Maya and school

I haven't totally dropped off the planet. But unfortunately, more than a month after we moved into our new place, we still have not managed to get the state-run telephone company to successfully hook up our internet. So I am still on a really slow dial-up account, and I can't even post pictures -- believe me, I tried!! Anyway, we are hopeful to have real internet soon...

Maya has been doing great at school. She loves it! She has gone four times so far, and she has not cried even once when we left, although she was pretty clingy the first three times. Then on day four, she just walked in, saw some other girls, exclaimed "I play my friends", and ran inside. Did I mention that she is going to school with no diapers? That's right! And she has only had one accident at school so far, which I think is terrific!

Also, I am in love with Maya's preschool! I love the age-mixing at the school. I love that it is small and cozy. And I love that it is totally play-based. I also think they organise the activities really well. It is free play when the kids arrive in the morning, but that is also the time they do their art project of the day. So they basically get pulled aside to do art, or do it in a sort of starggered way as kids arrive in the morning. So they seem to get lots of individual attention with the projects. They have also done really cool activities. One morning, the activity was making pancakes. They also did painting, then turned their painting into paper airplanes. Another day they painted pre-made newspaper hats. And they have outdoor time and circle time every day -- or at least that's what we think. Maya seems to think school is a private affair, and when we ask her what she did every day, she just shrugs her shoulders...

What is also cool is that Maya is showing a huge burst of development since going to school also. All of a sudden she is interested in spatial games -- like shape sorting or stacking or puzzles. She previously was never interested in these types of toys, preferring to focus exclusively on her two favorite activities -- sports and talking. So it's been cool to see her expanding her interests since starting school. And she has been wanting to play "teacher" with us at home, which basically amounts to setting up chairs and telling us what to do.