Monday, September 03, 2012

First day of school- for real this time


Today is the first real day of school with classes. We all decided as a family to walk Abigail to school. The teacher asked that parents bring children to the front door of the school from 8:30. It took a while to gather the class together before they left for the classroom at 8:50. For the time being, Abigail's class is in the big school with the older kids. At that school there is a security entrance and parents are not encouraged to enter the school (although we can do so by showing our passport and registering).

Abigail's classes will run from 9 am to 1 pm. There are four 35 minute lessons. In the second half of the year there are four 45 minute classes. There is a ten minute break between classes, plus a 35 minute break for playing in the middle of the morning.

The first class is Russian literature reading. In first grade this will be nursery rhymes and traditional Russian children's stories. The second class is Russian language. The third class is Phys Ed (called Physical Culture). The fourth class for today is called "The World Around Us" (which we would call Social Studies in Australia, a mix of science, geography and history etc.)

Over a week this works out to be:
Russian Language- 5 classes
Literature- 4 classes
Mathematics- 4 classes
Phys Ed- 2 classes
Social studies- 2 classes
Music- 1 class
Art- 1 class
Technology- 1 class  (not sure what this will be yet, perhaps computers?).


Abigail in her regular school uniform. She wore her blouse today, but can easily wear skivvies underneath her dress other days.


Abigail was a little nervous. Surprisingly, not so much about fitting in, as much as about being away from us for so long (four hours).


Abigail responded confidently to the teacher:
Teacher- Avigeya?
Abigial: Zdes! (here).


And they disappeared up the steps to their classroom. We will pick her up at 1pm.

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