Summer Ends, Second Grade Begins

Second grade. Second grade!  I will probably say something to that effect every year, won't I?

Liam started second grade on Thursday of last week.  He wasn't nervous, he wasn't worried, it was no big deal to him. He hopped on the bus and headed off to school without a backward glance.

The other mothers and me? Cheering. The bus driver was laughing her head off at us.

He likes his teacher, knows all his classmates, and seems to have settled into the routine of school without too much trouble. Last year was a difficult transition. He has spent a year going to half-day kindergarten and then he transitioned to full day first grade.  That first month of school was brutal with him. He was tired and cranky and difficult. This year is another story.  He seems to be falling back into the school routine with almost no trouble. *knock on wood*

Today begins the first full week of school and, looking back on last year's post from this time, it was not an easy week last year. I hope that it's easier on everyone this year.

Here's to school and an end to The Crap Filled Summer of 2012!

Ready to head to the bus stop!

Jamie got in the way but it's too cute not to share.

Adjustments

"I hate school, Mom."

"You hate school?  What don't you like about it?"

"Everything.  I hate homework, I hate going.  I just hate it."

As these words came spilling out of Liam's mouth, I could feel tears start to well up in my eyes.  Two weeks into school and he hates it.  

"Do you hate your teacher?"

"No."

"And you like lunch and recess and gym, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," he replied a bit reluctantly.

"So you don't hate EVERYTHING, right? And you get to learn lots of new things."

"I HATE learning new things!"

Aha.  It was going to be one of those conversations.  Clearly, nothing I said was going to make him feel much better because he didn't want to feel better.  He wanted to hate school.

I sighed.  "It will get better, honey.  I promise."

It was the best I could offer him but I felt so bad for him.  Liam loved school last year and he always looked forward to going.  He'd push me out the door to be as close to the front of drop off line as possible.  He came home bubbly and happy every day.

This year is an entirely different matter.   I know that a lot of it has to do with the schedule adjustment.  I know that first grade is The Big Leagues and very different from what he is used to.  But I also know that his teacher knows this and that she is working hard to get the kids through all these changes as smoothly as possible.  All the same, my heart hurts for him that he is experiencing these feelings at all.  

Slowly and incrementally he seems a bit more chipper about school.  He came home yesterday in a better mood and Scot took him out for ice cream last night.  Some one on one time with Dad really seemed to center him.  We'll keep on plugging, because that's what we do, and I'll keep hoping that his love of learning will return soon.

Whew. We Made It.

We're all a little worse for wear but we have survived the first full week of school.  I don't think I've ever been so happy to see a Friday afternoon.

Liam is happy with his new teacher and his new class.  He loves being a big bus-riding kid and eating lunch at school.  Recess is the highlight of his day so far because he gets to see all his friends from last year.  But he is Worn Out.  He's wandering around with dark circles under his eyes that make it look like he ended up at the wrong end of a fist during Tae Kwon-Do.  The poor kid was exhausted last night.

Scot and I are little better than he is.  The new schedule is wearing on me and the week has been busy otherwise (see: vet emergency).  I probably should have stopped doing 90 miles an hour before I hit that wall in my way.  But hit it I did and tonight I am knackered.  The good news is that Curriculum Night at school was last night so tonight I can fall on my face.

Speaking of which, we love his teacher.  She's everything you want a first grade teacher to be.  She's clearly very excited to be in the classroom full time this year (she was a resource teacher last year).  I can't wait to see how far she can take these kids.

And as for Jamie, well, he's finally starting to get into the groove of things.  It seems like he had the hardest time with the changes earlier this week but is in the best shape tonight.  The inverse has been true for the rest of the family.  So, while we're all ready to face plant, he's got enough energy to power Tokyo.

Thank goodness it's a holiday weekend.  We can all use the extra day of rest!

From Ridiculous to Completely Absurd

I was complaining a couple of weeks ago about the stupidity of the school schedule during parent-teacher conferences and I should have kept my fat trap shut because it has only gotten worse.  I'm starting to think that whoever does the scheduling for my district is on some really good drugs.  I wish they'd share because then this might make sense to me.

The entire month of November is screwed up.  We will not have a single normal week for the whole month.  It started during that first week with parent-teacher conferences.  By day three of that schedule, I thought I was going to fall over in a heap.  Everything felt so hectic.

The week after that we had our regularly scheduled once-a-month early dismissal Friday.  I *hate* early dismissal days.  Lunch is always super rushed because I have to shove it in really fast.  Liam has to be at school at 11:30 and he gets home at 1:30 - so he's there right when he should be eating lunch but kindergarten doesn't get a lunch break so the kids just have to make do with early or late lunch at home and the regular snack at school.  It just throws the whole day for a loop and I can't stand it.

