What a week

Ryan began preschool this week. He was nervous and a bit anxious about a new pre school but overall he seemed ready. He had a friend, Melanie, in his class and he seemed to making friends just fine.

The reason we sent Ryan to this pre school was because of a few people we knew who sent their children to this school. They liked it and what we heard most was that they "challenged" children in their educational pursuits. Neal and I liked that since Ryan gets bored so easily and usually enjoys a challenge.

The school itself has never been impressive to either me or Neal. The teacher was expecting the children to already know things that are only age appropriate for kindergartners and was really keen on letting us know that the children she taught last year at that school were much better at everything. In her eyes, because Ryan couldn't conform immediately to what she wanted, he wasn't fitting in.

Well, that and a host of other problems including her rudeness to me on several occasions led us to get out of there in only 3 days.

Ryan made a lot of friends and was upset that we just pulled him out but at $500 a month we had to make a decision real soon before another payment was made to people who really didn't care. No one at all asked or cared why we were pulling him from the school.

Now he feels like there is no reason to be invested in a school any more and he doesn't like the idea of going to another school. I know what we did was right but it is hard to see Ryan, who is so sensitive and gets attached to people so easily, get upset. I can only pray that the new school we checked out will help him to get through it.

The new school is a polar opposite to the last school. They are a private Christian school and practice a lot of love and creativity and allow the children to be as creative as they can be. The idea that a child would have to draw something to look just like the model is not their philosphy at all. It is in the creating and in the developing of skills that the teaching occurs and not in the end result. They also teach the principles of the Bible to the students and help them to see that other people are less fortunate and find ways for the children to help. I don't get that he will master any big subjects like math or science or even the alphabet even though they will "teach" it to them. Neal and I do a lot of that home and and he can always get that from other places but what I like is the social skills (not like he doesn't already have a lot of those) and the Bible principles as well as the fostering of creativity in every subject will be terrific for him. I just hope he feels the same way.

I have pictures from his "first day" at the previous school and I kind of feel sad posting them. I have video too. I don't think I will post it tonight - but soon I will post it and then will be posting his "First Day - Do Over" pictures soon after that.

Here's to another week of Summer with Ryan!