School days – first term done and Christmas excitement

When you’ve got children, time seems to whizz past so quickly, and this half term at school has certainly done that.  N’s now done 2 terms (or 1 term in my old school language) and he’s so ready for the Christmas holidays.

He’s done really well where other children have flagged, definitely helped by being in pretty much full time day nursery and extended nursery school hours since he was one.  But the last couple of weeks he’s been more tired in the evenings.  If the OH isn’t in for N to muck around with, he has had a tendency to fall asleep on the sofa.

This final week of term has been busy as to be expected.

Nativity play

After practising their nativity play for what seemed like ages, the reception to year 2 children performed their show.  It was a really good performance – word perfect, and very accomplished for 4-7 year olds.

None of the reception children had speaking roles, but they all had their part to play as well as singing all the songs.  I was really impressed to see how well N did.  He knew all of the songs, sang them all and did the actions, unlike one of the older children stood in front of him.

I think he enjoyed it, and he seemed to know lots of the other children’s lines, so maybe next year he’ll get a speaking part and be a bit of a performer.  Hopefully it would bring him out of his shell.

No tears, but I was close to it.

Christmas jumper day

The children had one day to go in non-uniform day and wear their Christmas jumpers in aid of the charity appeal.  I was pleased that N’s reindeer jumper from last year still fit him, and we loaned out his 2 fair isle slightly Christmassy looking jumpers to his best friend in case one of them would be suitable.

Christmas lunch and Father Christmas

The last day of term involved Christmas lunch.  N was quite excited about having Christmas lunch at school.  All the children are asked to dress up on the last day in smart and/or party outfits.  How sweet, although I can’t say N’s was particularly smart.  Just a shirt and trousers.  He wasn’t too sure about wearing his smart clothes all day, but I think it’s a lovely thing to do.

N was also excited because Father Christmas was coming to visit, and was staying to eat lunch.  Can you imagine the mess of eating Christmas lunch with a huge white beard?  Especially if someone’s not used to it.

The school do like to get the parents involved and into the school where possible and the parents were invited to come in for the afternoon for carol singing.  There’s only so much time I can make up if I take time off work to go to all the special events so I didn’t make it.  Hopefully N didn’t miss me too much.  If either of his 2 aunts were there he’d have been fine.

Reading books

N now brings home reading books rather than general story books.  To be honest, the books are dull.  Trying to get N to read them is a nightmare, plus the ones he’s had so far have sounds in them he’s not learnt yet, so we’re having to go through those first.

But he is getting the idea of saying the sounds and blending them together to make the words.  I don’t think we’ve managed to finish a whole reading book yet, but we’ve been using the basic Biff, Chip and Kipper books as well.  There’s no excuse really, because N loves having those as bedtime stories, and if he’s learning to read them, it means I don’t have to.  Whoop!

He’s getting there, a couple of pages at a time (probably only about 10 words). But if he’s getting the idea of it, and gradually learning, then I’m fine with that.  There’s no point me pushing him and him hating doing it.

So we’ve now got 2 weeks off.  For the first time ever, I’ve got more days off than just those inbetween Christmas and new year.  Hopefully to be spent with family, meeting up with friends, and doing Christmassy things as well as sitting back and taking a breather.  Christmas excitement has taken hold.

How’s the last week of term gone for your children?  What have you got planned over Christmas?