Our First Nerd

Report card time!!!

Today I had an appointment with Eri's teacher, Ms. Kathy.  When I showed up for the 1140a appointment, Eri's entire class greeted me.  And Eri's "Hey Mum" with a simple wave to show acknowledgement but not necessarily acceptance of my arrival.  Ms. Kathy was just about to line the kids up for a walk down the hall to play in the ball room.  Come to think of it, I'm not sure if she meant to go play with balls, or if they really do refer to one of their rooms as a fancy ballroom (can't you just picture 3 year olds doing the waltz?!?  And waltzing perfectly together?!?!).  All of the kids lined up and at that point Eri said "Bye Mum" as if he thought I should be going now, with the same wave.  The secretary came to walk the class to the ballroom/ball room while Ms Kathy & I chatted about Eri.

I was happy to hear that he got all "A's".  And that's an "A" for "Always"...

Some key points she mentioned~

• Eri is very positive and has great self-esteem.
• Eri has great social skills and is very good at joining in & playing. 
• He shares and takes his turn.  (At this point, I raised my eyebrows...)
• He is very attentive and loves to be the first to answer during circle time.

And as I look at his report card...aka "Three Year Old Assessment", I see she gave him an "A" for clean-up time with a comment of "very good!".  (hah!)

Her only comment on needing improvement is in cutting.  I don't think I was able to hide my chuckle.  Cutting, you may ask?  Picture this:  a room with bright colors, toys, tables & chairs, books, blocks, and more, and oh wait!...a table with paper & lots of scissors in the center of the room.  (Mind you, this is the first thing I noticed when Eri started school and I thought having scissors at this close proximity to him was a bad idea....and the fact that Leona goes after the scissors every time we pick him up...right after the baby dolls, of course).  Well, my fear of Eri harshly slashing at himself & friends in class with the so innocently placed scissors at the cutting table was silenced at this news.  Ms. Kathy explained at the beginning of each month she changes the paper in the cutting table with the new color of the month.  She said the kids love to cut the fresh new paper.  But at the end of the month, when all of the paper is just a pile of scraps, it's just no fun.  Apparently Eri needs to pay attention next week at the start of the month!

She noticed he is a switch hitter...well, lefty & righty that is.  She said she's seen him favor his left hand and she thinks he will be a lefty, but he will write with both hands very well.  She notices that he doesn't press very hard when writing with his left hand, which explains why he gets frustrated when using a certain etching toy (???...she lost me at that one).  But she loves the way he writes his name.  Especially when he realizes he's running out of room and places the "i" above the "E" or who knows where.

I really enjoyed chatting with Ms. Kathy and listening about the fun things Eri does in school & all of his impressive behavior that he apparently leaves at the door upon exiting the classroom.  Although, to Eri's defense, just this morning he had a very nice conversation with Leona about sharing a toy he had in his hand.  It was almost perfectly scripted though, so either the things we (and Ms Kathy) are saying to him are finally sinking in, or he's figured out another way to trick us!  Here, Leona, we can share this, you take the black marker & decorate the wall first, I'll be waiting over here watching out for Mom, and then we'll trade.....