We worked on this poster over the weekend, and rehearsed his presentation last night. We had 3 weeks to do it, and really only did it in a few days, but it worked out.
I went with him to present it, and it went very well. Gabriel talked easily about his "Breaking News," "Travel Guide," his family, and his favorites.
Then his "sharing" about cultural traditional items or a hobby (thank goodness) was of course about electronics. He showed a radio-controlled car and talked about how it's no longer in tune with the transmitter, then showed a timer he made in his Electronics Learning Lab, modified from a design in the manual.
To my surprise, his teacher told me afterward that he's very comfortable speaking in front of a group. I have to give this school district some credit for that; speaking in front of groups is something they've been doing since kindergarten. I think that's a great thing to develop in everyone; I'd certainly have benefitted from that throughout my life.
The odious job of filling in all the kindergarten registration forms and finding all the right documents was weighing on me all weekend. It's shocking that registering for school is the same tired manual process as was probably done 80 years ago. Online? Download? Electronic? Feh! Here in Silicon Valley, technology capital of the world? No way! You have to go to the backcorners of Kansas for that sort of modernization. Here, you have to fill everything out by hand and replicate your address and phone number on every form. At least this year there was nothing about #2 pencil.
Then there's the pain of turning it all in. Conveniently, Gabriel's Star Of The Week presentation coincided with the kindergarten registration window, so I took care of turning in the forms (a 10-minute reviewing process, for each parent -- heaven forbid there's a line) after his presentation this morning. Aside from a quick trip home to fetch the originals of Katrina's immunization records, it went smoothly. And now it's done.
Done! Katrina is officially registered for kindergarten! My baby! But not a baby and thank goodness for that, but still -- my little girl!!
I can't decide which is freaking me out more today -- my oldest turning 9, or my youngest going to kindergarten. All good stuff, but I'm getting dizzy from the speed at which this child-raising thing is picking up!
I didn't mention my favorite second-born child here, and that is the trouble of being in the middle. He's not oldest turning 9 and he's not the youngest on her way to kindergarten, but he is the one who ran out to greet me when I got home and gave me a big hug and one of his famously fabulous kisses. That part doesn't need to go by fast either.
1/31/2011
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