Kindergarten Grace

So this is really a grandparent post.  For those of you who are not Grace’s grandparents, forgive me.  But since I also make this blog into a memory book each year, I want this stuff recorded. 

So if you really are not interested in the details of Grace’s kindergarten year, then please go back to your previous activities.  🙂

One more week of school left….and my sweetie will be a first grader.  She has had such a great year! 

Grace had the teacher on the far right until Christmas, and then HOPAC’s regular kindergarten teacher (who had been on maternity leave) took over for the rest of the year.  Both were fantastic, dedicated, talented teachers.

Outside the kindergarten classroom

One of the things I love about HOPAC’s elementary school is that each class puts on three assemblies each year….full of singing and dancing and presenting.  I remember when I was teaching at HOPAC, I thought, You’ve got to be kidding…you want me to do what each term?  But I got the hang of it and loved doing asemblies with my class.  So it was so much fun to see Grace do assemblies this year.  One of the major advantages is that the kids get so used to performing that they have no stage fright by the time they get to the upper grades.

Grace was a break-dancer in this assembly….oh yes, she was! 

Assembly #2 

Grace and three of her best friends, wearing their “outside” hats.  All elementary students are required to wear hats outdoors.  I think this idea came from Australia.  Who knows?  We are an international school! 

The day our puppies visited kindergarten……

The day the fire truck visited kindergarten…..

 Grace with her kindergarten teacher for the second half of the year, on Sports Day.  This teacher is British, which means Grace comes home with all kinds of expressions like, How sensible!  and Well done!  and I put a full stop on the end of my sentence! 

I love it (full stop).   

 When I was little, Sports Day was my worst day of the year.  I would cry every time.  I would be last in everything. 

Not this sweetie.  She was running against the first graders, and was the only kindergarten girl to place in any of their races. 

Second Place in the 400 meter!

She’s reading and writing like crazy.  This story made me particularly happy because she did it at home, in her notebook, totally on her own.  I discovered it one day and am not even exactly sure when she did it.

Here is the translation, with fixed spelling, but everything else hers:

The Turtle and the Monkey

Once upon a time there was a mean monkey.  The monkey lived in the tree.  And a little turtle that lived in the
water.  The monkey be so mean to the
little turtle.  The turtle had an
idea  he wanted challenge the monkey to a
race.  They raced.  The monkey was going so fast one of the
branches broke and the monkey fell in the water with an AAH and with a
splash.  Turtle was still swimming until
he saw the poor monkey.  He felt sorry
for the [monkey].   The monkey was
sad.  The monkey said he was sorry that
he had be mean to the turtle.  He
promised to never to be mean again. 

 The
End. 

aaaand….the illustration. 

But this is what made my whole year.

Yesterday was the Kindergarten Awards Ceremony, when each child in the class was presented with an award.  Grace received hers for “kindness and thoughtfulness towards others.”

Not much else I would rather her to receive an award for! 

Onwards to First Grade!