School Days: PK3 Month One {Riley}

“I like riding in the car to school, but I don’t want to go to school.”

That’s what I heard four out of the five days of every week Riley has been in school so far. Or something similar.

However, he is getting better. He did really well the first week or so, then he started to cry every time I dropped him off, and now he finally seems to be settling in. He still tells me he doesn’t want to go to school, but at least there aren’t any tears.

I may not do a recap like this every month, but I’m going to try to post about what Riley has been doing in his PK-3 class every now and then. It’s only been five weeks but he’s already done so much!

Week One: “My School.” They learned about routines, behaviors, and expectations. They were introduced to the concepts of counting and patterns. As you already know, they read The Kissing Hand and did a couple of associated activities: a poem and handprint picture and also a paper bag raccoon. Riley also had his first potty accident, on the very first full school day when he woke up from his nap. Understandable.

Week Two: “Making Friends.” They partnered up to fingerpaint (although Riley apparently refused and Ms. Amanda didn’t force him to participate) and also made Gooey Goop with their new friends. They listened to and identified letters and sounds. The first all-school mass to celebrate the school’s 45th anniversary was also this week, and I attended with Riley’s class. However, I ended up checking him out early after mass because he was sick, and he was absent the rest of the week. He missed out on making a friendship bracelet and exchanging it with one of his new friends at school. :(

Week Three: “Learning Together.” They learned how to work and play with their friends at school. They learned the Pledge of Allegiance. They completed a project, “How Tall Am I?”, where they measured their heights with string. They learned about the letter “Aa.” They painted paper plates like apples and had a picture from their first day of school attached to them. They tasted different types of apples to see which one they liked the best, but Riley missed this activity since we were at the beach. They colored worksheets from religion (shamrock) and library (pizza).

Week Four: “Getting Along.” They counted to five. They learned about the letter “Bb.” They had a Bubble Day to celebrate the letter of the week. (Riley came home that afternoon and excitedly told me, “Ms. Michelle flinged the bubbles at me!”) They learned that God made the world and everything in it. (Riley is apparently thankful that God made hippos.) They read stories in library about going to school and making new friends. (One of Riley’s new friends from school is named Michael.) They had a Bear Buddy Day when they all got to bring a stuffed bear to school. (Riley brought Macaroni.) They colored a “B is for Bear” worksheet and made boat-shaped sponge art.

Week Five: “Families.” They learned about family roles, members, and unique qualities of families. They made family trees (I don’t have this back yet). They learned about the letter “Cc.” They colored a cupcake picture in library after reading If You Give a Cat a Cupcake. They created their own “helping hand” (I don’t have this back yet either.). They learned about shapes and had a shape parade. Riley’s very first school picture day was also this week….can’t wait to get those back!

Some other things of note: Riley can recite the prayer that they say every day before snack and lunch (“Bless us, O Lord, for these thy gifts…..”) and knows how to sit “crisscross applesauce.”  He cried a lot in the beginning because he missed me. He told Ms. Amanda, “I’ll just sit right here and wait for Mama.” He didn’t always want to participate in everything, like painting/coloring, PE, music, etc. Hopefully this gets better. He did not eat great at lunch, but after seeing their lunchtime chaos, I understand why he doesn’t. He fell asleep during naptime most days but talked in the beginning of them at first. Ms. Amanda had to tell him, “Shhh; don’t talk.”

He has gotten a green stamp on his behavior chart every day thus far. However, he came home on Wednesday and told me that he had to move his banana (Ms. Amanda’s theme is monkeys and she uses a banana tree to enforce behavior.) from green to yellow because he was talking during quiet time. He also confessed that he got a time-out for taking toys away from someone else and not sharing. Oh my. However, I did hear back from Ms. Amanda about both of these incidents, and she said neither was a big deal at all. Whew.

He claims the gray lego truck every day during free play. He has told me multiple times that there is a big fire engine in the outside play area that’s broken so Daddy should fix it. He has apparently watched episodes of Clifford, Super Why, and (gasp!) Barney in school because he talks about them at home. He comes home singing songs that he learned from Mr. Tanner in music class and tells me he played with animal bean bags and hula hoops in PE.

My sweet, big, preschool boy.

Here’s hoping this next stretch of PK3 will be even better.