This isn't college...it's preschool

Warning: this is a long one ;)

Harvard cares about pre-schools right? Wrong.

I will never forget a conversation I had with a friend 2 years ago - our daughters are exactly the same age (1 at the time) and she was already applying and interviewing at some of the prestigious Boston pre-schools. I remember thinking "you have got to be kidding me!" when she told me how much the school was going to cost per year, and judging her for even thinking about sending her child somewhere where there was an application "process" much simliar to applying to college. I will never send my child somewhere like that! She can't even talk! It is pre-pre-pre-school?! I won't care where my daughter goes, as it really isn't even real school yet! I am going to send them to the cheapest most convenient school possible - they won't remember their time there, and I sure as hell don't think it will make an impact on the rest of their lives...is what I was thinking...

Well, fast forward two years and here I am running to the mailbox every day frantically searching for acceptance letters from Boston area pre-schools.

I didn't think I would be in this situation. Last year we decided to send M to a local pre-school, which reminded me of Sunnyside Daycare from Toy Story 3; bright and colorful, kids laughing and playing, fun art projects, nice teachers, etc.. We had planned to keep her there for at least 2 years, and then apply to private schools that have pre-school programs, in and around Boston, for the remainder of her schooling (why private is a whole other post for later.) She started camp there last summer, and after a day or two of clinginess she was walking right into the classroom and telling me to leave. I assumed we had found a great fit.

Every day I would pick her up and the teachers would tell me "she had a great day today!" so I went along thinking all was well. Then we were called into the office in October. The head of the school explained to us that M doesn't play with the other kids, but only plays by herself. Ok, she is not even 3 yet, that is normal, right? We were asked if she talks at home...yes, she talks all the time (she had talked before she started school, but since going to school she talks well beyond her age and we have a hard time shutting her up at home.) To our great surprise we were told by the teachers that she only says 3 words while at school. And that she gets upset when asked to do anything...and that they are focusing a large part of their time on getting her to listen or follow directions...and...well, the list went on.

At the time, we knew that she was behind the kids as far as gross motor skills were concerned, so we followed the advice of her current school administrators given at that October meeting and put her in physical therapy at MGH. Within weeks she had improved by leaps and bounds, and I could immediately see her becoming a more confident little lady. I thought all was good...until we were called into the office again in January.

Again we were told that our energetic, playful, creative little princess, who does not stop talking or singing at home is totally shutting down at school. She still wasn't talking much in the classroom, still not playing with the other kids, and was still not following directions. Her teachers had never once indicated that any of this was still going on...I just kept getting the "she had a great day today!" report when I would pick her up. It was at this point that my husband and I decided we needed to find a different school for her - one where she is comfortable enough to let her personality shine.

We immediately started to research Montessori schools, as well as some private schools that had pre-pre-school programs. For all of these schools the applications were due a week after we had that last meeting with schools so we were scrambling like mad people filling out applications, scheduling visits, scheduling evaluations for M at each school. We had found a school that we really loved (non-Montessori), we felt like our interviews and assessments went incredibly well, and we seriously had no doubt that we were going to get in. That was until we got the small envelope with the rejection letter in it.

You would have thought M had gotten rejected from Harvard. I was in tears, my husband was distraught. We wondered what we did wrong? Should we have called in some favors (we knew a few parents of current students there)? Did something happen while M was being evaluated in the classroom? Did I say something wrong at one of the meetings? Was I trying too hard when talking with the Head of Admissions? Did the evaluation from her current school put the nail in the coffin for us? (We are pretty sure that is what happened...but we will never know for sure)

So we move on...it is pre-school for crying out loud. And cry out loud I did when we didn't get into that school. But I am hormonal and cry at everything these days...that is another blog post.

We got in everywhere else we applied, and have narrowed it down to two Montessori schools. I am actually excited about the chance to send her to a Montessori school, somewhere so different than her current school. I am hoping she thrives in the Montessori atmosphere and can be who she is at home, at school. But we will have to see if that is the case.

