As summer rolls along, I've been asked several times, "how did school go for Moose?" I'm awed that others would be curious, but maybe that's a normal question for everyone to ask after kindergarten. But I know, as always, there's special connotation for Moose. We didn't know how a highly structured world of school (beyond more unstructured preschool) would go for Moose.
Anyway, so I thought I would share how I think school went.
AWESOME!
Academically, he did really well. Spelling words was easy peasy around our house; I think he missed one word on his tests all year (backwards b or something like that). Words are his thing. Math went OK. I've been impressed this summer as we've done some worksheets how many addition and subtraction problems he can do without his hands. That seemed to be a problem for him when he couldn't use his fingers. Estimation is not his forte; it's just not concrete. He wants to count things. Guessing anything is difficult for him; he just tells it like it is "I don't know." He also seemed to excel in PE and music. I think he always seems to not pay attention in music situations (church, Sunday school, school music) but he always is learning the music, the actions. He can seem to not know anything and blow you away at the performance. I think I enjoyed our pre-performances a lot this year, especially when Squirt, too, would pick up on the songs and sing them.
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| Moose (turned around in red) at his kindergarten music performance. He did really well! |
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| Moose had a special music part playing a toad?? I think that's what they called it. I think most, if not all, the kids had a special part in the program. |
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| Moose (red shorts) ready for his something-meter dash in field day. He thinks he won...so cute. He was SO excited about running!! I love that. |
Socially, way beyond what I thought! He has friends! Not a ton; he's not a socialite. But he has friends - that want to play with him! With him. He tends toward girl friends (not girlfriends); one in particular he really enjoyed playing with and her mom reports the same back to me. He does have a few boy pals. It was just nice to know that other kids were enjoying my son. I hope next year some of those same kids can be in class with him.
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| Moose with his friend E and Squirt, too. We had her over for a play date after school ended. |
He seems to have good discernment with who to spend time with as friends, too. There are a few boys that he did NOT get along with. I've observed these boys; one for more than a year, one just this year. They aren't the nicest fellows. Moose came home sometime the second semester after a day when he got in trouble for squeezing one of these boys. We were talking and he called this boy a "villain." Now, I'm not saying this is true; we talked about how 5-year-olds are NOT villains. We talked about how we should be nice to others, love them, even when they aren't nice to us (Jesus says love your enemies). But I am saying I am thankful he seems to understand that they aren't being nice, so that he doesn't imitate them. Sometimes it's hard to discern good influences and bad influences, especially when you are socially ill-equipped or just young, and he seems to be good at it. We just have to work at the vernacular.
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| Moose finding the horse's tailbone on their field trip. |
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| Moose leading a horse on the field trip. I had fun supervising this field trip! |
Specially (I'm not sure what to call this), but his speech has improved. He is answering (rarely but still not never) "wh" questions. This is HUGE for us; we've been working toward this for a few years now. He ended up being in the "normal" classroom more than not at the end of the year. He used fewer paras at the end than at the beginning.
I feel this all just spells out for a successful year.
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