The First Few Days of School

We started with Bianca’s first day ceremony at 755 on Monday morning. The whole school assembled in the courtyard for the salute to the flag, complete with the national anthem, followed by short welcome speeches by the directors. After the ceremony, all of the parents accompanied the kids to their respective classrooms for a final sendoff. Bianca was excited, but as you will see from some of the photos, she had sort of a “deer in the headlights” look, not sure what to expect.

After leaving Bianca at First grade, we had until 0930, when Diego’s first day ceremony started. They had a similar event to Bianca’s, but smaller and more geared towards the 4 and 5 year olds. All of the kids lined up with their teachers, and again, the students and parents went off to their classrooms. Diego’s group of 4 year olds are in the sala naranja - “orange room”. Since many of the children were in preschool for the first time, all of the parents stayed in the classroom for the first 15 or 20 minutes, as the teacher introduced all the students. We all slowly filtered out as the kids moved to the outdoor play area.

After three days, the kids seem to be very happy with their schools. There is obviously a language barrier to work through, but it hasn‘t seemed to dampen their enthusiasm. I think the fact we made several visits to the schools last week has helped them to feel more familiar.

We have made a point of checking with their teachers to see how things are going. Diego’s teacher Senorita “Andy”, said that he is very sociable and talkative, although he insists on talking to his classmates in English. Diego finishes each day with a smile on his face - so far so good.

Bianca’s teachers have been positive, as well. She obviously has a long way to go with her Spanish. It is unrealistic to expect much after less than a week. We are confident that she and Diego will both progress. Also, because they study English some of the afternoons in Bianca’s school, they have some English-speaking teachers on the staff that have taken Bianca under their wing, so to speak.

We have been impressed by some aspects of the school down here. Each student has a hardbound cuaderno (notebook) that the staff use solely for communication with parents. Daily and weekly schedules, permission slips, and anything of concern is stapled in to the notebook, which we can check each afternoon.

Another nice aspect is that nobody drives their kids to school. In Arizona, we are used to a gauntlet of Minivans and SUV’s, in a constant procession of drop-off or pickup. Usually the closest you get to the other parents is a glimpse through the tinted windshield. Here in BA, parents (from all the schools in the area) walk their kids to and from school. We have chatted with some of the parents that we recognize, and we look forward to getting to know more people in the coming weeks.