Tot School...

...coming to our dining room!

Well, my original plan was thrown out the window...AG was suppose to start preschool last week at the Child Development Center at Berry. (CDC) The biggest requirement for enrollment that they be 100% potty trained and they be at least 3 years old. Well, we toured last spring, signed the papers, and paid the deposit. In late August we began potty training hardcore so that we'd have it down pat by January. Well my friends, that did not happen. AG is completely potty trained when it comes to peeing but pooping on the potty just isn't happening on a daily basis. (It's not that he can't or hasn't...it's that he just flat out doesn't want to.) This is when Andy likes to remind me that I wanted a redhead child and thus, implying, the stubborn streak that comes with being redheaded! Ha. You name it and we've tried it.

So, where does that leave us? Since Plan A is on hold we are moving to Plan B. The new plan is that AG will, Lord willing, enroll in August. (I might be bald if August comes and he's not off to school!) In the mean time AG and I are going to begin Tot School. AKA a special time two or three days a week for us to sit down together and work together. I'm thinking we'll do it in the morning when Avi-Kate takes her nap...we'll see once we get started if I need to tweak it. This won't necessarily be 'school' but rather time during the week for us to casually explore numbers, patterns, colors, shapes, themes, books, letters, etc. Most of this will be geared towards whatever is going on/he's interested in. (For all my fellow teachers...maybe I'm more Reggio Emilia than I thought I'd be! My preschool professor in college spent an entire semester on Reggio instead of teaching us all the different theories of preschool instruction...which makes me laugh that I'm even writing about this eight years after the fact...) Exploration and simple instruction. Nothing heavy, in depth, or involved.

The name Tot School comes from this little gem of a website I stumbled upon two years ago...you can take a look here. I'm in the process right now of some cleaning and organizing. Once we get past AG's birthday next week we'll get started on Tot School. (This should give us several weeks at it before we head to Disney for a week...spring break?!? Ha.) I'll post our simple plans and what we are doing once we begin. Be on the lookout...