9/3/08 - Just Playing

Evee had her first day of preschool today (well, her first day for this school year... she went to preschool for the first time last year). It was also orientation day, so Roseann and I went along to fill out the paperwork and such. Becca stayed with Gramma Jean and did some homeschooling. She learned about homonyms, sundials and the geometry of shadows, and she read a couple of poems. They went through a surprising number of other things considering we were only gone for an hour and a half, but Gramma Jean used to be an elementary school teacher, so she knows how to cram it all in there.

Evee was very happy to meet her new teacher, Mrs. Rosbach, who was also Becca's preschool teacher for two years. Ellie, who is one of Evee's good friends from church, is also in her preschool class. Ellie gave Evee a stuffed animal, Pony, for her birthday last year, and that's been Evee's favorite toy ever since.

On the preschool orientation pages, they had included a poem called "Just Playing" by Anita Wadley about how when children are playing, they're really learning all kinds of things... It's written from the child's perspective, saying, for example... When you see me up to my elbows in paint, Or standing at an easel, or molding and shaping clay, Please don't let me hear you say, "He's just playing" For you see, I'm learning as I play. I'm expressing myself and being creative. I may be an artist or an inventor someday. The last verse goes: When you ask me what I've done at school today, And I say "I played," Please don't misunderstand me. For, you see, I'm learning as I play. I'm learning to be successful in work. I'm preparing for tomorrow. Today, I'm a child and my work is play. I thought it was a very poignant poem and so afterwards when I asked Evee what she did during preschool and she said, "I played", I had to smile and laugh. Evee's not driven as much towards academics as Becca, but she's always been a very playful girl who is very smart and observant of her surroundings. If she gets that from playing a lot, then I'm happy to see her studying that kind of curriculum.

Otherwise, the girls played outside for quite a while and we did some various errands and continued work on our video project. We also went to look at a moped. It doesn't look the greatest, but it runs well and we might pick it up and fix it up for making odd trips around town.

Evee with Mrs. Rosbach...




Don't worry, we'll buy some helmets if we get this moped...