Kennedy's First Day of First Grade

Last week was a pain in the tush as far as school goes. If anyone is interested I will tell you why, if not feel free to look at the pics. Kennedy and Kohen are going to the Taiwan American School (TAS, generally the private school aspect is considered a big perk of living over seas) and they each had to have "interviews", orientation and finally the first day of school. Kohen has been placed in K-A which is like a Pre-K though it runs from 8:30am-1:30pm- that's a LONG time!

The kids were all observed by a Psychologist and then since Kohen is technically old enough to go to Kindergarten but we felt he may do better in K-A, they did their 'analysis' if you will and then called us. We were relieved. After our poor experience with the teachers at his preschool last year, this guy had clearly understood Kohen, his weaknesses and strengths in a matter of an hour watching him interacting and working with other children. His conclusion in a nut shell, was that though his social skills are certainly ready for Kindergarten, he still has a strong need for play and in K-A they do a lot of the teaching and learning through play and he felt he would really thrive in that environment. We feel really at peace with the decision...though for some reason when talking about learning through play Nathan and I started busting up imagining the teacher eating glue like on Billy Madison...anyone remember that? lol.
So Friday was Kennedy's first official day of school and Kohen's orientation. One thing I am loving is the size of the classes. Kennedy's class has 18 students and Kohen's has 12 so far and his class pretty much has two teachers, though neither of them ate glue in my presence. By all accounts it seems like a really great school and as difficult as it's been I am glad we made the effort to be here at the beginning of the school year so that the children would be able to have the orientations and a fresh start. One thing that is a huge hit is that down the Kindergarten and K-A hall the bathrooms have teeny tiny toilets- HUGE HIT with the kids, highlight of Kohen's orientation for sure.

Reality Check:

Here comes a dose of reality, I want to remember the good things but I also want to remember accurately. Last week was hard. Nathan was gone a lot for work, the children were super tired again and having meltdowns and frankly, so was I. Last week was the first time that when Nathan -sensing I was feeling partly cloudy- asked if there was anything he could do I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying, "buy me a plane ticket home." Friday especially was a hard day. Nathan was gone all day and I was responsible for lot's of driving children 30min + back and forth to school with shouting, teasing and fighting in nerve racking traffic. By the end of the day I had yelled my head off at the kids and pretty much acted like the worst mom ever. That never does anything to improve my mood. Especially when I'm pregnant because then when I have a bad mom day I look at my growing belly and think in despair, "what am I doing?!!" I did have the realization that I have been with these children nonstop since July 28th and maybe, just maybe I need a break (where's my Target?!). I am feeling better now, and I know I will continue to feel better especially in 2 weeks when we get to move into our house. But I just thought a little honesty wouldn't hurt my "Taiwan is terrific!" blog.