Kindergarten - again

I have a kindergartner - again. On Friday, I registered Colby - my baby! - for Kindergarten. WOW! Hard to believe. He went with me and did pretty well while I filled out the mountains of paperwork.

The older kids (3-5 grades) had TCAPs (our standardized tests) last week, so Friday was a relaxing day for them. Garrett's teacher told them Friday morning they weren't allowed to learn anything that day. So, after Colby & I registered for Kindergarten, we went outside and he played on the playground with Garrett's class for almost an hour. He had a blast!

He's young - he won't be 5 until the day before he starts. His brother was the same way. In fact, Garrett's birthday is later than Colby's. I considered holding him out. And even though he's registered, I reserve the right to do just that. I did the same with his brother. Spent the whole summer preaching to him about how he needed to behave. We started him and he did fine.

I know every child is different. But, really, how do you hold a child out who is READING just because he's young? Don't get me wrong, Colby's not reading classical literature or anything. But he's reading. I've been trying to remember Garrett's "sight words" from Kindergarten and work on those. He's doing really, really well. He also knows all the sounds of his letters, so in addition to the "sight words" we're working on sounding words out, too. That's going okay.

We're still working on things - like sitting still - but I suspect it will be worse if I hold him out and he's bored when he does finally start. As it is, I'm afraid he's going to be a little bored this year - Garrett was. But, we have great Kindergarten teachers at our school (we have great teachers in all grades, but right now Kindergarten is my concern). Teachers who make learning fun - even if it's something the kids already know - like the sound M makes.

Next year is my first year with 2 in school. A Kindergartner and a 4th grader. I'm not sure it's sunk in yet. Talk to me in August.