Yesterday all parents who wanted to were invited to come visit the school and see the kids in their "natural habitat". They gave the lessons as normal, but there were chairs set up in the back or to the sides of the classroom where parents could sit and observe. We were asked to stay for the full lesson, so as not to disrupt the teacher or the kids too much, but otherwise we were free to go wherever we pleased for the whole morning. I had planned to visit Sophie first, then Nick, then Sarah. But of course, that isn't what happened at all.
First, Noah took 20 minutes to put on his shoes and jacket, and even after all that time, I ended up having to do it for him. So we were both in a bad mood when it was time to drop him off for preschool. I was running terribly late by now, so barely said goodbye to him and took off. His teacher told me later that he was very angry for the first part of the morning. He told me later he was so mad he refused to make me a Christmas present as that was the activity for the day. Sigh. As they say on my favorite message board, I win the "Freaking Mother of the Year" award today.
Since I was now so late, I had no time to stop in to the kindergarten to see Sophie, but rather had to race to get to Nick's German lesson before it started. Yeah, not so successful on that one. Fortunately, his regular teacher, who already rolls his eyes every time he sees me coming, was out sick. So I escaped another mark of disapproval in his eyes. Not that I personally care what he thinks of me, but he treats Nick differently because of it, I think. It all started back when I refused to bend over backwards to get Nick back up to school just so he could look for some paper he needed to turn in. But that's another story.
Anyway, they had previously read a story about the owls and the ducks. The owls thought the duck way of doing things was very strange, and vice versa. Then the kids had to write down things they thought were strange that people did. For example, "I think it is strange that people smoke cigarettes knowing it will kill them." (That was one of Nick's) So for this lesson, they then had to write two plausible reasons for why people would want to do whatever the kids found strange. Kind of trying to get them to see the other point of view. I thought it was a pretty good exercise in tolerance, with a bit of German thrown in. For homework, they had to rewrite the original story of the owl and the duck in cursive.
I was pleased to see that Nicholas was not the biggest trouble maker, neither was he "Mr. Goody goody". He was just a nice, normal average kid in the class. That is what I am hoping for. I want him to stand out academically, but not socially. That is never good, and he already has a few obstacles in his way preventing that. Alexandra was very good, and sat nice and quietly on my lap the entire hour we were there. She did engage in several games of peek a boo with Nicholas from across the room, but it was quietly done. The other kids did turn around several times to look at her, she is so adorable and most of them have no babies at home. In fact, only one other kid has a half sister that is a baby. So a baby is quite interesting to them.
There was a recess break where the parents and children were served freshly baked slices of Zopf and coffee if we wanted it. Sarah and her friends took Alexandra around to show her the playground, so I went and visited Sophie quickly in Kindergarten. She showed me all the beautiful art pieces they had been working on, and where she stores all her works in progress in a drawer. I had seen the drawer before, but there were some new creations that I was rather impressed with. One was this really long snake made out of two different colors of paper folded together. I think I am going to have her make one out of red and green for Christmas. Sadly, I didn't think to take any photos.
After the break was over, Alexandra and I went to watch Sarah have p.e. They are just little first graders, but they still go into the changing rooms and change into their p.e. clothes and shoes. (You have to have special shoes for the gym that won't leave scuff marks on the floor.) There was a lot of running around, although it seemed to be somewhat organized. Groups of two or three children would hold hands and run around as fast as they could through the gym, trying not to run into any other groups of children running around holding hands. Sarah seemed to really love it. She was laughing the entire time. Then their teacher came out and had the kids set up different little stations all throughout the gym. The children were divided into groups and they all had 7 minutes or so at each station.
When all the groups had had a turn at each station, the teacher blew her whistle and all the kids gathered in a circle around her to listen to their next set of instructions. Apparently, this fascinated Baby quite a bit, so into the silence of the children expectantly listening to their teacher, came this loud squeal combined with a sucking in of air from Baby. It totally echoed through the room, and all in attendance cracked up, including the other parents. She certainly has no fear of being the center of attention.
After the kids were all dressed in their normal clothes again, we headed back to the classroom. Sarah showed me lots of her artwork, and we looked at each individual page in her drawing book. Unfortunately, it was then almost time to go pick up Noah from preschool. She really wanted me to stay longer, but I had to go. What I love about this school is that if I ever want to come visit on a day that isn't parent visiting day I am welcome to. They have no problem with parents just hanging out in the back observing for whatever reason. So I promised Sarah I would come back soon another day.