Now I am having anxiety over choosing which of the two schools to send her to. I keep going back and forth thinking in my head, picturing her at each of the schools, making a list of pros and cons for each school: (I will refer to them as school A and school B)

- Both are equidistant from our current house, but there is a chance that we might move to the town where school B is within the next year.
- School A was our favorite out of the Montessori schools we visited.
- We like the way school A tracks the kids during their independent time and encourages them to try new things often.
- We really liked the admissions director at school A, but in all honesty we won't have much interaction with her going forward.
- At school B the classrooms themselves are much newer and bigger.
- There are the same amount of kids (approximately 20) at each school, but there are more classrooms for the 3-6 year olds at school A (6) than there are at school B (4). This just means that when it is recess there are a lot more kids on the playground at school A - M does not do well in large groups of kids and I feel like this might overwhelm her.
- At school B each classroom has a pet that the kids care for, which I really like
- Each of the classrooms at school B have outdoor space, and the kids can utilize it whenever they want
- School B is right next to a preservation where the kids plant and grow things and spend a lot of time when the weather is nice. School A has a pond down the street that the kids visit when it is warm out.
-  School A has a wonderful reputation and is a prestigious school (at least I think of it that way)
- I got more of a hippie dippie vibe from school B, but I am not saying that is a bad thing - just felt a little more laid back and relaxed
- School B is much more convenient, in terms of location, for me to pick her up and head down to RI to see my parents while they are up here this summer - assuming M will be in summer camp at one of these two schools
- School A is significantly more expensive that school B

In true Mom fashion though I think about this all day long. I made the decision to send her to her current school, where she crawls into a metaphorical hole by herself each day it seems. I feel so guilty about making the decision to send her there (I was adamant about her going there and didn't even let my husband research other schools as I thought it was a perfect fit - boy was I wrong!) that I don't want to be responsible for making this decision, for fear it will be the wrong decision. Isn't that terrible? I will be the main parent when it comes to her school though - I will be dropping her off and picking her up. I will probably be on some sort of parent board. I will get to know her teachers the best. I need to be a big part of making this decision, which of course I will be...and like I said, she will only be there for a year or two, tops.

I am sure she will be fine wherever she goes. She has been a different kid when we visited these two schools. Talking to teachers, playing with other kids...there is just something about her current school that makes her clam up. To be a fly on the wall!

One of the schools (I will not mention which one) that we are deciding between M seems to like more than the other. I am sure it is because she has been there twice, as opposed to the other school just once, but each morning when I get her in the car to drive to her current school she actually asks to go to the new school, and subsequently starts to convince me that her current school is closed and we NEED to go to the other school.

Huh, maybe my decision is being made for me.

Stay tuned...

Cool for School: Part One (Mental Preparation)

There are certain things in your child's life that you look forward to: the first smile, the first giggle...we were dying for M to walk, which she didn't do until around 19 months (much later than all her friends.) There are certain things in your child's life that you know you have to do, but the idea of them is so unappealing you would rather get a root canal. Potty training is one of those things (as Coco Baby Mama talked about in her article last week) for me, so I have yet to actually get my butt in gear and seriously start training her. Moving her to the big girl bed was one of these things too - but after a few days of putting her back in bed for two hours it ended up not being as big a deal as I had made it out to be. I fear potty training will not be as easy as the big girl bed transition by any means.

At the top of this list of things I dread has been dropping off M at school for the first time. Since she was born I have pretty much been with her every day of her life. Sure my husband and I have gone on vacation, but no longer than 3 nights, and she was with my parents (who at most times I think she likes more than my husband and I). She has been left with a babysitter with no problem too, but never has she been left in a strange place with strange people for an extended amount of time, so I was absolutely sick to my stomach about having to drop her off at school some day.

When we started looking at schools this past winter we knew that we wanted to get her in somewhere that had a summer program, so that she could get acclimated to the new school environment before the new baby comes in August. We found a lovely private pre-school (I guess they are all private at that age, no?) only a few minutes away from our house, that reminded me of Sunnyside Day Care from Toy Story 3 so I was sold from the first visit. They offered a 7 week summer program to ages 2.7+ so we signed her up immediately and set the start date (a week later than the other kids due to vacation last week) as this past Tuesday.

I think it was about 3 months ago that I started losing sleep over the fact that my baby would be going to "school" in a few months. How was my child, my little sidekick, going to react to being dropped off in a strange place for 4 hours, 3 days a week? I have a hard enough time getting her 2 year old self to listen to me, how is she going to listen to her teachers? How the hell was I to prepare her for this? How the hell was I to prepare myself for this??

Sources of Stress: Summer Camp & Toddler Lunch Ideas

In just two short weeks M (now 2.7 years old) will be attending summer camp at the same place where she will begin pre-school in the fall. We had decided that it was better for us to send her to "school" before the baby comes in August, so that she does not think we are replacing her and shipping her off three days a week to some strange place alone once the baby arrives.

