5 Things No One Tells You About the First Week Of Preschool

“She has excellent fine motor skills…”

This past week was our 4 year old toddler’s first week of preschool.  As parents we lamented the thought of sending her to school too early.  Was she going to listen to her teacher?  Share?  Play with the other students respectfully?  And most of all, would she enjoy being away from us, and at school?

A Homeschooling Way of Life

You see, I left Corporate America almost 3 years ago to become a Stay at Home Mom and to make sure that our daughter got the best start at life.  And with that I took on the role of a Home School Teacher too.  Hence, I was not prepared to hear her echo to us Mom and Dada I want to go to school.

I Want To Go To School

The first time she made this remark to us was when she had turned 3 years old.  I thought to myself, oh, she is just talking at first.  However she kept bringing it up.  My husband and I discussed it, and we both decided against sending her to preschool at that time.  Why?  She was not ready to completely listen to direction, enjoyed pondering from one subject to the next at her leisure, and loved having temper tantrums.

Therefore, we delayed her start to preschool until some months ago when she stated again, Mom and Dad, I want to go to school.  This time, however, things were different.  How?  She is: more focused, listens and follows through on instructions, and the temper tantrums have ceased for the most part.  Thus, my husband and I began our exploration of preschools.  We found two that had spots open out of dozens with a long waiting list.  We visited both and decided on a rigorous 5 day preschool to help best prepare her for “Kindergarten.”  With that said, here are 5 things no one tells you about the first week of preschool.

5 Things No One Tells You About The First Week Of Preschool

1.) Fine motor skills, fine motor skills, fine motor skills!  Upon entering our toddler’s preschool she was given a coloring page and crayons. Her teacher enthusiastically rejoiced that our toddler had drawn only within the lines of the coloring page. “She has excellent fine motor skills”, she raved “this is a must for Kindergarten!”

2.) Let your child use scissors!  Of course child approved scissors.  I was all for our toddler using child approved scissors at the age of 3, but my husband was adamantly against it, so we didn’t let her use scissors.  And guess what?  They use scissor every day at our toddler’s preschool.  Thus she is behind on her scissor usage, and we now are working on helping her learn to use scissors each evening.  We were also informed that scissors are used daily in Kindergarten. I knew this, but my husband didn’t believe me…doh!

3.) If the school is peanut free don’t send your child to school with anything containing peanut butter.  We assumed that because of toddler doesn’t have a peanut allergy that we could send her to school with peanut butter crackers but that is a big no, no.  A student sitting next to her in class yelped she has peanut butter crackers-ahhhhhhhhh!  Can you say lesson quickly learned!

4.) Expect mass Mom group text and emails.  Group text for: contributions for Teacher Appreciation, Birthday’s, Valentines day, and the last day of school.  Wow!  On another note, it’s 2018 why is there no Dad mass group text and emails?  Even more, I never got gifts for all of these days as a homeschool mom-lol!

5.) It’s a full-time job!  If you previously home schooled your child/children like I did you may feel like you started a new job.  Our toddler’s preschool is 5 days a week.  And I feel as if I applied for a new job and, I got the offer!  I have to be regimented so that our toddler is not late for school, her lunch is nutritiously packed, and my warrior/face paint is intact for starters.

Oh, the ease of homeschool I now miss!

What have you learned as a parent during your child’s/children’s first week at school?  Feel free to comment below and share this article!  Like us on Facebook and Instagram at Growingupguptas and on Twitter at Growingupgupta

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