Monday, October 09, 2006
School news
Jacob went back to school at the end of August, to a new group (class). Normally everyone stays in the same group the whole time they are at the kindergarten, from age 3-6. There are always some older children and some younger children in each class, which I really like. Unfortunately, the enrollment was dropping at the kindergarten. More were leaving to go to first grade than were coming in as 3 year olds. So they had to rearrange the groups a bit and start some new programs. Jacob moved from the mouse group to the bird group, and has adjusted well. He is still a little sad but he can go visit his teachers from the other group whenever he would like. They are very easygoing about the children going to visit friends or teachers in the other groups which is a good thing. One of Jacob's teachers from last year (Ruth) lives in our neighborhood and we often see her when we are out for walks or bike rides. She always has Jacob come in her garden, and sometimes we have cake and coffee with her. She doesn't speak much english, but we manage to talk about some things in my broken german.
Jacob is also signed up for some "extra" classes that they now offer, and is enjoying them. He has music class for one hour on Mondays, and Art on Thursdays. Also on Thursdays he has started going to a "sports" program in our town. It is more like physical fitness, with running, jumping and some games. All the kids have a great time, it will be even better in the winter when they can't play outside as much. It is in the gym at the regular school in Wolframs-Eschenbach.
Right now they are replacing the roof on the kindergarten, it has been quite a process to watch. First they remove all the red tiles, then the old insulation. Now they are putting in new insulation and underboards, I imagine any day now they will start putting on the new tiles. I'm not sure how the tiles go on, if they lock together or are attached somehow. I know that the ones on my house can be removed one at a time when someone is working up on our roof. They take them off and use the blank spots as steps. It's very interesting to see. The children are enjoying the work, since they have a large crane in the play yard that is always doing something. It has limited their time outside to play, although today they all walked over to another playground a short distance from the kindergarten. Jacob thought that was a lot of fun, a little field trip I guess.
Jacob is also signed up for some "extra" classes that they now offer, and is enjoying them. He has music class for one hour on Mondays, and Art on Thursdays. Also on Thursdays he has started going to a "sports" program in our town. It is more like physical fitness, with running, jumping and some games. All the kids have a great time, it will be even better in the winter when they can't play outside as much. It is in the gym at the regular school in Wolframs-Eschenbach.
Right now they are replacing the roof on the kindergarten, it has been quite a process to watch. First they remove all the red tiles, then the old insulation. Now they are putting in new insulation and underboards, I imagine any day now they will start putting on the new tiles. I'm not sure how the tiles go on, if they lock together or are attached somehow. I know that the ones on my house can be removed one at a time when someone is working up on our roof. They take them off and use the blank spots as steps. It's very interesting to see. The children are enjoying the work, since they have a large crane in the play yard that is always doing something. It has limited their time outside to play, although today they all walked over to another playground a short distance from the kindergarten. Jacob thought that was a lot of fun, a little field trip I guess.
