What is it with Mondays?! I've never had problems with them - Sundays, yes, (before becoming a pastor) - but Mondays, not particularily. But today as I went to take little girl to kindergarten we found all doors closed - there are three - and I felt really awful looking at this place of closed doors where I have to leave her.
They have gates for the rooms where the little ones are and up till now they've kept the doors open. There aren't that many children back yet but I guess they're anticipating a greater crowd now that schools are about to start and keeping the doors cloesed would keep the noise level down. But it felt very unhospitable even if I do understand the logic. Also, it was very hot and humid there.
The problem is that I am very emotional, well, always, but espcially now and it's kind of hard to hide it from little girl. Thankfully she like most kids lives in the moment and forgets my reaction the minute we start doing something else.
The policy they have there is that the kids wash their hands as they arrive and use disinfection fluid after. It's a good policy but it does mean that the process of arriving takes a bit more time. Not a big deal but I kind of would like her to go in right away with the other kids and maybe go wash her hands with the caretaker. I think it may confuse her that I'm the one helping her with this but then I leave. I might be wrong, too, though. Maybe it's just me.
I told little girl yesterday that she will now be attending kindergarten when mommy and daddy are at work. She was pretty ok with the idea but she did cry in her sleep this morning and say "Sleep is missing." which is her way of saying that she can't get to sleep. On Thursday she had not been able to fall asleep for her nap but that was to be expected and she had rested for about a half an hour which I thought was really well done. the problem is that her natural rhythm is to take a nap around 1.30 pm and not at noon. It seems unfair to have to force it but since all children have their own rhythms nap time needs to be set at something and the kids then need to adjust. Sigh.
This is the part I hate. The fact that at two you already have to start adjusting to this that and everything. It's important to learn to play together, and it is important to get new friends and it is important to get a chance to learn new things I just wish I had realized that all of this could have been done in familydaycare, too. However, since we have started this process with the kindergarten and little girl seems to be quite happy to go my emotions just have to deal with it. The braver one of us is little girl. Mommy clearly sucks at this.
As little girl went in she didn't go to play with the other kids and she wanted me to come in, too. I needed to do that anyway to sort out a couple of things so I did. As I had talked with her teacher I said goodbye and got a hug and then she turned to go join the other kids with her teacher. As I left I heard them praising her dress and she seemed pretty proud of herself :).
She likes the kids and the teachers there. At the end of the day that's all that matters. Everything else I will talk about with the teachers when I get a chance but they are really not that huge a deal. They just get to me since I'm already feeling so vulnerable facing the fact that little girl is now in daycare. I pray a lot these days :).
3 comments:
As HL said, you and little girl will get used to it (and understand all that) very soon! :-)
Maybe the doors were closed because they were having breakfast when you arrived? That's what they do in our daycare because they have to remove the gates when fetching the meals with the "cart" from the kitchen...
And washing the hands with you shouldn't really be a problem - it is also you who is helping her to undress after arriving there, and not one of the caretakers, right?
People may think differently about the different ways of daycare - but I am an absolute fan of päiväkoti, and I wouldn't like to send my kids to family daycare.
One of the main reasons is that you have to be very lucky with your perhepäivähoitaja. If there are problems between her and the child (and that might just be that the child doesn't like her, for what silly reason ever), then they still have to cope with each other. All day long, without any alternative. In päiväkoti they can choose. Of course they will have to learn that sometimes also somebody else then the preferred caretaker might serve them the meal or change their diapers or whatever, but at least they do have a choice. If they don't like one (and this might also be temporary - mouse girl did for months not like the caretaker who has become after all her most favourite one!), they do at least have a choice whom to turn to during the day...
There's the same caretaker to child ratio in päiväkoti as in family daycare - with the difference that if the perhepäivähoitaja is occupied by one child, the other three have to wait. In daycare it won't happen very often that all three or four caretakers per group are occupied at the same time...
And they have to follow the same routines and schedules in family daycare, too. In the end it doesn't matter if there are four or fourteen kids - they just have to eat and sleep at the same time. (This is something they have to do at home, too, if there's more than one child! ;-) )
If you feel completely sad with the situation as it is now, you can always try to change to another päiväkoti (would there be one?) or to family day care, but maybe this is not necessary after all. :-)
Thank you! I really needed another point of view. You are absolutely right and as I said little girl really likes it there. She'd been almost crying yesterday at the yard but had kept saying that "I really like it here" at the same time. Poor pet but it's nice to know that she likes it so much. AND there's a boy she likes, too :).
Today the doors were open again :) and yes they might have had a longer breakfast yesterday for some reason.
Thank you Karen, your comment is is why I love blogging :).
prayer is good :)
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