Preschool Jitters

Jay starts the first grade on Monday. As if the idea that my daughter will be away from me for about 7 hours a day, 5 days a week isn't painful enough, Nas will start preschool the week after. Typically a kid born after October 1st doesn't get to go to preschool until he is 3 years old, so he'd have to wait until October 30th to even register anywhere! Luckily Jay's school offers a Young 3's program so even at 2-almost-3 years old, Nas can go get some schoolin'.

That schoolin' may come at a painful price, at least for me. One of the teachers called on Wednesday when I was out running umpteen-million errands with the kids in tow and Babe answered...go figure. We got the start date and a time to come in for Nas' evaluation before his first day.

Uh, evalu-who? For what? Why? What's he supposed to know?

My mind raced a mile a minute. Forget Nas and how he might feel in the evaluation, I suddenly felt like I was being tested.

"How much time have you spent teaching your son colors, the alphabet, how to fly a space ship?"

"But, but, Nas wouldn't sit still long enough to have an entire story read to him. He weighed about 28 pounds for months because he wouldn't sit long enough to eat! What do you want from me?"

Much of what he's learned up to this point was in passing. But none of that matters now. My son's being evaluated and I have no clue what they think he should know as an almost-3-year-old. Heck, I've gotten the boy potty trained...isn't that enough?

Suddenly I feel like I need to stuff all the preschool information I can down my son's throat. Let's learn every color in the box of 144 Crayolas, let's learn to write your name....all three of them, let's sit down and learn how to type a 5-paragraph essay. Why not!!?? But when the idea of "cramming" for Nas' pre-preschool evaluation occurred to me, I realized that Nas is a great boy all around and he'll learn everything he needs to succeed in school...that's what the teachers are there for, right?

I'm no teacher, child rearing has taught me that if little else. But Nas is funny, smart and sees everything in a cool, original way...and the kid's been here less than THREE years!! Whatever he shows his teachers he knows will be great and whatever he proves he doesn't is just something for us to work on while his big sissy is at school all day. It's time for mommy to step up her game and get this little boy ready for school, the time passes so fast it's vital I do my part.

Let's just hope my little guy doesn't get in front of his evaluators and forget any and everything he's learned in his short two years...he's got to at least be ready for pre-preschool! I mean COME ON!