This was ´meet the teachers´day and whoa! what a brave day for the children and I, mostly the children! Hagaskoli is Grades 9 and 10 for Alexis and Kai, only 3 blocks away, we attended an opening mtg where parents come with the children to be called by their new teacher and we didn´t understand one word. It was impressive though, how the parents continue to be that involved with their children. Then, the woman I´d been in touch with organized Alexis and Kai to meet their teacher, I´ll leave that for them to share, I think they´ll agree the teachers couldn´t be more welcoming and willing to work together combining their interests, learning Icelandic, Danish if they want, helping with English in the class and there´s electives like chess and photography that Kai seemed lit up about! Alexis´teacher speaks french, english and icelandic so it´s a treat. Every adult and child speaks english very well, we´ve found, thank goodness. One thing I couldn´t help notice is how respectful, calm, quiet and warm-natured the kids are, and Icelandic people are in general. We noticed this the first morning eating breakfast how calm and quiet the dining room was and it´s continued to present itself. Then off to Niall´s school, Melaskoli one block away from Hagaskoli, where the headmaster shook Niall´s hand and his teacher warmly said how lucky they were to have him. Again, the grade 3 children were impressively so calm it is part of their upbringing to not be loud or rude. Niall wants to see puffin birds, swords, knights and asked to go to the Iceland Museum next door. I am so impressed and in awe of their openness and braveness. It´s one day at a time, right. We cooked fish and kale, salad from the market for dinner - the markets don´t have a wide variety of foods yet lots of fish, lamb, chocolate and coffee. Tonight, Niall wanted to go swimming in one of the several pools that are in Reykjavik, naturally heated by the earth, so the two of us went on a bus and enjoyed a wonderful swim at Laugardalslaug - it´s obviously a way of life for Icelanders to swim often. One of Niall´s favourites was walking on attached tubes across the pool while using a rope above to balance, most often the children doing it would fall laughing all the while - haven´t seen that contraption in Canada it was cool. A shallow lying down hot tub was new, while looking up at the sky, nice. The wed bible study was read together by Kai and Alexis this evening, yes I am moved by them.
AuthorI'm the mom of my three beautiful children on this wonderful Iceland adventure. Archives
June 2013
Categories |