Oh Really

Life commentary by Jack:

*I'm a puppy, Mommy's a cat, and Daddy's a rhinoceros.

*There is some paper in my pocket. Maybe Nana or Judy put it there.

*Mommy you can't watch my cartoons. When you are two then you can watch my cartoons.

*"Probably" is my favorite word.

*A real spider has 8 eyes but a pretend spider only has 2.

*Mommy I want more hot chocolate.
  - No Jack. Only one hot chocolate in the morning (not real hot chocolate, just Ovaltine - like Bonvita).
 But Mommy, Jack, Jai, AND Abhishek all want more hot chocolate!

*There is a rock in my nose.

*I am a rocket ship that shoots peepee.

Decisions Decisions

The past few weeks have been over taken by preschool decisions for next year. We were thrilled to find out Jack got a spot at the school we really wanted him to go to (we had to make our way through mounds of paperwork and two separate interviews in the admissions process!), but unfortunately found out that even though he was admitted and we qualified for financial aid, they didn't have any aid left for us. That means the school is way out of our price range.

Now we have been scrambling to make our decisions for next year before all the spaces are filled. We could stay at his current school, which we do like and he may stay at. Jack really likes it and it is a very good school. Tuition just jumps a lot before you can apply for financial aid.

However he also got a spot at one of the highly desired public pre-k through 8th grade schools. It is a well regarded public school, and it is free, which is a big plus, but after sitting in the classrooms on Thursday morning I am not sure it is a school that will be good for Jack (mixed age classrooms and not a lot of direct interaction with the teacher - the kids did their own thing a lot and Jack is not super independent).

We also visited another nursery school that we liked a lot. They admit by date of application and we just heard about them last week. Their formal acceptances began to be sent out 2 weeks ago so we don't know if we could have a spot now.

Basically, we are still not sure what to do. The next week will be full of  nursery school visits and meetings. Hopefully we will settle it up soon!

Happy Feet

Because sometime you just have to move and groove!

Sudoku

GI introduced Jack to Sudoku today. It was a big hit!

Winter Wonderland

Winter has finally arrived in the city! We got a nice coating of snow last night. This morning the hill in front of our house was prime sledding territory. Jack was in heaven!

Videos

We have a bit of a video back log at the moment. I'll try to get them all on the blog again soon. Here is the back log of video from Florida!

Parent Teacher Conference

We had Jack's first parent teacher conference at school on Friday. His teacher gave us a written progress report on him. It said:

"Jack is now comfortable separating from his mom upon entering the room. Before he participates in activity, he likes to connect with one of his teachers.

 Jack follows the classroom rules and daily routine. He is now comfortable transitioning from activity to activity without stress or anxiety as he experienced at the beginning of the year.

 Jack speaks in lengthy sentences using a wide range of vocabulary when communicating with us. He freely shares factual information he remembers from previous experiences. Whenever he needs us to help him, he is able to use his words.

 Jack is busy throughout free play. His favorite activity usually involves letters of the alphabet such as, putting and alphabet puzzle together, molding and shaping play dough, do the project of the day, helping to cook or set up the train and train tracks. He uses all of the center activities without needing assistance from us. But he does enjoy teacher company while doing his favorite A-B-C puzzle.

 Jack exhibits strong fine motor ability. He can stack small blocks, string wooden beads, and handles paint brushes, rollers and sponges, crayons and markers at the art table. Usually he is one of the first to volunteer to do the art project of the day. He takes his time choosing different colors and is proud of his accomplishment at completion. We have been impressed when we see he can write his name.

 Whether indoors or out in the courtyard, Jack is on the move. He climbs up the ladder and zooms down the slide, rides the seesaw with his classmates, twirls on the Sit N' Spin enjoying gross motor an in age-appropriate fashion.

 Jack remains attentive and interested in what is being read at story. He is not distracted by others who are talking or fidgeting in their seats. He is able to remain quiet and focused throughout the story. Bravo, Jack!

 Music and circle dancing is a fun activity for us all. Jack will join hands to do the HOKEY POKEY, HERE WE GO LOOBY LOO, and RING-AROUND-THE-ROSIE. He enjoys doing the finger plays such as, MR BROWN AND MR GREEN, OPEN SHUT THEM and THREE LITTLE MONKEYS JUMPING ON THE BED. When we take turns beating the drum, Jack takes his turn and will politely passes it to the next person.

 Jack has enjoyed his first experiences in preschool. He no longer displays desperation anxiety when entering the classroom, is learning how to be a good friend to others, s more easily directed and doesn't remain moody for long periods of time if something doesn't go exactly his way. He is getting the full benefit of what preschool has to offer and is enjoying himself each time he comes to school. I look forward to participating and observing his future progress during the remainder of the school year. Thank you for sharing him with us."

Let's Talk!

Jack is going through another big shift in play. His latest favorite game is "Let's talk." Basically it is your classic pretend play. He has his character, and he wants me to be a character, and those characters are in direct interaction with each other. For example, we may be playing with his castle, and the king, queen, and knights may be playing hide and seek. Or we may be playing with his toy animals and he may be the bear and I may be the sheep and the two will go on grand adventures climbing mountains, singing songs to one another, and hunting for things like bushes to eat. The big change compared to how he was playing before is that he is no longer just making people climb stairs or building a zoo for the animals, the toys are now characters with personalities who live in their own little world and he wants to play with them in direct interaction. He wants someone playing in this pretend world with him. He is directing most of the adventures and leading me into the little worlds he is creating. It is a fun shift in play. It is also a big shift in moving away from parallel play and into full interactive play.

Things I Never Thought

As a parent you find yourself saying phrases you never thought you would ever in your life say. For example, last week I found myself saying to Jack "Please don't stick your fingers in your butt and then try to stick them in my mouth. That is not nice." Anyway, on that same subject, for the first time ever, I find myself wishing we had an Indian style toilet in our house. For those of you not familiar with an Indian Style toilet you can read about them here. They are basically squat toilets that you do not sit on. In general, I am not very comfortable with them, however in our on going potty training with Jack we have discovered that the only way he will use the toilet to poo is to stand up on the toilet and squat. Since we started doing this a couple of weeks ago he has not had one accident and he is more than happy to go in the potty. Understandably he can not climb up on the potty himself and stand without falling in, so a squat toilet would be useful for him. Now that we seem to have that process under control, I finally feel pretty confident in saying that we are potty trained. Since we have returned from Florida he has only had 1 pee accident and he has even been dry at nap time. His teacher still wants him to wear a pull up at school, but he has been using the potty there too and hopefully they will let him go in undies soon!

Early Reading

We had a major reading breakthrough this week. Just to re-cap. Jack has known about 30+ site words for a while. Phonic wise he had known his ABC sounds 100% since early September. He has shown a little interest in sounding words out, but usually would say the sounds then say any word that starts with that sound. For example cap would be read car or cat or canoe or any other C word. He also liked to construct long nonsense words with his ABC puzzle pieces, try to sound them out, then ask me what it says.

In the past couple of days he seems to have finished making the connection that all the sounds need to be present in the word he is reading. All of a sudden he is reading 3 letter words (in a consonant, vowel, consonant pattern) with about 80% accuracy. At first I thought he may have just memorized them, but when he sounded out and read words like wig, jug, bum, job, tab, etc... it became clear that he was sounding them out and actually proper reading them versus having memorized them.

Four letter words are still a bit too hard for him. However words that rhyme with Jack, like sack, back, and rack he can read. Needless to say we are very excited and he is very proud of himself!