Why I Love Our Little Charter School

Little Man literally won the lottery...the lottery to get into his charter school. I had wanted him at this school since he was like 2 or 3 years old and they had an opening for a third grade teacher! Yes, I applied to teach with them, I wanted him in so badly. (Employees and siblings get dibs on open spots!)

So when lottery application time came around last year, I was turning them in the moment I could! I still remember the night we got the call. I was at Bible Study and the kids were with their dad. When we got home, there was a missed call on the phone, but no message. It was from the Charter School! I checked my cell phone and there was a voice mail. He had got in!

This school is small, one class per grade. His kindergarten class is maxed at 24 kids. (Which is 4 more than what they had initially drawn for! They opened up 4 more spots in the summer due to high enrollment in the public schools.) This is so great! Why? Here's a few reasons:

1. They know us!
Okay, I know this sounds crazy, but I like the fact that I can drop my son's lunch off in the office when he forgets, or donate disinfecting wipes, and the secretary already knows who I am. I've only been in the office a handful of times. And the teacher is always telling me things in the pick up or emailing. This is one of the great things about having him at a "small" school. Sure I could've put him the public school where they have more classes per grade and maybe this would've happened, but not likely. Little Man isn't going to be lost in the shuffle of the many classes of kindergartners.

2. My son is academically advanced!
One of the school's "goals" as a charter is to make sure each child is meeting individual academic goals. Going in, I knew my son had just about met all the kindergarten standards. I go to his first trimester conference, yeah, he's met them all. Kid passed kindergarten in the first trimester! But we're keeping him with his peers as he is still a bit behind his peers in the emotional and social aspect of things. But that means that the teacher has to do some quick thinking to keep him involved! Thank goodness for technology! But my kindergartner is telling me about "bossy R" and "bully E" and contractions. Things they don't teach until first grade! And because the school is small, his teacher is able to talk with the first grade teacher and find out what she would like to make sure he knows going into first grade, so she can make sure he hits those milestones.

It's important to me that Little Man continue to grow academically, but remain with his peers. And had I put him in the public school, this may not have happened. He may not have been challenged enough. He may have become a problem child. But that hasn't happened. We are working on his social skills while enhancing his academics. And EVERY break that is longer than a 3-day weekend, he gets homework! And his homework is first grade stuff. AND his teacher sends home the extra stuff! How great is that?!

3. Community Involvement!
Another one of the school's "goals" as a charter school is to get the kids involved in the community. So my son's class picked up trash at one of the parks in town. And now that we are looking at my son's 6th birthday party, we are asking his friends to bring donations for the local animal shelter instead of presents. And surprisingly, Little Man was okay with it! It just goes to show you that kids CAN be involved in their community. They are learning to be productive members of society NOW and learning that even as a five or six year old they can make an impact.

I'm SO glad I picked a charter school for Little Man. It was the best decision I made. And I'm SO glad we won the lottery! Hopefully when Princess gets there, they will be willing to work with her special needs as well as her intelligence. And hopefully by the time Little Man is done there, we'll be able to move him to a charter high school. (It's something that they're looking at now.)

Even We Have Our Bad Days

I often feel like the special needs community makes a big deal about the parents being "Super." They juggle appointments, therapists, medications, equipment and the way the Internet makes it seem, we all do it with ease. But what you don't see are our bad days. The days where we just want to cry (and sometimes do!). The days where NOTHING goes right. The fights, the meltdowns, the screaming, the crying, the spills, the leaks. Even we have our bad days.

Yesterday was one of those days where NOTHING went right. I felt like an awful parent. I felt like I wanted to go hide in my room. And the thing was, it actually started really good!

Little Man got up and after ten minutes of watching TV (yes, I let him watch TV in the morning before school to help him wake up), he wanted breakfast! He was then ready to go to school by 7:15 in the morning! This NEVER happens. Who was this kid? We were out the door by 7:25 because I had to get Princess up. He was one of the first few at school and there was NO line to drop him off. I totally thought it was going to be a good day. I was wrong.

It started when it was time to get Princess dressed. See, Princess can't really get herself dressed or undressed and she's almost 3. There are things she should be able to do, but can't and things that I believe she can do but is so flipping stubborn that she won't. She will be receiving OT twice a month to help with this. So I decided to start before we have OT in place because there is a plan in the way things are done while we are AT the therapists. The main therapy will happen at the beginning and end of the session. Princess will take off her clothes, get to play and then put her clothes back on to go home. I know, sounds weird, right? But we were advised to get a leotard or swimsuit for her to wear. (Luckily we found her a short sleeved and long sleeved pink leotard at Walmart in her size and didn't have to find a dance store!)

