Freshman feeling

The other day I overhead Zoey sputtering, "hold on a second, let me get my act together," as she emptied the pool water out of her swimming goggles and readjusted them.

I think I might say 'let me get my act together' a lot — as in habitually — but tonight, I'm really meaning it. The girls start school tomorrow, I go back to work on Thursday, and it feels like the earth's rotation has suddenly sped up.

Just when I was beginning to feel less afluster here in our Montana life, the change of season and routine bring new experiences to trip over and dissect. The freshman feeling started on Thursday night when we all tromped over to Zoey's preschool for orientation. Aside from being the only people who brought our children, (until another family showed up much later,) and having very little understanding of the Montessori education system, we also felt like travelers from a culturally distant and wacky land, a land we are decidedly no longer in. Whereas so much of the educational focus that we experienced in San Francisco was focused on creativity and art, here, there is a much stronger focus on academics, no surprise since we live right in the backyard of Montana State University. (Today the football stadium conducted a sound check, and I hopped on my bike to case out which neighbor was blaring the death metal.)

I'm not opposed to a heavily academic focus — in fact it's what I grew up with — it's just that it's different than the educational scene we chose in SF. Here's another thing that became familiar in SF: public schools starving for resources. At Stella's school, parents literally cleaned the bathrooms and the school yard so that we could spare some of the janitorial budget to keep art teachers on staff.

At Stella's new public school in Montana, which we visited on Friday during 'Sneak-a-peek,' they have a school psychiatrist and a school counselor, a 'health and wellness' teacher, a full-time librarian, a 'teacher coach', ice-skates for all of the kids, (part of the playground ices over to form an NHL-sized rink,) and maybe even cross-country skis so the kids can go ski in the adjacent corn field? I was stunned.

Oh, and each classroom is marked by an adorable wooden sign, kind of like this:

 

 

Total culture shock. And it's crazy how my brain works: at first, I felt defensive of not only Stella's beloved school back home, but of all the SF schools - and the teachers and administrators - doing so much with so little. I felt protective and proud of the scrapping SF school district. But when I imagine what San Francisco's innovative educators could do with better funding, I'm so maddened that they aren't given the chance.

Meanwhile, Stella has her backpack at the door, her outfit picked out, (it's been ready for a week actually,) and just requested an alarm clock of her own. She can't wait to bike over to school tomorrow morning with her friend, Zoa. I'm 'allowed' to tag along for the first week, but that's it.

Should her enthusiasm wane, we have a backup plan: a one-room schoolhouse, a la "Little House on the Prarie." The girls are ready.