she shot up her hand, and was called, much to her excitement. Actually, it's a pretty smart thing to not raise your hand at all, until something's important to you, because the teacher will notice that this time you're actually raising your hand, and will call on you.

So the hardest thing about writer's workshop is not spelling out words to the kids. They write whatever they want (at least on this day), and however much they want, and then draw an accompanying picture. We're suppossed to encourage them to write the way they think the words sound. And even when they ask you for help, you're suppossed to encourage them to sound it out, and not give them the answer. But when they write it out and ask, "is this how it's spelled?" it's hard for me to bite my tongue. I know that they will learn how to spell correctly throughout the year, and that the teacher wants to use this time to encourage writing at all, but it's still hard for me.

It was interesting to see the different personalities emerge, in a scholastic sense. One boy, feeling inferior, kept saying, "well this isn't real. It's just fake," and being ashamed of his work eveytime I checked in on that table. It made me so sad, and I kept encouraging him. Other kids don't even want you to know what they're drawing, and try to hide it from you. Other kids don't even want to try. At all. They'll say, "I just don't know what to write about." When you help them come up with ideas, they say "Nooo..." and just want to sit there, doing nothing. One kid had a story that took place in several different scenes, so he split the drawing part of the paper in quarters, each square depicting a different part, in sequence. I was really impressed. I. surprised me by being really into this, and wrote enough to fill up the page. She didn't get to the drawing part until there was only a few mintues left. Even her teacher walked by and said, "Wow, I.. Good job writing!" This is something her Kindergarten teacher NEVER would have said. I like that her teacher isn't afraid to complement the students.

By the way, I. has be hanging out with her Soul Mate (and other people) and they seem to have fun together still. At recess they play with their other friends who aren't in their class this year. I. told me that at rug time one day, Soul Mate told Paul to tell her that when they're older, he wants to marry her. She seemed to take it as a compliment. Kids are so fun!

Random picture of mine and A.'s birthday celebration.