So far in September...

Here are some of the things Josh has been up to this month:

Painting at the easel - using the force!

Drawing pictures in his journal.

Checking out Big Red (the class beta fish).

Learning about gears.

Making "my owns body"

Picking a monkey to draw for his journal.

Reading a book on Tumblebooks before nap time. The class favorite is called Fifty Below Zero.

Making circle people

Josh's response at our dinner time reflection of our favorite part of the day has been "playing with blocks at big school" pretty much every day.

This was during PE - Josh is on the far side holding onto a yellow section. 

This is an early math activity that he loved so much. Usually when I pick him up, he is still groggy from his nap and ready to go home. The day they had this activity, he woke up excitedly and went straight to the table to do it one more time before leaving.

They were studying the letter O and made these octopus pictures in Mrs. Curry's art class. Josh's was the only one with all the legs spaced all the way around... Except his does have 9 legs. 

Driving home from school one day he said, "I have a heart and lungs, you know."

Making his own face

Recess activities! Usually they play on their own Pre-K only play ground. But there isn't a ton of shade, so when it's really hot they play next to the school where there is a lot more shade.

They planted wheat grass in eggshells. Josh was SO excited to see that the grass sprouted over the weekend! They drew faces on the shells and the grass grew up like hair. Super cute!

Writing his name. He has been able to write Jj, Oo, and H fairly well for some time, but he has gotten really good at Ss, and h now too!

Painting apples with apples.

Still life drawing of apples for his journal.

Making their own applesauce - Josh loved it!

They had an apple taste test - Josh liked red best, but the golden delicious won overall favorite.

So that's what has been happening. I have taken on several roles as a volunteer at his school (to give me an excuse to stay close by) and at first Josh would get upset if he saw me there doing something other than being with him. But, he has finally gotten used to seeing me around. 

One day this week after his nap, he saw me hanging artwork in the hall outside his classroom and just smiled and gave me a thumbs up. He happily went back to playing until I was ready to come get him. It definitely makes my heart happy to know he is happy when he is away from me. 

Today we are driving to Indiana to celebrate his Uncle Hersel's 40th birthday. He has been SO excited about this trip, but when he realized he was missing big school today he was sad and said, "but I just love big school!"

<3

Two weeks down.

This week at Big School:

Josh drew a self-portrait while observing himself in the mirror. I think (of course) that his was one of the best in his class! His teachers put copies up on the wall outside the classroom. I will try and take a picture tomorrow so you can see that I am not completely biased about that. 

EDIT: Here is his finished portrait

And these are some of the others:

They made a class graph of everyone's names organized by the number of letters in each.

They read The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. It was one of Josh's very first favorites (thanks, Grandma Katie). Then they experimented with colors and patterns by making caterpillar pictures.

They learned about the number zero.

One definition of zero

Is the mathematical value

Between positive and negative values

They Might Be Giants taught me that.

They made an Age Collage. Josh chose three popsicle sticks and three blue feathers. Blue is his favorite color, by the way. And this was also picture day! Can't wait to see how they turn out.

In his Mandarin class they learned some new songs and I was really amazed to hear him randomly sing them to himself throughout the week! I convinced him to let me take a short video. I will try to link it. http://youtu.be/EWAJe_yPe5o

The newsletter this week said that the results of the previous years Mandarin comprehension exams showed that all 20 of the pre-k students not only passed - a passing grade is 120, they all scored above 166 and two students even achieved perfect scores! My suspicion is they were already Mandarin speakers though, but I am planning to ask. 

Josh also got to meet the Librarian and was excited to point her out to me the next day when we saw her in the hall. I don't know her name though, because he called her "the library guy," but she remembered his name, which I found impressive.

Friday was the first home football game of the year, so all the students and teachers wore their school tee shirts. I really wanted to take him to the football game, but kickoff was at 7, and we have been trying to stick to the schedule as much as possible.

Here are a few shots of his classmates, he is in the background of each of these:

Violet (she has a twin brother in the other class and on older brother in kindergarten this year).

Lucas

Tessa and Violet. Josh is in the time-out chair. When I asked him why he said that he was playing too rough, I am so not surprised.

Tessa again, she has the first class birthday and turns 4 this week! Josh's will be the next birthday we celebrate in the classroom.

Another photo of Laney.

Josh and Lucas on the slide.

He loves his big school! At dinner, we have a family tradition that we each get to say what our favorite part of the day was. Tonight Josh said his favorite part of today was big school... It's Sunday. I am so glad he is thinking happy thoughts about his days at school. On Friday, I said that I was going to meet him for lunch and bring him home to take his nap. He immediately protested and said that he wanted to stay at big school the whole day!  

I guess all that time worrying that he wouldn't handle a full time program was not necessary. That is a wonderful thing!

Bonus: 

For those of you who made it through that entire post, this is a clip of Josh singing his favorite new song... http://youtu.be/T0KqBpGeJzA

Big School!

Since making the decision in February to send Josh to preschool this year, I have had extremely mixed feelings. I am so happy to admit that after his first full week, I could not be more certain that we have made a fantastic choice for him. Josh is naturally outgoing and quite extroverted (gets that from his father, for sure)! He has needed more daily interaction than I have been able to offer - all my character voices sound basically the same, and I am not nearly imaginative enough. He made fast friends on the first day, and he is noticeably thriving in his new surroundings!

Here are some photos that his teachers uploaded to the class website today:

This is Kipton - Josh's number one new buddy. Josh loved making this cloud painting and told me all about dipping the sponge into the paint before pressing it to the paper!

A sandbox inside the classroom - how cool is that!?

That is Miss Jodi, one of his teachers. I love how approachable and confident she is. I am amazed at her multitasking skills, and look forward to getting to know her better as the year goes on.

This is Laney (short for Delaney) and she is one of Josh's friends that he met over the summer. She is observing Big Red, the class Beta fish - Josh is building a shelter in the background.

And by the way - how have I never heard of a Promethean board before?? That's one on the back wall.

The best part of this whole week has been the conversations Josh and I have in the car on the drive to and from school. It's about a 23 min drive and I park so that I can walk him in/meet him at his classroom. Eventually I will let him hop in and out at the curb (maybe), but for now I really enjoy getting those extra moments with him.

On the drive the first day our conversation went sort of like this:

Josh: Tell me a story about Grandpa when he was a baby.

Me: One time Grandpa played a trick on his sister and told her that a ghost named George lived in their closet.

Josh: But that was when Grandpa was a baby in your tummy?

Me: Grandpa wasn't a baby in my tummy, I was Grandpa's baby. You were the baby in my tummy.

Josh: So you were a baby in Grandpa's tummy??

Me: No, babies are only in tummies of mommies - I was a baby in Marmee's tummy.

Josh: Oh. Well how do babies get out of the mommy's tummy?

Me: Well, when babies are born they come out of the mommy's tummy.

Josh: I know that already, but HOW do they come out?

Me: (nervously) Um... Well, there is this place called the birth canal... And when babies are born they go through it. (I know... What a terrible answer, but this was the last conversation I expected to have on the morning of the first day of Pre-preschool...)

Josh: But where is it?

Me: Um... It's inside of mommies... 

I can't remember how I managed to change the subject, but somehow I was able to distract him from this line of questioning. Needless to say, I was ill prepared for that discussion. Going forward, I have to prepare discussion topics in advance!

Here is a snapshot of his sweet little face that I hurriedly took the morning of his first full day of Pre-preschool. I love that he was holding on tight to his beloved Mellobear. He gets to nap with Mellobear everyday.

Oh, and he really loved that spikey hair! He pointed it out to every person we encountered as we walked to class.

And a couple more for good measure: