Yesterday, James and I attended the girls first parent teacher afternoon (I keep on wanting to say parent teacher night). I know it is normally night time, but I suppose pre-school is an afternoon time frame. I suppose it could be afternoon, not sure as I have not done the school thing as yet and pre-school is our first encounter with a school like system, other than our time at school.

You will all be pleased to know that both children are doing extremely well and the teacher would like to start the process of teaching them to read and to write. We got the impression that this is left to when the child is older, but as the girls seem ready she would like to give it a go and see how it goes. One thing that we need to do more of at home before learning can commence is play word games with them to know how letters sound, what words start with what letter. Once the girls have more letters at their disposal the game and learning that the school wants to do will happen.

The pre-school has cards and they get the child to recognise a letter and put the letter to a word, so if the word was “Cat”, and if the letters were “AT” and there was a C or say a B available, then the child might spell either cat or bat, depending on which letter they pick.

The girls are recognising letters and numbers quite well, however not sure how many they do know and if we are at the point of forming word/words. We have been practicing today and Julia was getting some things right and others all mixed up. She got annoyed and said, “I want to get it right!” I told her there were heaps to learn and it doesn’t matter if it is wrong and there is nothing to worry about.  Lillian also found it a bit hard to understand why it was all wrong and she just ended making up things, C is for Bed, D is for Pillow and more strange things.

I can understand from their point of view it is frustrating as there is a lot to learn and it is not making much sense, early days still and no pressure, they are smart little bunnies and they will get it soon.

One thing that the teacher was very impressed about is that you tell girls something and they say it well, do it, and remember things. Language, fine motor skills, and other skills seem to be on track or above. We are very pleased indeed. Not only are they doing well with what the school is teaching them, they are making friends and seem to popular as well, could have something to do with being cute little twins or just down to personality.

Do you find that your child is hungry for knowledge; Lillian has wanted to go to school since she was one years old. She did not understand why she could not. I hope the appetite lasts throughout their life and they learn great skills. As I told their teacher, we are not fussed if they go to university or become doctors or lawyers, we just want them to have a skill and be able to work, provide and be happy with what they do.

Did you get good outcomes from parent afternoons/night s? Did they help? We did ask if there was anything we could do to help, other than helping with the letter recognition we are on track. However I was prepared for any area of improvement if need be. Sometimes the girls are not the best at sharing, or doing things on their own, this has gotten a bit better due to school, but as mentioned was armed to think that there could be something else to focus on. If you did get a report that an area was in need of improvement or more guidance, how did you deal with that? Send in your comments.