100 Days Smarter.

Today was the hundredth day of school. Avery's class had a party involving all things one hundred. 100 piece puzzles, 100 day crowns, guessing games involving 100 things and 100 item collections brought by the kids. Avery collected pennies and pine needles (we have enough pine needles for the millionth day of school!).

Let me just say I am thrilled with her kindergarten experience thus far. Especially since I had recieved a few suggestions that I might want to send her to a different school as it isn't one of the "better" ones in the area. After visiting the school and determining that diversity and poverty was probably a factor in those opinions and not danger (many of us survived and thrived in just such an environment right?) we sent her along and hoped for the best. Also, it is all-day kindergarten - which directly factors into how much I enjoy the experience and how much she learns. So what can you learn in 100 days? If you have the fabulous Ms. X as a teacher you can learn some great sayings that can be brought up in myriad situations (and Avery uses these often). Including but not limited to:

- "Don't let anyone steal your learning"
- "Do the right thing even when no one is looking"
and my favorite...
- "You get what you get and you don't throw a fit"

Miles particularly enjoys their daily chant which Avery taught him:
R-E-S-P-E-C-T. Add Respons-i-bil-ity. Re-sults are what you get from me. Rea-dy to learn. (Clap Clap Clap Clap)

She has learned to read fairly well which is probably the most exciting thing for a parent to see. Only now she knows if I skip sentances or pages when I am reading books to them at night. She hasn't learned to tell time yet though which allows me to remain inconsistent on bedtimes - if it's pitch dark at 6:30 and I say it's super late and they need to get in bed she doesn't know any differently. And the more common reverse - if it's 9:30 and I haven't put them to bed yet they don't realize I'm inconsistent and a bad parent.

Besides the basic reading and math stuff she has learned things that dumbfound me. Just the other day she asked me if I knew who Degas was and proceeded to tell me about his life as an artist and how as he went blind in his later years he turned to sculpture as a means of expression. I asked her if she knew what he was famous for painting and she said that he painted ballerinas and that he "mixed the colors in such a way that their tutus looked like they were glowing". I'm pretty sure I didn't learn about stuff like that till Mr. Van's art history in high school. She has studied civil rights and can tell you about racial injustice per Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.. She can discuss the anatomy of the worm (red or earth) including a part called the clitellum, which I had never heard of and wasn't sure if a kindergartener should be learning about. (Turns out it's fine. Thank you Google and Wikipedia for helping me keep up with my 6 year old). She can sing a song in Swahili and she can give a pretty accurate display of the earths rotation using her head as the sun and her fists for the moon and earth. Unfortunately I can't take credit for any of these learnings, and that's okay. What I can take credit for is making her lunch, getting her up and to the bus everyday and we haven't missed it yet (this seems like a huge accomplishment to me)!

I can't wait to see what she learns in the next 100 days. And I can be a little bit happier to pay our property taxes.

Photo above taken at approx. 30 days smarter.