The End of the School Year

Amiya has been very, very busy with everything going on at school to wrap things up. Her teacher has been phenomenal and she did a great project with the students wherein each child studied an animal and then completed a research project on said animal. When the research was completed, each child wrote a book and created artwork. As a class, they created graphs comparing the animals and learned a song and a poem. Then parents and siblings were invited to attend their Zoo Museum at school.

Amiya was very excited about the Zoo Museum. She loves any sort of show in which she has a starring role, but she's never had any lines to speak so far, so this was all well and beyond her previous experiences.

Amiya, along with a very nice classmate, got to introduce various parts of the Museum. She was extremely poised - I was actually surprised a bit by it. No nerves, no bumbles. Very clear, metered speaking. We got many comments afterwards about how nicely she did.

And then she was off to be the "expert" on white tigers (never mind that it's an orange tiger stuffed behind her - Kev, amazingly enough, does not have a white stuffed tiger). She stood next to her report and her artwork and was ready to answer any and all questions that you might have about white tigers.

Each book had a cover, title page, table of contents, text, index and author's biography. Amiya's reads:

"Amiya Gupta was born in Illinois. She lives with her mom, dad and younger brother, Kev. She ha a pet fish, Indagowa (In-da-go-wa.) When Amiya is not writing, she enjoys playing, reading and going on the computer.

Amiya has written ten other books."

(I'm not sure what the ten other books are, but I'm sure that if I dug to the depths of the debris in her closet, I'd find them.)

As if all of that wasn't enough to swell up our hearts with pride for this little chick, she was also Citizen of the Month for her class. Each teacher at her school selects one student who exemplifies all of the things that fall in line with what a student should be and Amiya got that award for her class in May.

Cute, right? Right. Please don't grow up too fast, Peanut. Please.

Getting her ribbon and her award. See? Her chest is all puffed up with pride, too!

All the first graders who got the award.

On a sort of funny note, one of the remarks that the Principal said while introducing the event was that they saved the best for last as these kids are the last to be given the awards this year. Not understanding that it's a common expression, Amiya has taken it quite literally and is feeling especially honored that she got this award last. I'm not going to burst her bubble, but someday she'll blush.

However, to keep things real, Amiya did get her second agenda note of the year recently. Her teacher doesn't call home when a student gets in trouble, but writes a simple note in the student's agenda. Three guesses what both of Amiya's agenda notes have said this year. It won't even take you three.

That's right. Excessive talking.

I love that it's so simple and so direct. Not anything emotional, a plain statement of facts. And here's why it can't be emotional.

Because it is d.e.v.a.s.t.a.t.i.n.g. to Amiya. Absolute devastation. She got off the bus when she had this note and she sobbed the whole way home. And then she sobbed at home, so hard that I actually called the teacher to find out if there was more than just talking that happened because I didn't understand the reaction. In the end, it was just talking (albeit not a paltry amount) and Amiya had been given plenty of chances to fix her behavior. So, she lost all TV, computer and fun stuff for four days. And she had to write a note to her teacher:

Dear Ms. [Fantastic Teacher],

I am very sorry for what happend yesterday. I have always been a talker. I've been able to control it most of the time. But this time I must have been to excited to ->

control it. Sorry again and again and again.

love your student
Amiya

I love the line "I have always been a talker." She is nothing if not self-aware, right?

So there you have it. The highs and low of Amiya's last bit of school. 3.5 more days of first grade and then off to second! Can. not. believe. it!