Saku is the one going to school, but Troy and I are learning some things as well. Yesterday we received the first progress report. I will admit that I think that Saku is very bright boy and I would expect him to excel in school. And it doesn't help that many other adults comment on how smart he is as well. I also admit that I was a competitive student from early on, as in elementary school my teacher told me that "school wasn't a competition" as I would do extra homework...
So on his first progress report, Saku got "2" (approaches) on "knows all his alphabets" and I thought that this was off as he knows his alphabet. BUT I did not want to be the parent who freaks out about one little thing. Yet I felt a bit of concern whether the teacher was aware of Saku's abilities and I wanted to have an understanding of how he is tested.
As Troy dropped Saku off this morning, he talked with Mrs. Bohnsack and she explained how Saku had mistaken lower case "b" to lower case "d" and called "p" a "q". And if the student misses one, then they are graded as a "2". Also she showed Troy how he had missed many of the sight words as he was tested with, such as "can, a, and," which really should be easy for him. It is nice to have an understanding how things work, and it is also good to have an awareness that Saku gets intimated when he is put on the spot and needs to answer questions. And we know that the teacher is aware of Saku and his abilities and she had also been surprised by the lack of reading of the sight words.
Selfishly, and also unselfishly for Saku's sake, I want others to see his abilities and I want him to succeed. And I am aware that one progress report in KINDERGARTEN does not define anything, but it was a good starting point to make sure that we help Saku figure out a way to show what he knows.
The other things that we are learning about him at school is that he gets frequent nose bleeds and he falls over a lot. His teacher asked me he trips at home a lot. And the answer is that he doesn't. This is our child who learned to walk at 9 months and is very coordinated and nimble. We will try wearing his tennis shoes more to see if it is his sandals that bug him. He has also been to the nurse several times for random things. Some days it takes him few minutes to come out of the class room as he is giving his friends hugs as a good bye.
It is a weird transition when you suddenly don't know what is going on with your kid all the time and need to explain random things or asks questions about other things.
I am very happy with Saku's teachers and he likes them a lot so I feel good about his situation at school, but I sure would like to be a fly on the wall to know more about everything. Because a 5 year old can only tell you so much what is going on in the class room.
He has made good friends at school and school is overall a positive experience him. Zane is his buddy and they seem to stick together during lunch and recess. He tends to not finish all his work in class and has had to stay inside for recess for few times. He is very meticulous about his work, as stated by his teacher, so he takes a long time to get things done.
This week has been less emotional for him. I am very grateful for that. He does state "But I was gone all day" if Eerika seems to have get a preferential treatment with playing such as 10 minutes of playing time with me while Saku wants to play with me as well.
He seems like to like the Chinese aspect. On Monday he was in the bathroom and asked me "are you [insert an incomprehensible word]? So I said "what?" and this happened three times until I just asked him to come to the kitchen because I could not understand him. It turned out that he was asking me if I was a frog, by using the Chinese word for frog. So I literally could not understand him. He also suggested a Chinese name for Little Ninja and said that he could teach Little Ninja Chinese.
I still wrestle with the question whether this Chinese and all day Kindergarten is the best thing, yet it does feel right so I just need to express my doubts and fears to Troy and enjoy this year as we are committed to it.
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