This afternoon, my wife and I met with our daughter’s kindergarten teacher. The meeting last thirty minutes and contained the following takeaways.
- Our daughter is reading and writing at the level of a first-grader.
- She’s a rule-follower who looks to her teachers for help and does whatever she’s asked.
- She gets along well with her classmates. “She’s a good friend,” her teacher said.
- She loves learning, and shows curiosity about new things. These are the best attributes she has in terms of her long-term education success.
- Her teacher wants to help her gain confidence in learning independently and stretching herself, when possible.
My wife and I were pleased. Part of us asked, “Is this our daughter?” when the teacher explained that she was easy going and wasn’t easily frustrated any more when she made a mistake. She certainly is still a perfectionist at home, and I doubt she would treat her teacher the way she occasionally treats her mother.
What was the teacher’s advice to us? “Keep doing what you’re doing.”
Of course, that includes more than educational training. It includes truths about the who gave us our intellectual gifts (God), why we need education (sin and ignorance), and what we can do when we know more about God’s world (glorify Him and enjoy Him forever).
My wife and I are very blessed to have an intelligent daughter who loves to learn. She has succeeded during this first quarter because of the help we’ve received from her preschool teachers, her extended family, and, most of all, God. I pray that we continue to help her cultivate the gifts she’s been given. They are considerable.
Learning Together 