Matthews first day!

Matthew started Nursery School today.

He had a little bit of difficulty at first when he didn't want to hang up his backpack on his hook, but his tantrum soon gave way to the lure of an as yet unexplored bathroom within the classroom.
The light and the fan were both controlled by a single switch, and that annoyed him, as he wanted the noisy fan off, but he finished his business and proceeded to play with a soap dispenser that was lots of fun for him.

I have to say he has the greatest teacher. She has been doing Nursery School for 2.5 years, and before that, she worked with special needs kids so she was VERY thorough in asking about what Matthews strengths and weaknesses were.

There are 8 kids in the class and they have a door in their room that leads to a fenced in playground just for them! Teresa the teacher is lovely and young and energetic and oh so patient with my Matthew who would not look at her or give her the time of day for the first 35 minutes.

The morning without him here went by SO FAST! Hey, what happened to all my grand plans for cleaning up the house, and spending some quality time with the baby, and all the shopping I wanted to do.....
the time just flew by, and before I knew it, it was time to go and pick him up!

The verdict? Well we give this place 2 thumbs up!! Teresa said he did terrific, although she still thinks she will need an assistant for him. She said he sat during circle time, and even talked to her a bit.
Most importantly, he enjoyed it, and was not crying when I left, or when I came to pick him up, although he did look a little distressed as I pulled up - probably because he was one of the last kids to be picked up (bad mommy). But he ran to me, with a smile on his face and although he didn't volunteer any information about his day at all, I knew he'd had a good time.

I'm just so thankful that he has such a caring and understanding teacher who is so eager to help him transition.
Since he has pragmatic language difficulties but his verbal language is excellent, it helps to have a teacher who used to work in the area of speech and language. Really, she is pretty much ideal. Even though it's an added expense that we weren't counting on to put him in nursery school, I'm pretty sure it's going to be so helpful for him.
Milestones this week: He is finally nodding yes. HOORAY. He's done it 3 days in a row, so it's definitely a new skill for him.
Also, he waved goodbye to his nursery teacher. He must really have a crush on her ;) since that's a relatively new skill for him as well. His OT told me that it's a skill generally achieved at 10 months or so. Matthew acquired it at 38 months.
Yes, nursery is going to be very very good for him.