Preschool
It hit me sometime last week that Nathan is starting preschool in less than a month. How did that happen? And we haven’t really talked with him about it. When we were looking for a preschool everyone asked him excitedly about “school” (Grammy: Nathan, are you going to school? Nathan: No. PREschool.”) but we haven’t done anything to help prepare him for being left at a strange new place for two full days a week. So of course we got a new book to see if we could cram some preparation into these last two weeks - Llama Llama Misses Mama. While other books about starting preschool have main characters who spend the beginning of the story fretting about the first day, just to show up and love all their new friends and the new activities, poor Llama Llama gets whisked out of bed and off to school in just six pages. And then he spends half of the remaining story being shy and grumpy before having a meltdown because he misses Mama Llama. Now that’s our kind of kid. And of course, in the end he plays with the other kids (four pages) and then Mama comes back and he’s thrilled and learns something new - he loves Mama and school too.
So last night we read Nathan’s “New, Special Book” for the first time. And he LOVED it. He felt bad for little llama. He wanted to know where Mama went (to work). When Llama Llama cried Nathan reassured him that Mama comes back (Nathan knows this from personal experience) and he was SO EXCITED when Mama Llama returned. And he wanted to read it AGAIN RIGHT NOW. So we read it again. This time we wondered together where Daddy Llama was (working too, but he’d be home making dinner when they all got back). And Nathan got JUST AS EXCITED when Mama Llama came back. We had no idea this book was going to be such an emotional experience. And then we got into bed and offered one last book and Nathan asked to read his “special book please???? with Llama Llama goes to school?”
This time when the teacher tried to engage Llama Llama at story time (Does little Llama want a look? Llama Llama hates that book.) Nathan said,
“He scared.”
“He’s scared of the teacher?”
“Ja. He scared.”
“Because the teacher is new to him?”
“Ja. He scared the new teacher. Mama go to work and leave him all alone. Nathan scared when Mama leave him and go a work at church. And Daddy work a church.”
(At this point Tim and I were trying really hard not to laugh because Nathan was being so slow and thoughtful and deliberate in his tell and also because we never ever expected that this new book would have Nathan expressing his own separation anxiety or that in just three readings he’s figure out that this book was kinda about him.)
“You get scared when we leave you in church school?”
“Ja.”
“But do we come back?”
“YAH!!!!!!” with big smiles and jumping up and down on the bed
So, WHO KNOWS how the first day of preschool will go, but the book is a keeper.