That same week, Scot and I went to see Ben Folds which fell on a Thursday night - a night we would normally have been at the dojang.  Since that wasn't going to work out, we took Liam to a class on Saturday morning to make up the class.

This week, Open House fell on a Tuesday.  Again, this is a TKD night.  So, once again, we had to skip class and we'll make it up on Saturday morning.

Next week is the real kick in the jewels, though.  First, there's no school Thursday and Friday due to the Thanksgiving holiday.  Second, the entire kindergarten is putting on a Thanksgiving puppet show on Wednesday.  It's being held at 10:15 am and that means that all afternoon session students have to attend the morning session instead.  I thought that meant a change in schedule on Wednesday only.  Oh, how very wrong I was.  In order for them to practice for the show, all sessions of kindergarten (that's 40 kids, folks) must attend morning kindergarten ALL THREE DAYS next week.  I think I may just stab something.

I don't understand how the kids can be learning a damned thing with all these short days, schedule changes, days given over to show preparation, etc, etc, etc.  There have been days when they've only been in the classroom for 45 minutes.  WHAT IS THE POINT?!  Couldn't they have spread some of this stuff out a little bit more?  It's already beyond annoying to me that our district insists on half-day kindergarten in the first place, but cutting down on instructional time even further - and for an entire month - makes me stabbity.

I've said before that Liam is a creature of habit and routine is his saving grace.  When routines are off, he has trouble adjusting.  We do our best to help him through it and prepare him for upcoming changes, but we still end up with a kid in tears.  On Saturday, while I was trying to get him ready for TKD, he broke down into tears about going.  He loves going to TKD and to see him resisting to the point of tears was so unusual.  When I asked him about it, he eventually came out with the fact that he is used to going at night instead of in the morning and that he was scared of not knowing anyone.  Translation:  I don't like this change in my routine, Mom.  I worked through it with him and reassured him that there would be people there that he knew and he calmed down and by the time class was over, he was bouncy and happy.

Yesterday he cried and whined that he didn't want to go to school.  Normally the kid is pushing me out the door, bouncing up and down, completely revved up to go to school.  Yesterday he was upset, sullen, and all out rude to me.  Obviously, I made him go and he was happy when he got home, but I have no idea how things went in the classroom yesterday.

The holidays are always a rough time of year anyway - with all the excitement and family plans and whatever else.  But now school is pitching in and helping to make things so much worse.  Anyone else have a kid like Liam?  How do you prepare them for things like this?

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Not only has Liam started kindergarten bringing a whole new schedule to our lives but I'm attempting to make Jamie give up his morning nap.  He'll be 18 months old in 4 days and, quite honestly, I've had it with this two naps a day business.  It's a pain in my bahookey, thankyouverymuch.

With Liam starting school and changing schedule anyway, I figured I'd just add on a few more logs to the fire and rip away Jamie's morning nap, too.  Did I mention Jamie is working on a molar at the moment, as well?  It won't kill me, right?  RIGHT?

Efforts to this point have been scattershot.  In the last 7 days he's taken only one nap on 6 of them.  However, yesterday I put him down in the morning due to a bad night's sleep the previous night.  He slept for an hour and a half; I figured I'd get at least an hour out of him in the afternoon.

That was a pipe dream.

He chatted in the crib for an hour before my mother-in-law (who was watching him so I could attend an appointment) gave up and got him out.  He was happy and giggly all the way to bedtime and then slept like a rock all night.

Oooo-kay.

So today I didn't offer the morning nap and planned to put him down after I dropped Liam off at school.  We made it through lunch time, although he was cranky as hell in spots, and then we had about 20 minutes to kill before we had to leave for school.  Jamie was whining and cranking about me telling him no about something or other when suddenly it was silent.

"Jamie!  Where are you, buddy?"

[crickets]

"Jamie!  Honey, what are you doing?"

[crickets and more crickets]

Crickets are never good.  NEVER.  I figured he was doing something particularly evil so I got up to go look for him.  I nearly stepped on him because this is what I found:

He stopped crying and cranking and whinging and whining and simply fell over asleep in the middle of the floor.  Apparently he wanted that morning nap I didn't give him.

After snapping a picture or five I had to wake him up.  I felt bad but we had to leave in 20 minutes to take Liam to school so I really had no choice.  When we got back from drop off I put him down for a nap.  He slept from 12:45 until 3:00 when I had to wake him up so we could go meet Liam at the bus stop.  He was so sacked out that when I went in to get him he was still all tucked up in the same position he was when I tucked him in for nap.

I'm hoping that in another week he'll be feeling more like himself.  In the meantime, I'll keep a watch under my feet for a randomly sacked out toddler.