Moon Festival 2012

Happy Tet Trung Thu!

First day of school

"Inside shoes" 

size 3 outfits - still a little big

Not at all convinced this is a good idea

 Meeting the teacher - she got them giggling and apparently they didn't stop all day

First time coming home on the bus 

Not too worried...

The BNK appear to be related to a certain someone's TP; that is, they are mostly imaginary.  Not a lie, but a concrete way of expressing their very real feelings about school.  They claim it is too long, and boring... we will wait and see.

Vanh's story

Vanh finally spoke about school - he said the BNK said, "Vanh? Van! You're not a VAN, ha ha ha!" We explained that it was supposed to be a funny joke, but he was not impressed. Now he is refusing to say anything else and I don't think we helped. They are wearing skull and crossbones shirts tomorrow to ward of the BNK. Not sure that is a helpful idea either but it seemed to make them both feel better.

Max's letter to his teacher

The first day of school is behind us and things are looking good, but not without challenge.  It was a little startling when both boys begged not to go the next day - luckily (I thought) they weren't scheduled for Friday anyway so I fretted, panicked, and drove everyone nuts with my concerns relaxed and figured we had the weekend to work it out.  The main concern seemed to be that there was not any enough playing.

Friday evening they were still quite adamant that they didn't like school, so I said that was okay they didn't have to like it, but they had to go, that's what kids do, so maybe if they could talk about why they didn't like it we could figure out what to do to help.  Max started talking and after a few sentences I grabbed a clipboard.  He asked what I was doing, and I explained that I was writing down his concerns to share with his teacher, so that she could help him solve his problem.  He asked for the paper and wrote his own letter to his teacher.

Here is what it says (as dictated):

I don't like school because the big kids - big naughty kids took things from me.  All the big naughty kids didn't let me play with anything at all.  Don't let the naughty kids play with my toys the one toy that Max (points to self) has.  What happens if the Big Naughty Kids come here (to our home) and take all our toys away?

Max's letter

(The drawings at the top are illustrations including toys, a big bin, and a foot)

And then he signed it - carefully, beautifully, proudly.

We had a little talk about sharing, and how just because the teacher made sure your favourite toy was in the room on day one doesn't mean you're the only one who gets to play with it.  Max thought maybe he could solve the problem by bringing in toys from home to share with everyone, but he's going to see what his teacher thinks first.

I think he's ready to go back now.

Photo fix

Yes, Vanh is wearing Max's shirt, and yes, he did it on purpose.  Thinks he's pretty funny, he does.