A Word About Kindergarten

Bethelle's favorite aspect of life before we left Bainbridge Island was kindergarten.  When we discussed the move and our options before coming to California, I told Bethelle that the schools were different here and that she would not be enrolled until we came back home to Washington.  She concluded that she would still rather be with her daddy than stay in school.

Why no school in San Francisco?  For one thing they are very poor performing.  Bethelle was not getting much academically out of even her "good" school so what would be the point at a bad one?  In SF, the enrolled children are part of a lottery.  They are expected to attend whatever school around the city that they are assigned to in order to prevent the segregation of neighborhoods to penetrate the schools.  I would not consider putting her on a bus in any downtown and sending her across the city to a terrible school.  What would she learn on that ride?  Those lessons can wait a decade or two.

It is a commonly accepted truth here, regardless of political preference, that the schools are terrible.  The moms talk about it at church, at parks, in grocery lines, everywhere.  The wisdom is that you enter your child in the school lottery while keeping a private school or a home school plan in your back pocket.  If you are lucky enough to get an acceptable school, you dump plan b.  This approach means that those without means for private school or for an at-home parent end up with no options and an unfortunate education.  This is a sad commentary on the area and one of the worst strikes against San Francisco that I have encountered.

And so Bethelle does not go to school.

She can read, write, add, and subtract.  These things have come as a fairly natural result of who she is and who I am and not any formal stretch.  She makes friends easily and I make sure she gets interactions with other children.  She loves to craft and wants to be either a scientist or an artist.  At her age, I wanted to be a bus driver.  Recently, we sat at home for a couple days straight and I began investigating formal homeschooling options.  Then we started getting out of the house and exploring the city more.  I believe that this is a sufficient education for her for now.  I am no longer looking at formal programs.

Bethelle has always been very involved in whatever I am doing.  She has never really been overly interested in spending time with her toys.  Weird, I know.  She seems to prefer doing laundry with me.  The point is that she learns and asks questions and does.  Tonight as I began to blog, she asked if she could type for me.  I don't have anything impressive to say about her words per minute, but I let her type.  I spoke the words one at a time.  Bethelle typed and Rigby hit the space bar between each word.  Here are some of the words she typed, as she typed them without help:
   impressiv   (impressive)
   thouhgt      (thought)
   stockt         (stocked)
   quite
   flair
   become
   despite
   half
   walk
   easier
When I said the words, "which" and "to," she asked me clarifying questions so that she would spell the correct form of the word.  What?!  What kindergartner knows that stuff?

Well, I meant this to be about kindergarten, but it sounds like bragging about Bethelle.  I just wanted to pen my thoughts and reasonings on this stage and decision.  And to document how impressed I was with her spelling tonight.  I am so thankful for my special little girl and I feel that even without school, her progression continues.