First day of kindergarten!

UPDATED: Below is Meredith's picture in her classroom on her first day of kindergarten. She reported having a fun day that was very "busy." Her bus ride home was long, but she liked looking out the window. They had recess, and snack time, and lunch and she got to see friends from other classrooms. At some point I'm sure there was some learning in there.


This morning the whole family brought Meredith to school for her first day of kindergarten. It is in the same school, just down the hall, that she did pre-kindergarten last year (International School of Minnesota). But it's been a long summer and the excitement that it's kindergarten has made Meredith to be a little apprehensive.

It's understandable. She has new teachers, mostly new classmates, a new classroom. It's all very different for her. It didn't help this morning that she had to go to the bathroom when we got to the school. Fortunately her classroom has its own bathroom right there. She went in, but then had a bit of trouble getting out! It's no fun to be stuck in a tiny bathroom and not knowing how or when you'll emerge. In a quick moment she was helped out, but a little shaken from the experience.

Meredith has been getting over a cold and the bags under her eyes make the fading black eye from earlier in the summer reemerge. But the pictures we took of her are still really cute! (We'll show them here within the next day.)

Meredith's teacher told her all the exciting things they were going to do in kindergarten. With tears, we were able to separate from Meredith and tell her goodbye. We know before long this will all be familiar and she'll love school, just like last year in pre-kindergarten.

This afternoon Meredith will experience another nerve wrecking first: a ride on the school bus! Each day I'll drop her off in the morning and she'll ride home on the bus. We'll have to do a follow-up report on how that goes.

In summation, wow, the girl is growing up!

Kindergarten versus computers

Recently, Meredith's school has been doing a marketing push for kindergarten. They've engaged the pre-kindergarten kids and their parents on the subject of staying at the school for kindergarten. As part of this push, Meredith got an invite from her "kindergarten friend" to visit the kindergarten class and see all there was to see. We let her do a special full day last week (kindergarten at the school is all-day), which she loved. The parents have gotten an orientation and some literature.

Overall, Meredith has been very excited about being in kindergarten next August. She's talked about it a lot and sees it as the big milestone it is. She likes her school and was impressed with the kindergarten experience she had.

Today, while we were driving home from the zoo, Meredith told us that she didn't want to go to kindergarten at her school next year. We asked her why. She told us that it was her decision and that she decided not to. We told her it was not her decision, but we were very interested to hear what she thought, and again, why she didn't want to do kindergarten at her school.

We went back and forth a bit, explaining over and over again that "because that's what I decided" isn't a reason per se. Eventually, it became clear that she didn't want to be in school all day, but preferred the half-day experience she currently has in pre-kindergarten.

"Why don't you want to be in school all day?"

"Because then I can't play games on the computer."

Recently, Meredith had been introduced to some educational games at PBSkids.org. It's become an infatuation. I point out that she can still play computer games even if she's in school all day (evenings and weekends), as well as point out that she currently isn't playing on the computer in the afternoons anyways and that wasn't going to change. The conversation then devolved further into her saying she was going to play on the computer every afternoon and me saying that she wasn't. Meredith informed me that that was her opinion and that she was right. "Meredith, you're entitled to your opinion, but as the person in charge I can say confidently you're not going to play computer every day." (Why was I continuing this conversation?)

When we got home, it didn't take long for her to ask to play on the computer. "No, we're going to have lunch now." She pouted a little. I guess we'll have to sell the concept of all-day kindergarten a little more to compete with the almighty computer.