End of Year Program

My kids are fortunate to attend Spartan Station.  They love it!  Though many would argue that home is the best place for kids to be (and they are probably right for THEIR kids), I think this is the best place for MY kids to be.  Here are my reasons:

• They love going there and they love all of their teachers!  Their teachers all love them!
• They LEARN so much (basically they are in pre-school from age 2)!
• They have friends and they learn to positively interact with others.
• They are better eaters because they have to eat whatever weird school lunch they get that day.  At home I just give them the same things over and over again.
• They have positive experiences with lots of different kinds of people.  They know "little people," girls who wear veils, people with tattoos and blue hair, people of different skin colors, and people who look just like them.  It sometimes lends itself to interesting discussions in the car, but at a young age they are learning to accept and value diversity.
• They are much more structured and routine than I could ever be at home.  Though I love the summer, I'm a bad stay-at-home-mom.

Anyway . . .  I'm so proud of my kids and what they learn and how they behave (most of the time).  I'm so grateful for this wonderful place to take them every day.

We had a bit of a battle at the end of the school year because the school district had decided to cancel the unfunded (by state funds) bus routes to two elementary schools and one route to a junior high.  This included the route that picked up kids from Spartan Station to take them to Liberty Elementary, the school Molly and 7 other kindergartners will attend next year (nearly 20 kids total, mostly teachers' kids).  It put many of us parents in a predicament and gave us some challenging opportunities to address the issues with our district leaders and school board.  I even had the unique opportunity to sit down one-on-one with our district superintendent, Steve Hirase, and discuss the matter. That was quite a learning experience for me.  

Poison Pen Petersen hasn't struck in quite a while and I realized that some of my strengths include the ability to write poignantly, problem solve, and also that people look to me in a leadership position when I get involved.  I haven't had an opportunity like that in a while.  

Long story short . . .  the problem isn't solved, nor did we as teachers get any credit for putting on the pressure to solve it, but one bus route did get extended for one year and we now have that year to figure out a more permanent solution.  

This post was supposed to be about my amazing children and their ability to recite difficult text.  The year end program had a patriotic theme.  Here are the results!

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal . . .  - Declaration of Independence

“A thoughtful mind, when it sees a Nation's flag, sees not the flag only, but the Nation itself; and whatever may be its symbols, its insignia, he reads chiefly in the flag the Government, the principles, the truths, the history which belongs to the Nation that sets it forth.” - Henry Ward Beecher