Kindergarten: A Review

Kindergarten was long.  Super long.  It would not end!  My friend, whose children go to a private school, went to California and Disneyland for a week and came back and we were still in school! And the last two weeks were mostly a waste of time; I had a really hard time getting up every morning to send my kid to watch movies at school.  But Rex wanted to go, so go he did.  

Overall, however, we were pretty pleased with kindergarten.  I could have done with more than one 25 minute recess in a 7 hour school day and fewer movies (seriously, Rex watched parts of Frozen nearly every day while waiting to be released to get on the bus).   But Rex finished kindergarten reading somewhere between a middle of first grade and beginning of second grade read level and doing math at middle of first grade.   (It's my blog I can brag all I want).  Rex is a smart kid, but I really owe a lot of his success to his teacher.  I tried teaching Rex to read and couldn't get him interested but she did it.  She was strict but loving.  And she watched out for Rex--he's a bit of a nerd.  

Which, I guess is another thing I didn't like about kindergarten--the other kids.  One kid in particular picked on Rex a lot.  He'd just come up and punch Rex in the face for no reason.  Really, I even asked his teacher if Rex had done anything at all to provoke the boy and no, the kid was just a bully.  But his teacher always stepped in and made sure Rex was ok.  And it didn't seem to bother Rex.   He knew the kid was a bully and brushed it off. Rex had even volunteered to be this little boy's partner and to help him with his assignments.  After he punched Rex a few times, Rex finally told his teacher he was tired of being his partner and she moved him to the other side of the room and made sure that they will not be in the same class next year.  She was good to Rex.   But a few kids made fun of Rex for coloring with pink one day.  Now that is ridiculous.  And seemed to bother Rex.  We talked about it and decided you can't color a sunset without pink and that it's ok to use pink, but come on now parents, teach your kids something.  

I guess what I'm saying is I give kindergarten and A for academics, a B- for physical activity, and a C for social skills.  

As mentioned that last few weeks, were basically a constant party.  

There was field day, in which Alice and Henry were not permitted to participate, so Henry got strapped, crying, into the stroller, and Alice become the photographer, while I was super bored and stressed from keeping Alice and Henry happy for a good two hours.  For a school that teaches children, Rex's school is not super child-friendly.

Alice and her camera

Alice longing to play along

Henry gnawing on his hand to stave off the boredom.

Alice breaking free to play in some puddles left from one of the games

Rex having fun.

Then there was the end of school party that Rex also wanted me to attend.  They had extra food to share with Alice, but she didn't get to play the game, which she was pretty bummed about.

Rex's table of nice, well-mannered children who didn't punch him in the face.

One last lecture.

And then the last day finally came and while I was doing a happy dance about not having to get up and catch a bus or do homework anymore, Rex was pretty sad.

He got over it once we had ice cream for dinner, went night swimming, had a water balloon fight, and went camping in the course of two days.  He now knows the glory of summer.