Straight "A" Pre-Schooler

Last Friday, Jeremy and I had our end of the year parent/teacher conference with Piper's Pre-school teacher, Mrs. Findley. Mrs. Findley started off our conference by telling us she wanted to let us know that Piper is the perfect student. She is the kind of student that every teacher wants to have in class. She gets along with everyone and doesn't cause any problems. Mrs. Findley said she has really enjoyed having Piper in her class this year. I almost had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming. My Piper? The Piper that does not really sit still at home? The Piper who likes to argue with Finn just for the sake of arguing? For those of you who know Piper, you know the Piper I am talking about. I told Mrs. Findley that it was good to know that she is so good at school. Why can't she act like that for me? I don't want you to get the wrong view of Piper, she is a good girl; just really active!

Mrs. Findley said Piper did a self-portrait at the beginning of the school year and then she did one last month, which is close to the end of the school year. This is the picture she drew at the beginning of the year. I'm not sure why it is blurry. I guess the camera didn't focus on it very well. But you can see there is a head with no body and long legs. It is purple.Here is Piper's self-portrait she drew last month. What an improvement! The colors are more realistic. She is brown, which is a skin tone color. You probably can't tell but she even colored in her face, the color of her skin. She has drawn a neck, a body, arms, hands, legs, and shoes. It really looks like a person, unlike the first picture.

Mrs. Findley showed Jeremy and I the writing strokes Piper has been working on since the beginning of the year. Piper has been working on the vertical line, horizontal line, diagonal line, a dot, a spiral, and circle. It was neat to see Piper's work and how she has progressed since the beginning of the year.

Mrs. Findley shared with us the Kindergarten Readiness Test. Mrs. Findley took Piper to the side and the test was done one on one. Piper had to identify different pictures. She had to circle the letter that Mrs. Findley spoke aloud. Piper was to circle the picture that looked exactly like the first picture. The pictures were a variety of shapes, number sequences, and letter sequences. Another part of the test was to look at the first picture and find a picture that started with the same letter. For example, there was a picture of a rake. Piper was to find a picture that started with the letter "r". She circled a picture of rain. Next Piper was to look at the first picture and circle the picture that rhymed with it. For example, there was a picture of a jar. Piper circled a picture of a car. The next part of the test, Piper had to know locations such as inside, under, and following. She was asked to find the picture where the cat was inside the box. There was a row of pictures with cats and boxes and the cat was in different locations. She was asked to find the picture where the dog is under the chair. There was a row of pictures with a dog in different places near a chair. Piper was then to find the picture where the duck is following the girl. There was a row of pictures with a girl and ducks. They were in different positions in reference to each other. There were a few more questions like this. I was very impressed that Piper knew them all. Some of them I thought might have been difficult for someone of Piper's age. Piper also had to count different things on the test and find a picture with a certain number of dogs and a certain number of cats together. I will repeat myself and say I was very impressed. These pictures were not simple. She had to really look closely and pay attention in order to find the right one.

Mrs. Findley stated that Piper is the only one in her class to get all of the 36 questions correct. She made a 100% on the Kindergarten Readiness Test! Wow! My Piper, the youngest student in her class, is the ONLY one who answered all of the questions correctly!!

We shared with Mrs. Findley that Piper was premature. She was born 4 weeks early. This did not matter to Piper. Right from birth she showed the world that just because she was born early and statistics said she would be behind, she wasn't. Piper attended a Daycare her first year of life. Her teacher knew she was born 4 weeks early and would often tell me that the things she was doing developmentally, she should not be doing yet since she was born that early. Piper was never behind. She was advanced. She walked at 10 months old.

Piper is a "Straight A Pre-Schooler!" I am so proud of my daughter!! Do we have a valedictorian on our hands? She sure is off to a good start and headed in the right direction! Check back in 2022 to find out the answer.