First day of Montessori pre-school

The big day finally arrived!

While the building is not yet complete (it will be open for business in a week: 9/20), parents were given the option of having the kids go to an alternate location for this week at a nearby church. Gene and I decided that it would be best to do just that; so Sabrina could get used to the teachers, classmates and teaching methods. They had actually made arrangements to have a whole wing of the church's school. It was a real school environment.

I worked from home so that I could take Sabrina in around 8am, which is when her primary teacher, Ms. Leanne, arrives. We all had a chance to meet Ms. Leanne when she came over for a house visit last weekend, and after about 10 minutes, Sabrina had warmed up to her. So I wanted to make the transition a little easier by dropping her off when Ms. Leanne would be there.

Sabrina was happy to be able to carry her Dora the Explorer lunch box, which Gene and I had packed the night before with green beans, sliced turkey, a soynut butter "roll-up" (flat bread with soynut butter spread on it, then rolled up -- something we invented on the spot), raisins, organic smoothie which we froze so it could act as an ice pack until lunch time rolled around, and an organic yogurt.

We get there, I sign her in and we are led down the hall to the "lady bug" classroom where 4 of her classmates have already arrived: Nate, Ian, Bridgette, and Charvie, a cute little Indian girl. Bridgette immediately came up to Sabrina and before I knew it, they were off to the back of the classroom to play. I decided to stick around for a bit, mostly out of curiosity. Ms. Leanne took a jingle-bell instrument and rang it, saying "OK, it's circle time, let's all sit around here". Nate, Charvie and Ian immediately come and sit down. Bridgette and Sabrina have heard the bells and the request but they promptly return to playing. Hmmmm. I ask Sabrina to go and sit down. Ms. Leanne tells me it's OK if she doesn't come. The group, sans Sabrina and Bridgette, start singing a song. I try to encourage Sabrina to join them, to no avail. She is resisting. Oh boy, this is not going to go well, I think to myself. I decide that perhaps my presence there is influencing what she does, so I give her a kiss and leave.

Throughout the day, as I toiled away on my work laptop, I sometimes thought about what Sabrina might be experiencing and how things were going. By 3:30 I couldn't wait any longer. Gene, who had just gotten home, suggested we either take a little something/token to her or maybe take her out for pizza to celebrate. I didn't have anything token-like that she hadn't seen yet so we decided we'd pick her up together and then pick up a pizza for dinner.

The report we got from Ms. Leanne and Ms. Mia (the teacher assistant) is once I left, she joined the group and was very cooperative all day. Go figure! Ms. Leanne even told us that Sabrina had given her lots of hugs and kisses.

Here are some photos before we left home in the morning:

Forced smile...