Thursday, September 6: back to school

He was up a bit past 6 and came down with Carly. We read more of Magic Tree House #27 and then he watched Puffin Rock and ate his vitamins, Cheerios, and apple. I took a shower and he was still hungry so Carly made him peanut butter toast.

We got walking before 7:40. We sat and read the last two chapters of the book. He was reluctant to let me leave, although not getting as upset as yesterday. Went though a lot of tissues, but hopefully his sinuses were pretty drained by the time I left. He kept wanting to know precisely how many activities were between now and lunch and how long each would be. At one point he said, “Let’s divide it into chunks.” He wanted me to check in more. I left at 8:30 and he held Marion’s hand as she walked him back across the outside area.

Rode my bike home, then back to school. I was sitting on the PKA bench when they came out just after 12:30. He thought he didn’t have a lunch but it was hidden behind a backpack. He told me he hadn’t gone to the garden. And he had watched kids play the coding card game. Wasn’t clear what he’d done. He ate a good amount at lunch and I talked to Reia a bit as she was sitting across from him. He said he would choose yoga for the afternoon activity. I was surprised it wasn’t makerspace. Seems like he’s trying them out as he was in the garden last Thursday. He asked me to write down his anthropology notes:

people were kind of making a mess of fake food but cleaned it up.
some people were being really crazy in the classroom. They were running. The teachers said it is not okay.
people haven’t been playing with clay lately. Not even paint.
“Thry won’t listen to me.” If he tries to ask what they’re doing, although he hasn’t tried it.
People have been practicing the one thing at a time goal. “Can people do that at home?” He wanted to practice.

Randomly, he asked me, “How much is 12 plus 12?” When I said 24 he thought about it and said, “So if an hour hand pointed at a twelve it would be half a day!” And then he figured out that if it said 12 again it would be a day. He got one of the sponges to clean his spot and I packed up his lunch. He let me go once they started to line up.

Ran out to me 2:55. Andrea asked if I knew were the Magic Tree House book went. I said I’d taken it has he had brought it out to me at lunch. Apparently he had forgotten this and was stressed out about it. He told me how he had signed up for yoga class, but apparently the teacher didn’t come. So he watched makerspace but sounds like he didn’t join in. He said they did a card or board game and tested batteries.

He took photos around the outside of the preschool. He took a photo of a frying pan lying in the grass and he ran to show it to Marion to tell her about it. I got out the macro lens and we had fun figuring out how to use it. Lots of talk of texture and shape as he was looking for photos.

We sat and played the Human Resources game that he had spotted on my phone. It is basically another learning to code game. Played a couple levels, and he learned of the ‘Go To’ and ‘Copy From’ commands. Particularly for the latter I talked about how computers store data and compared it to what they do in the StoryBots episode.

He found a ball and returned it to the playground. I pointed out red bumpy ball. He asked, “Dada. Do you want to see my porcupine?” When I said yes he threw the ball at me. We sat and he ate Cheerios. He spotted a bunch of harvested kale on the PKA bench and tore some off to eat. He said he thought it was his last chance to eat kale. We went to look. I led us to where the kale had been by the door. He told me that was the wrong kale, as that was where the dino kale had been and this was a different kind of kale over in the garden. He explained how they were different colors and different shapes and tasted different. I told him he was teaching me about kale.

We headed up towards the library. As we went up the stairs he asked, “Is there anyone that takes care of wolves?… Like saves them…But how do they communicate with them? They’d like bite them.” We went down the elevator so he could make a little noise in the echoey area, then went to the library. He had me play chess, and as I was explaining I said that a piece was vulnerable. He asked, “What’s vulnerable mean?” We made it the word of the day.

We went and looked for books. He got the next Magic Tree House and I found a book called The Unexpected Love Story of Alfred Fiddle Duckling. Bar, Omri’s oldest sister, was tickling August and chasing him. He was having fun, but both Liz and I had to tell her to calm down, as they were being loud. Liz’s younger daughter, Eve, was helping out, and had checked in the Magic Tree House book we had brought in, and now checked out the books when August brought them to her.

Carly showed up and August showed her the word stick things, where the letters spin and you try to spell words. She then found the Scieszka Math Curse book and checked it out. Liz gave him a bookmark that smelled like pineapple. As we left he asked, “Dada, will I ever get a bookmark that tastes like pineapple?”

In the car he said, “Dada, as soon as we get home, let’s get ready to go on a walk to take pictures. Let’s take the macro lens.” As Carly went to park, August told her to not park by the big bush across the street because it was poisonous for our car: “Car coisin (poison) drains the battery of your car when you’re gone.”

We did indeed go for a photo walk. He found all sorts of different textures in the wood and rocks as we walked up to the playground. Took photos of plants up there and I told him I was ready to go home and eat: “That’s why I said we’d only go to the park cuz I knew you’d get hungry.”

We were home at 5:20. He finished an Ollie and Moon and we watched the how do ears work episode of StoryBots. We showed Carly some of his photos from yesterday. He played TodoMath as I made him pizza. He did a great job asking for help and when Carly went to help him he said, “You’re a really good teacher.” He ate his pizza, then played Quick Math Jr.

I took him upstairs to his bath. He said he should make a bracelet for me. We went down and looked at our bead options. He said I could wear mine everyday. He’s a little sore that his teachers don’t.

He said he detected an asteroid that was going to hit the earth after “all three people that live in this house are dead.” I asked if he meant near-term, or like thousands of years. He replied, “No. It’s going to be right after all three of us die.”

He then had a machine: “It smashes together rocks with these smashers when you turn a crank. It has a million rocks in it. It has a little tube, and the flour comes out.” But then he decided the first machine only made wheat, then a second crank turned it into flour.

Downstairs he ate both pieces of French toast that Carly had cooked for him. We then read The Unexpected Love Story of Alfred Fiddleduckling and then on Skybrary read Mr. Mouse’s Motel and a a new book called Zachery Zorner Shape Transformer. He didn’t want to make a Möbius strip out of paper, but we liked the book.

Took him up to bed and we discussed the meeting with his teachers after school and the possibility of him being in Mandy’s room while we met somewhere else, like Carly’s classroom. August was trying to visualize it and used the headboard. He pointed at the top of it and at the mattress level and said, “So this is upstairs and this is downstairs.” It was cool how he was visualizing it. No conclusions, but he was open to the idea, knowing there might be science and popsicles involved.

I left them at a 8:25 and he was soon asleep.

‘Everybody do this’ song: