And then there was....one?

So with Christmas falling in the middle of the week I expected to have a few children leaving early on vacation (hence why we opened our class gift last week!) But I can't say I expected to be down to just one child in class today!

As soon as M came in this morning I told her "Guess what! Today it's just me and  you, we can do anything you want!" She looked around the classroom, taking it all in with her fingers on her lips as she thought. Then she asked "Why are the dishes over there?" "Oh I washed them all for the new year. Do you want to help put them away?' And that was what she chose to do. The possibilities were endless and she wanted to put dishes away. Her dad just laughed when I told him at the end of the day.

Not that we spent the whole day flying solo. She and I attended a little re-enactment of the Nativity Story in the other classroom. Another segment of sharing family traditions that has been going on for the last week. Afterwards a Kindergartner from the other room kept peeking in to our room and I finally extended her a formal invitation to join us for the morning. She was absolutely thrilled!

Together we three cleaned up the classroom; scrubbing the sink, dusting shelves, collecting ALL the laundry to be washed. M really enjoyed showing our visitor around the room, and our visitor was quite pleased that she already knew how to fold a dustcloth and could show it to M. I have to admit they were just adorable siting on the floor, the Kindergartner patiently showing each step and M copying her exactly. Unfortunately my camera was too far away to snap a shot, darn!

M was also happy to share our end of the day traditions. She let our visitor know that the clean up song was playing and they needed to put their work away, and she also showed her were the necklaces were so the two of them could be in charge of putting up the chairs...though who else was rushing to do the job I'm not sure ;) M was also quite proud to demonstrate how we put the bead on at the end of each day and together we all counted the beads for December to finish out 2014.

It bodes well for how M is going to help any new students settle in to our room, I can't wait!