PTA Night

Last night I went to Zach’s school for open house and met Mia there. After shaking copious quantities of rain out of our umbrellas, we climbed the stairs, enjoying the beautiful artwork on the way, to the third floor. Zach’s teacher Louisa was waiting for us in Class 10. We sat at a little people’s table and on little people’s chairs, so with my chin resting comfortably on my knees, I listened to all the wonderful news about our little guy.

Zach is apparently in the habit of setting up the chairs in a circle each morning, for “circle-time”. Although this is very helpful, it is not altruistically motivated. Circle-time is his favorite activity and happens first thing in the morning and last thing in the afternoon. During circle-time they do many activities, however, reading books along with the books on tape is his absolute favorite. We were stunned to learn that today at the end of the afternoon circle-time, Zach got up and actually said, “The end, go home.” He has never spoken more than two words in a row before, and rarely speaks at all at home, and then it is usually only a single word such as “noggin” (a generic term for TV), “give me,” “more,” “cookie,” etc. Obviously he has been holding out on us, and I think I now know where all my cell-phone minutes are going.

We learned that Zach has been doing more and more of his artwork independently, such as coloring with markers, painting with watercolors, and of course decorating with glitter (he is sometimes known there as “glitter-guy” because he likes the sparkly stuff so much). He seems to have a couple of nicknames, but the primary one is “buttercup” which Jessica his first teacher gave him. Everybody, from the principal down to the janitor, knows Zach and he seems to have charmed them all. It was nice to hear everybody gush about how different a kid he is now, compared to when he started. We discussed some kindergarten possibilities to check out for next year, and left feeling really good about our bumblebee (his proper nickname) and by the time we left the rain had stopped.