This is Calvin getting ready for school! His backpack and his lunch bag are all packed and ready to go. Yup, he has to bring his lunch and eat from it with his peers in school. My boy is now old enough to go to school. I can’t believe it!

Yesterday was his first day. I think I was more nervous than him. I kept telling him not to cry, and kept reminding him to go to the toilet, wash his hands etc etc. Robin laughed at me and said to me “I think you would be the one crying, NOT Calvin!”. He was quite right. Calvin did not cry at all. Thank God for that. He settled right in as he found something that he was interested to do. There were 2 teachers in the class. Both of them were really nice and have lots of experience working with children. I spoke with the teachers a bit and I lingered in the classroom for a while to make sure Calvin was alright. When I left, I was, in a way, emotional and yet at the same time I was proud of my son. He has indeed grown up. I did not cry.

We have enrolled Calvin in a 3-year-old kindergarten near our home for this term. It is not necessary for a 3-year-old child to attend kindy in this country, but we thought Calvin is quite ready for a school environment and we believe he will benefit from the many activities they have there. I actually *struggle* with the decision as I think kindy is similar to child care centre which he is already attending. I went to visit the school and spoke with the teachers there. My thinking somehow changed after that.

Well, the truth is, kindy is in fact similar to child care centre. There’s a lot of play time, and the activities are similar. The main difference is that it is a school environment and all the teachers are qualified early childhood educators. They have a structured learning program designed for the children. In addition, the children will learn many skills to help them to be independent and to behave outside their home environment. I think there’s where I have come to the decision that the kindy will be good for Calvin — that even though I teach him many skills at home, like behaving himself, feeding himself, gluing, cutting, colouring etc, but he is now learning to do all these things together with his teacher and peers in a school, outside his home, outside his comfort zone. He has to learn to listen and follow instructions from his teachers — not me. In any case, I hope and pray that we have made the right decision for him. We’ll wait and see.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 9th, 2008 at 10:39 pm and is filed under rambling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.