We went to meet Christian's teachers today. He only started at this new school last month, on the 17th, but the teachers already demonstrated a good understanding of our son, his personality, his quirks, and they even remember the exact things he says.
I heard from Teacher D that he has settled well in class, he interacts well with his friends and knows the routine of school. This is peppered with lots of anecdotes about what he does and says in school. For example, he used to ask Teacher D why HW cries.."it's so loud...". Teacher D explains that HW (an autistic child) has not learnt to speak yet, so he cries when he is upset (which is exactly the explanation I would have given.) She taught Christian how to react, by giving the same commands the other children give when HW cries "Pocket. Handkerchief. Wipe." and HW calms down quickly with the consistent response. Apparently, our son discovered that HW gets upset when the children leave the breakfast table to play, leaving him all alone and he can't even view the children cos there is a shelf in between the breakfast table and the play area. So Christian learnt to placate HW by bringing a pile of toys and leaving it at a corner within HW's line of sight, and telling HW that he has reserved some toys for him to play. And HW is happy. :)
The theme in school for the past few weeks was that of animals and pets. The children got to discuss what pets they each wanted, whether certain animals were suited to be pets.. whether they could fit an ostrich in a cage, whether they would be happy if they were caged.. in the course of their discussion, they would go off-topic and talk about foxes and hens in coops before Teacher D gives a summary of what they had talked about. We heard how Teacher D taught Christian to draw a goldfish, hamster and a parrot with step-by-step instructions. I was so surprised that those animals within the jotterbook were drawn by him. I think this is possible only because there are so few students in his class (and made me glad i didn't send him to the ubiquitous PCF kindy.) I also saw another jigsaw puzzle which the teachers drew on and he coloured with a variety of materials - markers, watercolour...Having seen all that, i realise there is no need to send him for art enrichment classes. :)
Teacher D told us how they train pre-writing skills with crayons, markers and a special triangular-grip pencil. She also pointed to some bird houses the children made with ice cream sticks. She described how she asked the children to count 20 sticks out, in groups of 4, and how she showed him to use 4 sticks for one side of the roof, another 4 sticks for the other side, 4 sticks for the base etc etc. It's brilliant, how she incorporates counting and grouping into artwork, at the same time demonstrating the practical uses of numbers.
We heard of the friendly competition between the children. Apparently, Teacher D has word strips and word cards of the words in the book..she jumbles them up and asks them to pick out the correct sentence.. or to form a sentence with the word cards. She's also making a point to ask them to point to the words as they read, and would flash the page to them before asking them which sentence appeared on that page. The children also take turns reading to each other.. and have even taken to challenging each other - "Can you read this word?" "i can read this page!" Teacher D talked about how she creates anticipation for the nice book in the Oxford Reading Tree series, and how she rewards the children who read well by allowing them to read the animated version of the book on the laptop.
Huang Lao Shi told us how A, the smartest boy in class, was a little intimidated by Christian's proficiency in recognising chinese characters, but has now gotten used to it and has started trying to 'reclaim' attention by jumping in to answer as well.
Christian and A apparently share a similar passion for food, and had such fun discussing their favourite foods and fruits..it was hilarious hearing Teacher D talk about the other boy who felt a little left out (cos he only likes to eat meat and nothing else) trying to butt in by repeating himself "i like chicken! i like chicken!" =7
Teacher D also mentioned that Christian would occasionally ask her if there was going to be any writing that day, if they were going to do any table work.. I was surprised to hear him so enthusiastic about sitting down and 'working'..but I take it as a very good sign.
I can't remember what else was said already, but i just remember feeling very pleased that my multi-week school hunt was not in vain. P said it surpassed all expectations, and our son seems to have found a best friend and attained self-realisation. What else can he ask for?
The school is visiting the zoo together with the parents this Thursday, as a culmination of the theme on animals. It's just nice, for I was thinking of bringing him myself.. but just couldn't find the time.
They've done a much better job of teaching him than what I would be able to achieve if i homeschooled him. I am so so so thankful..to the woman who first shared about this school on the forum, and to God for showing me the way to this school..
No comments:
Post a Comment