Back to School Night

It is a little odd for what is technically a day care, even though it functions like a school for the older kids, to have a Back to School Night. Since we're paying for the kids to be there in the first place, and I'm not really expecting kiddo to learn much right now beyond "biting bad" and "sharing good!" so anything on top of that is just a fabulous extra. On the other hand, some of our other parent friends were talking about their preschoolers' Back to School Nights so maybe it's not so odd these days. But my boss still went into a giggle fit over it when I asked to leave work early.

A lot of other parents showed up, which was nice, and the director and kiddo's teacher (who I like a lot, actually, she seems good for him) kept going out of their way to praise us for it, as in "We know your child will succeed because you're here!" Rah rah for us, but you'd hate to think the parental bar was set that low. Hey, maybe we were looking for free cake. You don't know that. (Note: There was no cake. I'm just saying.)

Apparently they're doing a letter a week with the kids, and they've already started on penmanship, and they're learning colors in English and Spanish, which all seems fine. And all the kids are doing great with circle, because they're being asked to sit still for a long time and they're doing it. Which yeah, is probably the hardest thing they're learning. And kiddo is even sitting on the potty there, apparently more willingly than he is for us.

One mom was talking about how her daughter tells her about everything they did that day and about all the other kids, and I forget the point she was making, but the rest of us were going "huh?" because our kids tell us squat about their day even when we ask them directly.

"Kiddo, what did you do in school?"

"Mmmm."

"What did you learn?"

Shrug.

"Who did you play with?"

"I dunno."

I expected this in high school, but not now.

His teacher made a point of telling us during the presentation how great he was doing, twice, and called him her "little man." Which is sweet, and he is a charming kiddo. And he did have some issues when he started a few months back -- some pushing, some hitting, some stealing food from other kids -- that we chalked up to a rocky adjustment, and that seems to have stopped. So likely she was just being reassuring. But both DH and I have done the teacher's pet thing in our own academic careers, and it's not all that enjoyable, so I think both of our radars pinged. Just something to watch for, I guess. It's great when your teacher loves you, but not when your teacher loves you way more than the other kids.

Still, a good night. Except for the chairs. The tiny, tiny chairs. I can't believe none of us broke the chairs. DH swears sitting on one threw his back out. My other boss said Back to School Nights get better as the kids get older, because then the chairs are bigger.