Kindergarten's going great!

Amy and Mrs. Mitkowski at
meet the teacher day

Amy is doing so well in kindergarten, just like we thought she would. She is excited about everything they're learning, and is enjoying the structure and organization of the classroom. We are so incredibly fortunate to have gotten Mrs. Mitkowski and Mrs. Cote as her teachers – Mrs. Mitkowski really seems to see what Amy needs, and takes the time to do things that will help her. Amy has quickly learned to use lower case letters and is really reading, though I think she still doesn't feel 100% comfortable and confident with her abilities – she doesn't feel ready to sit and read on her own, though I think she's pretty well capable of it. Amy wanted to learn to write her name in cursive, so Tod showed her how and she's been busy perfecting her signature.

Amy learned to tie her shoes last month....just before she broke her wrist. She got that cast off yesterday, thankfully, so now we can get back to wearing tie shoes and reinforce her abilities. And that cast – it didn't slow her down one tiny bit. She's a bit too much of a pro at it...here's hoping for no more broken bones!

Today was our first parent-teacher conference with Mrs. Mitkowski. She reviewed how Amy did on the PALS (Phonological Literacy Awareness Screening) testing. The expected benchmark for kids as they start kindergarten is a score of 27 (I think that's right – somewhere in the 20s) and then they'd like kids to be up to a score of 81 by the end of the school year. Amy started the year with a score of 85. Wow.

Mrs. Mitkowski also said "You know Mrs. Cote and I try not to have favorites, but Amy just captured our hearts from the very first day." Wow, is that nice!

So far, so good!