First Impressions-Week 1 at Webber

Today marks the end of Christian's first week at his new school, Webber Academy.  As a parent, it is taking a little getting used to having to go 5 half days versus last year when we were just going 2 half days; I can only imagine what Christian is feeling.  We've been good about bedtimes (in by 7:30-8), but I think the adjustment to the longer week for Christian has made him a little more tired.  He is now back to taking a two hour nap in the afternoon which is good because he and Liam (and sometimes me too) can take a nap at the same time.  

The structure of the class seems similar to CPS.  They get to play when they arrive or play the sand/water table, sometimes the paints are out too.  Christian, of course, gravitates to the car/block play area when he arrives.  They've had Spanish class with Senora Sztabzyb and the Kodaly music lesson this week and I am told that show and tell will start next Friday.  The one thing I noticed that was quite a departure from CPS last year was that the teacher spent time in small groups of kids doing a worksheet where they used the red laddie pencil to draw some sort of lines, cut and pasted some things from the worksheet.  After just finishing the book Boys Adrift, I was a little conflicted about whether I like the idea of worksheets.  On the one hand, these tykes have such absorbent brains at this age, but on the other hand are we pushing too fast, too soon?  I guess for me, I love that this school balances the structured worksheet time with ample time outside to play in the playground, so I think that all around, it is a positive thing.  We'll find out more about their "curriculum" this week at Elementary Curriculum night, so we will get a better idea of what they will be doing.   I guess at some point, school has to get a little more serious, but perhaps I was not ready to acknowledge this and the fact that Christian really is growing up and going to the next phase of schooling.