VPK

My goodness I totally forgot to blog about Kaitlyn starting VPK this year.  In Florida we have a voluntary Pre-Kindergarten program that basically makes "pre-school" free to all qualifying children.  You do have to register them in the spring before they start in the fall and wait for "approval".  (I've never heard of anyone getting turned down.)  Our daycare offers VPK so of course I was just going to keep her there for convenience and not to mention we have the best VPK teacher in the county.  The program runs from 9 AM to noon.  We just have to pay for the extra time that she is there for daycare; it's a greatly reduced fee, YAY! 

She absolutely LOVES it.  I asked her before she started what she wanted to learn about in VPK and she, without hesitation, stated MATH.   I am not a lover of math so thank God this child does not take after her mother in that regard.  (I'm pretty sure it's because of Team Umizoomi...thanks Nickelodeon.)  I warned the assistant director, who also teaches the VPK class, that there better be some math in the curriculum or they were going to have a hot, sassy girl on their hands.  She laughed and reassured me there was...PHEW. 

She was so excited to start VPK.  They went back to daycare a week before the actual program started because as a teacher I have a week of pre-school myself that I have to go to.  She made sure to tell me to not feed Tyler something that took him so long to eat because she did NOT want to be late.  (He takes forever eating cereal because he does not put any milk in it and eat it one cheerio at a time.) 

I took the obligatory first day of pre-school pictures along with the cute framed printable I got from I {HEART} Naptime.  My plan is to hang the framed printable over the sliding glass door in the playroom for every year the kids are in school and stick a 4x7 picture of each child holding the frame for comparison purposes.  I sent her off with her daddy on her first day of pre-school so I could also head off to my first day of classes.  I picked her up after my school day ended and asked her how her day was.  She was not happy at all that they didn't learn math.  I told her it probably would be awhile before they got to the math part because they had to learn the rules and learn who the new kids were and also let the teachers get to know them.  She was partly satisfied with that explanation but firmly told me "there better be some math tomorrow."  (Oy vey her teachers are in for a year.)  Ms. Mary, the assistant director/VPK teacher, told me that she absolutely LOVED having Kaitlyn in her class and there was no doubt that her mother is a teacher.  I absolutely love hearing that compliment because we truly do work hard with our kids instilling values, respect and a love for learning in to them.  I work with a lot of kids whose parents do not make any of those things a priority and it's a constant struggle to get them to see the importance of a good education. 

Every morning dad gets a report from the day before on how adorable Kaitlyn is and how smart she is.  So far she has given a lesson on cylinder (string) cheese, speaking Spanish, and what fun words start with whatever letter they are learning for the week.  (This week they are learning the letter "B" and she geniusly came up with the word booger! *eye roll*) 

I am so glad that she is having such a good time and that she's learning so much.  She came home with homework last night and insisted on finishing it before she even ate.  Super impressive because we were having her all time favorite, spaghetti; also the homework wasn't due for another week.  Hopefully she will always enjoy school or at least appreciate the need for a good education.