Buddies and Pals Nursery School<\/p>\n
By Kate Chamberlin<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The tension is mounting.\u00a0 We have sent in Tyler’s<\/p>\n
application to our local nursery school, but we haven’t heard if<\/p>\n
he’s been accepted yet. It’s quite nerve wracking.<\/p>\n
I mean, what if his credentials aren’t good enough.<\/p>\n
Perhaps, I started him on a sippy cup too late.\u00a0 Did we start him<\/p>\n
on “pull-ups” too soon?\u00a0 I think his first tooth cut through on<\/p>\n
time, but maybe they’re looking for early teethers.<\/p>\n
Now that I think of it, though, he crawled for only a couple<\/p>\n
weeks before he got up to run.\u00a0 He never did walk much.\u00a0 He’s<\/p>\n
always running!\u00a0 Not that he’s hyper-active, but they might<\/p>\n
prefer the Type B personality.<\/p>\n
When our oldest son applied to Syracuse University’s<\/p>\n
Architecture Program ten years ago, things got tense, too.\u00a0 He’d<\/p>\n
applied for early admission, submitted his application, went for<\/p>\n
the interview with his portfolio and then, nothing.\u00a0 It was so<\/p>\n
heart breaking to see him jog out to the mail box, only to drag<\/p>\n
himself in without a word from Syracuse.<\/p>\n
Then, late one evening when he came home from working at<\/p>\n
Family Ties Restaurant, he checked his mail.\u00a0 He bounded up the<\/p>\n
stairs and stood at the far end of the bedroom hallway, raised<\/p>\n
his arms in a victory sign and bellowed, “I’m in.\u00a0 They want me!”<\/p>\n
He ran down the hallway clutching the acceptance paper in his<\/p>\n
clenched fist and bounced on our bed to be sure we’d heard his<\/p>\n
good news.\u00a0 He was one happy camper and I’ve always been proud to<\/p>\n
be an Orange Mom.<\/p>\n
What if our 2-1\/2 year old isn’t accepted into the nursery<\/p>\n
school?\u00a0 Will he feel the rejection for the rest of his life?<\/p>\n
He’s so young.\u00a0 How will he cope?<\/p>\n
Oh Dear Gussie, Plan B.\u00a0 I need a Plan B.<\/p>\n
I taught at the Teddy Bear Nursery School years ago.\u00a0 I’ll<\/p>\n
just start my own school.\u00a0 It will be called Buddies and Pals<\/p>\n
Nursery School.<\/p>\n
Our “game room” already has plenty of space for large muscle<\/p>\n
activities, such as rolling and bouncing balls.\u00a0 I could put up<\/p>\n
the trampoline, too.\u00a0 We have the old water heater box to crawl<\/p>\n
through and lots of other games to encourage imagination, team<\/p>\n
spirit and taking turns.<\/p>\n
I could bring up the puppet stage from our basement.\u00a0 I must<\/p>\n
still have the puppets around somewhere or we’ll make new ones.<\/p>\n
Then he can learn to sew, use scissors, glue and create his own<\/p>\n
puppet.\u00a0 It’ll be great for small muscle development.<\/p>\n
Yes, yes, this nursery school idea is coming together!<\/p>\n
Every child needs to feel responsible for something, so<\/p>\n
we’ll have him care for the cat. \u00a0Each morning right after we<\/p>\n
review the shapes,\u00a0 colors and seasonal holidays, and have<\/p>\n
“Calendar time”, he can feed and water the cat.\u00a0 Some days he can<\/p>\n
even brush Gato.\u00a0 The fish are already his and he now knows from<\/p>\n
experience, that dumping the whole can of fish flakes in, will<\/p>\n
result in dead fish.<\/p>\n
Oh, whoops.\u00a0 Teaching colors will be a bit tricky for a<\/p>\n
totally blind person, but I’ll braille a lot of things and, I’m<\/p>\n
sure, we can find some talking computer software that will assist<\/p>\n
us in learning the colors.<\/p>\n
Technology is important these days and we have a tape player<\/p>\n
that he already knows how to use.\u00a0 We’ll listen to lots of books<\/p>\n
with cassettes.\u00a0 Then draw pictures on paper with crayons or on<\/p>\n
my chalk board.\u00a0 The kid already can use our VCR better than I<\/p>\n
can, so he’ll be in charge of running the educational video<\/p>\n
tapes.<\/p>\n
Socializing is very important for three-year olds, so I’ll<\/p>\n
have other children in every now and then.\u00a0 Years ago when I had<\/p>\n
several children in my After School Study Buddy Program, we had a<\/p>\n
Friday Is Friends Day.\u00a0 We invited several neighborhood girls who<\/p>\n
were the same age as my charges in to play board games.\u00a0 This<\/p>\n
left out the younger brother, so we started inviting a couple of<\/p>\n
his friends in, too.\u00a0 Then the younger siblings of the girls<\/p>\n
wanted to come for Friday is Friends Day, also.\u00a0 It was a huge<\/p>\n
success.\u00a0 Why not start that up again?<\/p>\n
I’ve always dreamed of running my own nursery school.\u00a0 This<\/p>\n
is great.\u00a0 I’m really excited.\u00a0 I’m trained and Certified N-6, so<\/p>\n
this might really work.<\/p>\n
Oh, there’s the phone.<\/p>\n
It was the director of the local nursery school.\u00a0 Tyler has<\/p>\n
been accepted for the September, 2001 semester.\u00a0 She recommended<\/p>\n
the summer pre-nursery school session for three-year olds. I<\/p>\n
suspect the summer session is more for introducing the children<\/p>\n
to the school experience rather than a remedial pre-reading<\/p>\n
readiness skills session.<\/p>\n
Does he want to join them?<\/p>\n
Yes, he’d like to attend.<\/p>\n
Poof!\u00a0 There goes my dream of a nursery school.<\/p>\n
If I’ve learned one thing during my more that half-a-century<\/p>\n
on this earth, it is that I must let go of my dreams for my<\/p>\n
children when they start to have dreams of their own.<\/p>\n
So, be off with our Blessings, my little love.\u00a0 Have fun<\/p>\n
with the other wee people at your nursery school.\u00a0 Your Mimi will<\/p>\n
be here with milk and cookies to welcome you home.<\/p>\n
Besides, we can\u00a0 always be buddies and pals.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
04\/19\/2001 Wayne County STAR Newspaper<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Buddies and Pals Nursery School By Kate Chamberlin \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The tension is mounting.\u00a0 We have sent in Tyler’s application to our local nursery school, but we haven’t heard if he’s been accepted yet. It’s quite nerve wracking. I mean, what if his credentials aren’t good enough. Perhaps, I started him on a sippy cup too […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=700"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":719,"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700\/revisions\/719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/katechamberlin.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}