Now M has been home with me for her entire life. We have attended classes every week with friends, but for the most part it is her and me all day long, every day. I knew that school would be somewhat of an adjustment, as she will have to follow someone else's orders and do as she is told, but she is so easy going (well, most of the time) that I thought she would be just fine. So to prepare her for summer camp at school we visited her school for the first time since our initial visit in January last week. I went into this visit with complete confidence that my daughter would take to being in a classroom of kids like she had been going all her life - and boy was I wrong. She did nothing but whine, threw a fit in front of the entire class, and screamed "I wanna go home now!" We were only there for 20 minutes of the two hours we had planned to be there, when the school director asked us to leave and come back this week (in the nicest way possible of course, as it wasn't doing us any good to stay in the state M was in). 


I, of course, being 8 months pregnant and hormonal, broke into tears as soon as we left as our visit was a total disaster. The school asked us to come back this week for a second visit - and thankfully this week's visit was the polar opposite of our first one. Yes there were some moments of whining and a few loud screams, but over all she had a great time with the kids at her new school. I was able to talk to one of her teachers, and she eased most of the fears I have about M starting school on her own in a few weeks - is it ok that she isn't fully potty trained? What if she throws a fit? What do I pack her for lunch? I left the school feeling 100 times better than I had the week before, as M told me "school is fun" when we got into the car after our visit. 


But now I am stressing over little things - like what to pack her for lunch every day? At home meal time can go one of two ways: I make her dinner, she eats the entire thing without batting an eye, no matter what it is or I make her dinner she takes one look at it and says "no thanks," requests something else, I make it and she says "no thanks" and ends up having a piece of cheese and an apple sauce for dinner. Most of the time she eats what I make, but I fear that meal time at school might be a disaster! What if I pack her something she doesn't want? And she throws a fit and doesn't eat it? And then is a cranky beast? 


This is such a silly thing to stress about, but because I am thinking about it so much I have been doing a little research via Pinterest on Toddler lunches. I also bought her some Bento box-type lunch boxes on Amazon, as well as some sandwich punches, and cookie cutters so that I can cut out veggies and fruits in fun shapes. I am totally going to be that mom who makes her kids lunches in to Sesame Street characters...just you wait!! 


Here are some of my favorite pins on Pinterest that are full of great ideas for toddler lunches! Just click on the photos to go for more details and follow me on Pinterest... 

Source: weelicious.com via Jessica on Pinterest

Source: blogs.babble.com via Jessica on Pinterest

Source: kidsactivitiesblog.com via Jessica on Pinterest

Source: easylunchboxes.smugmug.com via Jessica on Pinterest

Too Cool for School

Last night I went out for dinner with some of my girlfriends from Isis. All of our kids are around the same age, give or take a couple weeks, and we have known each other since they were 6 weeks old. Now they are 21 months, and some have actually started going to "school" this fall. I say "school" because it isn't really school that they are going to but a program of sorts that is much like a daycare. Yes it is called school, but come on, these kids aren't even potty trained yet, so it is really a glorified daycare. Not knocking the idea of this, but just the fact it is called school...but back to my point!

I overheard part of the table talking about their plans for the fall of 2012, and changing of schools, and putting in applications. And then one friend turned to me and asked "what are your plans for M for next fall? What schools are you applying to?"

And I responded "she is going to the school of Mama J."

In all seriousness, I haven't given it a seconds thought! She is only 21 months old now...still a baby in my eyes. While there are some days that I would love to have a little bit of free time, I don't think I am actually emotionally ready to drop her off three days a week and leave her with a group of strange people!

I am totally blessed with a very cool, easy-going kid (90% of the time) and I actually love spending my days with her. I can pretty much get done everything I want to do (save getting my haircut, which I do on nights or weekends) when she is awake, and when she is asleep I get stuff done around the house, catch up on TV shows, etc. I am not saying my girlfriends don't have easy kids, because they do, I just don't feel like I NEED to have her in school at this point in her life...but come next year, my tune might be changing.

All of my girlfriends that have their kids in school either just had their second child, or will be having their second in the next month or two. So for them it is a different situation. Having their kid in a program of sorts makes sense for their sanity, and gives their kids a little independent time away from brother or sister. Hopefully by next fall our family will have increased in numbers by 1, and I will be ready to send M out on her own for a few hours, a few days a week.

But, how do you even decide where you are going to send your kid to school in the first place? I did a Google search today and came across 100 pre-schools w/in 5 miles of my house! How do you know which ones are good? And at which ones someone will beat your child with a ruler? I don't even know how to begin this process, and would love some direction/advice from my readers and Mamas.

What is the normal amount of money to pay for pre-school?
Did you all start your kids in school at 2.9 years old? Or did you wait?
How many days a week do you send them at first?

Help me Mamas!