Nashville Metro Schools has a special preschool program that ties into their GATE program in elementary school and beyond. For the last few months I have been trying to find out as much as I can about the program and take steps to getting Natalie evaluated. I figure, worst case scenario, she doesn't get in. Best case scenario, free once-a-week gifted preschool. I am IN. I submitted my application and the next step is submitting either a questionnaire filled out by one's preschool teacher or by doing a "creative project." Since Natalie is not in preschool this year since if she was, she would simply end up with three years of preschool total, we did the creative project. This entails us to choose a topic, learn about it extensively and then have Natalie create or invent something that builds on that learned information. Since Natalie is always telling stories in the car about a theme park called "Cat Land," I thought this may be the best choice of what direction to take with this project. Cat Land is a theme park where people can bring their house cats to go on rides, romp through the garden, shop, and eat.
Thus, Natalie and I embarked on our whirlwind theme park project. We read or studied many books about theme parks, maps, and cats. We also played some Roller Coaster Tycoon and visited some places around Nashville with aspects of things Natalie wanted in her park. Then we brainstormed some rides and attractions and then finally, created a map of Cat Land complete with a key and a story book about a day spent there. Natalie also learned about logos and designed her own logo which we then painted on a shirt for her to wear to the meeting and a shirt for her stuffed cat to wear as well. I also ended up buying a digital recorder where I taped an interview with Natalie about her project since I was concerned that three strangers staring at her may cause her to blank during the meeting.
Today, Friday the 13th of course, we drove on over for Natalie to present her creative project at the school site. It worked out well that we had a birthday party in the morning to go to since that kept me from dwelling on the meeting all day. Our appointment was at 1:00. A nice woman met us in the office and then walked us all down to a classroom to meet the two other teachers that would be evaluating Natalie. After that, Natalie stayed with them and I took Noelle to the waiting room. Almost an hour later, the same kind woman came back and both her and Natalie were chatting happily. The feeling I got was that it went well. I asked if they listened to the recording and she said they did but that Natalie explained most of what was on there already. She also told me that Natalie told her that we used to live in San Diego and that we had to fly over lots of states and even over Mars in a plane to get here (hehe). Of course this is only part of the assessment and I am sure the other part (the IQ Evaluation) holds much more weight, but I certainly feel like a weight has been lifted off both Natalie and my shoulders. Time will tell what the IQ test results show. Even though it was a lot of work, I was glad to have the opportunity to do this project with Natalie. She has been so excited to be the "boss" and to make the decisions. I also think it has sparked her interest in other related subjects and even today, she wanted to add some more rides and attractions to Cat Land. I feel so blessed to be home with my girls right now and watching them grow emotionally and mentally, as well as physically, every day.