Well, I wanted to start early with this "getting dressed/undressed" thing so we're not taking HALF the time getting undressed and HALF the time getting dressed and then there's NO TIME to play in between. (Playing is the reward for getting undressed.) So we decided to make her a sticker chart because she seems to be motivated by stickers.

So, back to yesterday. It was a NIGHTMARE getting her dressed! It literally took us 45 minutes! We almost didn't go to school! There was screaming, crying, bribery, everything. I felt like the WORST mom in the world! But we did manage to get to school. And she got to share her stuffed Everest because she was the helper. But beyond that, I think school was just too much stimulation for her yesterday. See, it's "Circus Week." So this week, we have a bunch of circus themed games in every room. The kids can have popcorn for snack. We even have a mini bounce house! And they are given tickets and if they want to, at every station, they can trade their tickets for prizes! Well, this was Princess's second day of preschool this week and I think after the first day of "go where you want, no schedule," the second day was just too much for her. Granted, I was able to sneak out and go grab a mocha because I felt so bad and she was hiding under the slide playing with her tickets. She wasn't interested in trading in the tickets, she just wanted to play with them. And then when I cam back, she was more interested in the things we usually have out, like the light table and the puzzles, than the games. She primarily stayed in the room where there were the least amount of kids. And when we went outside to play, she just wanted to sit on my lap and snuggle. Then she didn't want to leave!

When we got home, we watched some "Paw Patrol" and she seemed back to normal. We went outside and blew bubbles and she even let me use my new leaf blower. She went and sat on the steps into the house while I did it. And when we picked up her brother at school, she definitely seemed like everything was okay!

Then after Little Man was home, she started "denning." She hid herself under the dining room table, under the blanket, and then under the trampoline with all of her stuffies. Yeah, she was having an overwhelmed day, even though her brother wasn't being loud or anything. She took a late nap and then when she woke up and I was making tacos for dinner, MeMe had to hold "Tinky Nee," her giraffe, because he didn't like the noise the cheese grater made. She hasn't done this in a long time. She had figured out what that noise was and would usually come and ask for cheese.

When I got her into bed, I hoped that today would be a better day. So far, it seems to be. We skipped gym because it's been raining all day. And otherwise, we've just had a calm, peaceful day with puzzles and games. SO much better than yesterday!

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Six Weeks till School

Oh my goodnees! Where has the summer gone?

Okay, well, I knew it was going to go fast, but there's only six weeks left before I have a kindergartner!

With that being said, things started arriving in the mail from the school addressed: "To the parents of:" What?! Already? Okay, I've always gotten stuff addressed as "The the parents of:" for Princess. Usually it's from a hospital or clinic. But now I'm getting stuff for Little Man from his school!

Okay, breathe. This isn't a bad thing. You used to be a teacher, remember?

So I took the stuff from the welcome letter and put it on our bulletin board:

Yes, there is still some summer stuff on there: The Summer Tot-Time schedule and Little Man's Summer Reading Log, but otherwise, it's looking like we have a kid in school! Dental Assessment Form has to go with us to the dentist next week. Free & Reduced Meal Form has to be turned in. I'm probably going to turn them both in at the same time. The school calendar has been on the bulletin board for a while. We've got the school supply list, which we've already got a couple things checked off! And then there's the kindergarten orientation flyer. Kindergarten orientation is more for the kids than the adults. As soon as Little Man is comfortable, I can leave. He'll be there for two hours.

On the back of the orientation flyer was the introduction letter from Mrs. W, Little Man's teacher. It listed her blog and when our conference time was. His school does Personal Learning Plans for all students, so we'll meet with her three times; this first time before school starts. But there probably won't be much too talk about except what I've noticed, as she won't have assessed him yet.

We also got the welcome letter from the principal. It listed the uniform code and where we can go to get the school logo put on Little Man's shirts. It also told when Back to School Night is. And I found out that the first week is half day for kindergarten! Okay, it's only 3 days, and every Friday is half day anyway, but that was good to know.

Thankfully Mrs. W. made a YouTube video on how to do pick up and where the kids get picked up from. It was very helpful! I'm just curious how crazy things get on Fridays with EVERYONE getting out at the same time. It will definitely be a time of practicing patience.

It's still really hard to believe that in six short weeks I'm going to have a kindergartner! Where does the time go.