goodbye kindergarten

Here is my baby the first day of school.

He looks so young.

And here we are, the last day of kindergarten, all grown up.

I'm not gonna lie. It makes me want to cry that Finn is done with kindergarten. He had the most special experience ever, due to his fantastic teacher, Mr. M, pictured above.

I cannot say enough nice things about this man. He is the perfect teacher, if one exists.

He is a very firm disciplinarian. He has excellent classroom control. He manages to whip these kids into shape with a kind spirit about him-- "Now honey, I should not have to come and stop the whole line to come and get you" he says, stooping down to talk to little Harry. And he is a bit more forceful, depending on the attitude of the kid(s) in question. You should have seen him lay down the law when a bunch of rowdy boys were fighting. It was pretty much awesome. I just stood watching in absolute fascination.

And the kids adore him. I have never seen a teacher walk down the hall and see so many kids of all ages frantically waving to get his attention.

He is professional, yet ridiculously sweet. I remember having a concern over the legal writing in a field trip permission slip. I felt so lame asking him some questions about it. I started by saying "I'm sorry, I feel silly saying this, but I'm not comfortable with this permission slip..." and he immediately reassured me "if it's a concern to you, it's a concern to me!"

What an amazing attitude to have. I was so relieved that he did not make me feel like an idiot.

I was unable to be a room mom this year, but whenever I got to witness Mr. M in action, I was impressed. He has the gift of speech and I can just sit and listen to him talk forever. It really is remarkable to watch someone do what they were born to do. He has a lot of fun and he clearly loves what he does.

Finn wrote in a journal throughout the school year, and it's so fun to watch his progression.

Here is Finn's first journal entry, date stamped at September 4th, 2009:

And halfway through the year:

Finn's characters often carry on dialogs, as seen above. The penguin to the left says "you can't catch me" and the shark is saying "oh no!"

And here is my favorite journal entry. You know that Finn is definitely writing out his own thoughts here, because I don't know of any teacher who tells a kid to write about a zebra "squirting fire out of his bottom", LOL!

Good grief child! Where do you come up with these things?

And here are a couple of pictures he drew in his picture book during the year:

I wish we could stay in kindergarten forever.

Don't get me wrong. Kindergarten was not flawless. We had a rough patch in the middle of the year that lasted about 2 weeks or so. There was a mean girl who made Finn very upset,{and hence made his mama very upset}. Finn is not the most feisty child, and we really had to work hard at teaching him how to stand up for himself.

I was not sure we would survive. But we did.

And we moved on and the rest of the year was absolutely wonderful. He really has changed into a more confident{and talkative}little boy and he loves the company of his little friends.

Here are Finn's parting words in his last journal entry:

Goodbye Kindergarten! We loved you!