Kindergarten

Matthew starts school in September and tonight was kindergarten parents' night.
I cannot believe my child is starting school. When I went to the school tonight my heart was pounding. I had that mixed feeling of nervousness and excitement and disbelief that my child will be starting kindergarten in the fall.
Most of the parents were pretty friendly.
I had to laugh because you can totally peg the parents the moment they come in. There are the aggressive parents who must sign their kids up for the best spots for the 1/2 hour and 1/2 day visits. These are the same parents who ask the questions in the presentation that are phrased so that all of us other parents know how plugged-in they are to the education system.
Then there are the been-there-done-that parents who had to announce that they were leaving because they had "heard the spiel" already.
There are the deer-in-the-headlights parents who haven't been in an elementary school since grade 8 grad and can't believe how small the desks are and need to be pointed to the classroom.
I somehow gravitated to the daycare parents. I'm not quite sure how that happened. But, the few people I talked to somehow clued in right away that I'd been doing the daycare thing and we got on the topic of some of the best daycares.
But all in all it was a good evening. I met Matt's teacher and she is really nice. And I met the principal who was a little long winded. Seriously, as interested as I am in the jk/sk curriculum (and I am) I really didn't think it was terribly interesting to see it on a PowerPoint presentation. At this point, as a parent, I'm more interested in what I should be packing for my child's "nutrition breaks" (no longer called lunch and snack) than I am about what the curriculum says about jk/sk splits.
Regardless, it was an interesting evening and I am pretty excited for Matthew. I love his teacher, I know he will too. And there is a water fountain in Matt's classroom. Does life get any better than that? (when you are 4 - not really!)