Preschool Blues

The past week or so the little man has taken to crying rather passionately when I drop him off at Preschool. It's heartwrenching to walk away. I don't know what to do. I've tried talking to him about school, warming him up in the car, telling him we'll give kisses and hugs and then Mommy has to "go working". It doesn't matter. The meltdowns still happen.

I know they're good to him there. That's not the issue. If I have to guess I'd say that:
a) There's been a lot of change in his little life this year: new country, new language, new school, new summer school, at home with Mom for 2 weeks, another new school...
b) It's the language barrier. Though it never seemed to bother him quite so much before, I think he's finding it increasingly frustrating that he can't quite communicate with the children his age at school. He has reverted to baby talk and playing with the younger ones, who also can't quite communicate yet. But I think he's outgrown the little ones and doesn't quite fit in with his peer group yet. He's lonely.

The teachers keep a very close watch on him. So much so that at yesterday's 45-minute parent/teacher conference, I got the full rundown on "A Day in the Life of my Son". From his washroom habits to his eating habits and playing habits. They are looking for solutions to the challenges and I'm trying to provide them with as much insight as possible.

But I feel helpless. Short of taking him out of school (which is not an option at this stage in our lives), I really don't know what to do. Everyone says "It will pass", just as it has on so many other occasions but this time seems different. It's a delayed reaction to his new environment...quite delayed. Any suggestions?

Whatever the reason, DO NOT BE LATE

Oh boy...One thing I've noticed since moving to this country is that Swedes are chronically ON TIME. If you're having a party, like we did for hubby this weekend and tell guests the party starts at 7pm, the guests either arrive at 6:45pm or right on the nose at 7pm. So my usual buffer of "casually late" which I've become accustomed to in North America is gone. This is not so much a problem for me, really. But my chronically-late husband needs to get his ass in gear.

So my poor son has been sick with a cold since Friday. No fever. Just a runny nose. They called from his school to suggest that I pick him up early. And sure enough, hubby and I both fell ill after our party guests left Saturday night. Today is Monday and time for school. After gauging that Joe was just fine, save for a runny nose, it was off to school for him. Last night I decided we were sleeping in. No waking up at 7am to get him to school for 8am. In fact, we woke up at 8am and my plan was to call the school (like a good and respectful parent) to advise them Joe would be late.

I proceed to explain to the teacher that answered the outdoor phone, to which she replied, clearly aghast, "Oh no, what happened?" I was not expecting that kind of What-terrible-thing-could-have-happened-to-prevent-you-from-respecting-the-rules-and-being-on-time reaction so I blubber, "Son's sick, I'm sick and we slept in". I then had to backpeddle a bit to explain that son was actually feeling better (really, he's well enough to come to school, I swear). "Oh, I think you should speak to Anna" (the boss).

I had composed myself again, apologized, but my son would be late. He would arrive at 9:15am. "Oh...well...you know that the children are inside at that time and that you will be interrupting things. Please make sure we make eye contact before you leave. That's very important."

Suddenly sleeping in didn't seem like a good idea anymore.

So we show up at 9:15am (on time, the new time that is). Of course, son had expected to walk down the rock path to join the children in the park and was visibly upset the routine had changed and we were going inside instead. I am not stupid. I do realize that this change of routine would impact him. But in my defense, I had planned to make it on time for the park drop-off and blame my boss for calling me with a work emergency that delayed the "getting ready for school routine". Anyway, I drag him inside and Anna comes over to greet us as the other children look on. She, of course, notices son is a bit "out of sorts".

"The reason for your lateness doesn't concern me," she states, "Please remember that it is extremely important to follow the routine and that your son is confused now because the routine was broken."

"Yes, I realize that," I try to explain. "It was a bad morning."
"I'm sure it was," she said. "But please try to be on time."

Translation: Dear Bad Mother, Get your lazy ass out of bed in the morning and get your son to school on time.

From Hunky Dorey to Montessori

After four weeks of summer school (where he was the only constant) and two weeks at home with Mom, the little man started his new dagis on Monday.

Boy what a difference from his first daycare experience. Background Break: The dude had a nanny for the first two and a half years of his life. Then we moved to Sweden and he started daycare at a school a 30-second walk from our front door. Convenient, yes! Then we found out the school was likely closing for a myriad of reasons, mainly financial and due to the fact that the school is housed in converted apartments not ideally suited to a daycare facility. The parents continue to battle on to keep it open and have made enough of a stink that the local media has picked up the story.

I decided I wasn't that thrilled with the school anyway so figuring we'd have to move schools, I started looking around and happened on a Montessori school. For those unfamiliar with Montessori education, in a nutshell, it's about empowering the individual child to reach his/her full potential by allowing them to be independent and building their self-esteem. Teachers don't "teach" in a Montessori environment, they guide, direct, observe and redirect. After receiving an in-depth hour-long orientation and hearing stories like, "Oh yes, the children make coffee for us." "They help teach the younger children" "They know how to multiply by the time they're ready for school", how could I say No?

For one, Montessori schools in North American are EXPENSIVE. Here, I pay the same low monthly cost of 1260 SEK for 35 hours/week, which is about 200 Canadian dollars!!! Ok, so I also have to clean the place twice a year. But hey, what's a few pee-stained potties in exchange for a super genius son? (slight exagerration on the genius expectation but not the cleaning toilets part). Anyway, I can job out the cleaning to some kid for 750 SEK.

I digress (as usual)

Anyway, today was Day #3. We won't go back to Day #2. That was the day my angelic son changed to devil spawn: saying "No" to every request made by the teacher, constantly running out into the hall screaming, refusing to listen. I was mortified. But that was Day #2 (which involved me sitting in the hall outside the classroom for an hour). Day #3 involved me dropping him off outside and leaving for almost 2 hours. He cried but apparently not for long (his teacher called me an hour later with a report). I think my mother-in-law was right. He was probably wondering on Days 1 & 2 where the heck all the kids were. The first two days, no kids, just him and the director, one-on-one.

As per strict instructions, I arrived on time and waited outside. His teacher, let's call her Anna, came out to brief me on the day's events. A play-by-play: He read a dinosaur book, he played with a dinosaur puzzle. He was consoled by another English-speaking boy when he cried after I left. He played with blocks. She must have spoken to me for a solid 10 minutes and THEN informed me that there would be up to 5 parent/teacher evenings where we'd meet with her to discuss his development. WTF?!

All this for the rock bottom price of $200/month? (yes I realize this all comes back to us in heavy taxes, but still). His last school, though the teachers were kind enough, they NEVER paid that much attention to us! In fact, they didn't pay much attention at all, as evidenced by a few incidents where I freaked out over blatantly inadequate supervision.

Digressing again...

My point is this: Cautiously optimistic about this opportunity for the little man. It's gonna be a huge change for him AND for me but we're up for the challenge. I just hope they are...