The proud parent thread

[Clodfobble]

Minifob learned to ride a bike today!

[Chocolatl]

Go Minifob!

[Aliantha]

Yay for minifob!

Max had his first day of kindy today. Its been awesome. I am going to pick him up soon. I guess this lovely peace and quiet will be shattered then. :S

[glatt]

Bike riding and kindergarten, two big milestones!

[Clodfobble]

Wow, Kindergarten already. Is he 5 now? Man, how time flies... how did he like it?

[xoxoxoBruce]

[Clodfobble]

In the Southern hemisphere, school "summer vacation" is from October-December. (Which I learned not from Aussies, but from Argentinian computer programming contractors at an educational software company who kept screwing up our default school calendars in their code.)

[Aliantha]

He's actually just coming up to 4, so still 3. Over here, they have kindergarten the year they turn 4, then Prep, then grade 1 and so on. Prep is full time school in the place of pre-school which used to be a 5 day fortnight program centred more around play than learning. It's all about using those early years for greater learning. Not sure if I'm on board with it or not, but I guess I will have a better opinion after Max completes Prep next year.

He loved his first day. Can't wait to go back next week, so that's a win for all of us.

The big boys are back at school again now too of course. Aden is in yr 12, so last year of formal schooling for him. Hopefully he'll follow through with his plans and get into the uni course he wants next year. Mav is in yr 11 and so far is most impressed with his new subject, Film and Media. So anyway, everyone's doing well except Eva who is teething and driving me nuts.

[Clodfobble]

Ah, that makes more sense. Here, "pre-school" refers to optional private programs (unless you're in special ed but that's different,) and includes infants up to age 5, essentially the same as daycare. Then Kindergarten is the beginning of the public school system, and you must have already had your 5th birthday in order to begin.

[Aliantha]

Wow, so that means kids are turning 7 in their first year at school? Is kindergarten full time over there? I didn't realise there was such a difference. I thought we were the country who was running behind with educational programs.

Kindy is optional and not government funded in so far as you have to pay $20/day for the program, but they do have early childhood teachers in the education programs. We decided to put Max in because he's quite bright and might be better off in that environment a couple of days per week now that Eva is here and taking up a lot of my time in one way or another. Also, we wanted him to socialise a bit more with kids his own age. He spends way too much time with teenagers and almost none with little kids, which at times is not so desirable.

As an example, Aden was annoying Max a few days ago (tickling him or something silly) and Max told him to 'F**k off Aden!'. I'm pretty sure he learned that from Mav. Not that the big boys swear a lot, but kids Max's age only have to hear it once to learn it.

[Chocolatl]

Kindergarten is full time over here, and they go straight from kindergarten to 1st grade. So we start at 5 and graduate from 12th grade at age 18.

[Aliantha]

The kids here finish mostly at age 17 in our state (Qld). So they start Prep the year they turn 5, then do years 1 through to 12. I think they start a year later in the southern states, so they're mostly 18 by the time they finish.

[Sundae]

When I was a bairn we only had play-school. Which was all play and no school and only twice a week.

And we were not allowed to start regular school until our 5th birthday. Bearing in mind mine is in July, I effectively missed out on a whole year of school. Didn't hurt me though - I always wanted to do everything Laura did, and could read and write and do numeracy up to and including tens and units by the time I started.

In England, children who will be five in the school year starting in September start school then. Those whose birthdays fall after Christmas attend half-days until the New Year. We have all our Reception intake for 2012/13 at school all day now.

Much of the education is "child-led learning". They have the freedom to choose what they will do, but there is an educational element in all the activities. Tiger always just wanted to go outside and run around. It was up to me to encourage interaction, imaginative play and discourse. I think I have helped him some in socialising and feeling safe in his environment. Also in listening and accepting compromise.

But the bigest single change has been the switch in the way the school teaches phonics. Which I knew wasn't working for many children 2 years ago. But the evidence was against me. And after all I am an LSA, not a qualified teacher.

Since the switch, his reading ability (middle of the class I'd say) has just improved so much. He's at the right level comprehension-wise, but his sounding out and blending of sounds is so much better. He even attempted to sound out the names of two Chinese illustrators the other day. He came as close as I would to getting them right.

I co-teach the advanced phonics group. We're less about sounds and more about tenses, suffixes, mnemonics etc. Blimey, it's hard keeping up. I don't have perfect grammar myself, although my spelling (bar typos) is better than average. Better than the average at school anyway - teachers and TAs check their spellings with me (yeah I'm boasting - I don't have much to be proud of!). But learning the rules? OMG. I absorbed them via voracious reading. So the exceptions never bothered me. Now I am coming across them all the time and having to figure out whether they are real exceptions ("No not in this case. Just because.") or known variations ("Well that one is because..")

Bloody mongrel language.

[Chocolatl]

Our Anna Beans is 5.5 months old. Accomplishments now include: rolling over from front to back, conversational laughing, trying to break out of her booster seat, and testing gravity by throwing a ball off her walker tray and watching us pick it up.

[Aliantha]

Why do all babies respond when you say, "Oh really?" to them. lol Eva is the same. I think it's just the tone of voice that gets them suckered in. hehe

So cute!