The First Day Back to School in NYC

After complaining for weeks about how late school started in New York City, it started yesterday. I thought I had it together this year. And then I realized on Monday that my incoming Kindergartner needed school supplies too! There was no time to shop, so I’ll have to finish it this weekend. And I didn’t do the incoming Kindergarten worksheets either. While my son is going into special education Kindergarten class, I hadn’t received anything.

But back to getting ready, I spent hours on Tuesday night  packing summer school projects, work packets, and school supplies. I labeled everything and got snacks together. Before my children went to sleep, we put out outfits for the next day.

Naively, I thought that things would be easier this year. All the kids had to do was brush their teeth, get dressed, and ready for school. We have our kids eat breakfast at school, but we give them a drink in the morning.

6:45 AM My husband and I woke up to make sure things went smoothly. Usually one of our kids would already be up. But not today. Everyone was sound asleep, even though we made sure they went to sleep early.

7:00 AM I woke my little guy. He wasn’t happy. Then I woke my oldest and my middle child. Kids dressed, we showered and I actually had time to print out signs.

However, like most kids, they weren’t exactly cooperating for photos and we were struggling to get a good one.

 

However, it’s not always about getting that perfect shot. It’s about loving them and helping them be their best.

 

This little one is off to Special Ed Kindergarten. That’s his normal and he doesn’t know what the differences are between a regular class and a special ed class. After we dropped off our 4th grade and I dropped my 2nd grader off, I found that that Kindergarten (all of them, including special ed) was only going from 9 to 10 AM (it was 7:55 AM at this point).

So S and I went home and made waffles to kill the hour.

I dropped him back at 9 (and yes, I admit to tearing up) and since it was such a short time before I had to collect him again, I went to the bagel store with another mother. Our oldest had been in the same Kindergarten, first and second grade classes and they are in the same fourth grade class. So we introduced our youngest kids to each other. Looks like S may have a little buddy!

Unfortunately the wonderful teacher we were hoping he would have, Mr. H, didn’t end up being his teacher. In the spring, Mr. H. had taken the time to meet with my husband and I to reassure us that S would be fine in his special ed K-2 class. While I’m happy that S. is in a K/1 Special Education class, I wish Mr. H. had been teaching the class. I got to meet S. ‘s teacher when I picked him up an hour later. She seemed really nice. She seemed to really like S. (always a plus). I had sent in a note that S. is trained now (it’s on his IEP that they can have a paraprofessional help with toileting, but I wanted them to let him go himself). The teacher asked me for signs if S. is about to “go”. Unlike most kids, S. won’t jump up and down or hold himself. Since his training is a new thing, I wasn’t sure what to tell them. They did tell me that he released gas during class. Honestly did not know what to say to that. They asked me to check him once he got home (he was fine).

Pickup for the older two was awful. I had the wrong door to pick my daughter up at. Because of that, I was late to pick up my oldest child at the other school building across the street. Glad I was able to pick them up myself (last year I had to work on the first and second days of school and my mother had to deal with the chaos).

I hope the second day goes a little smoother (and a little less gassy).