back to school dual immersion

Today was Camila’s first day of 1st grade and I missed it. I’m in Houston due to a family emergency that I will share with all of you another day when the time is right, but for now I can share that I had to miss my girl’s first day of school, but am relishing all the beautiful moments we were able to create this summer.

Of course, I was all over my husband making sure he took pictures of this day and sent them to me immediately. And what I saw in those pictures was a very happy and smiley girl surrounded by a few of her best friends. It’s amazing how only one year after she first walked through the kindergarten gates into this new world of dual immersion in Spanish, new faces, rules and even new sounds of different languages all around her since her school has immersion in French, Spanish, German and Italian, she now walks into familiar territory.

I can’t wait to go back home in a few days and have her tell me in person all about her new maestra and how funny and nice she is. I also want to hear all about her amigas and who she ended up sitting next to. I’m even anxious to get back to our crazy routine of trying to get homework done without a few struggles and snuggling up to read our daily books.

I’m counting on her loving school to not only learn what she’s supposed to learn academically, but for it to continue being our ally in immersing her in Spanish. She had much exposure during the summer thanks to trips to México, visits from familia and the amazing Caja de Arte summer camp. She’s much more comfortable speaking Spanish now and it’s starting to come out more and more often and even feels like a preference. Maybe I failed in teaching her how to really read during the summer so she would have an advantage in first grade, but I did succeed in making sure she connected Spanish with many of the things adores: art, performing, familia and making new memories…like these below…

frida camila

Camila became Frida and Frida became Camila. She learned all about her at the Caja de Arte camp and became seriously obsessed after they performed a play based on Jonah Winter’s children’s book, Frida.

frida museo

Lucky for her, a few weeks after she performed Frida her Papi took her to México and they went to the Casa Azul, per Camila’s request!

valle de bravo

The trip to México was all about the primos. She’s even talking with the same accent they have!

primas

The prima from El Salvador came to visit with Abuelita. Many, many memories were made then.

music with sara concert

We even managed to squeeze in live music with our favorite friends and performers like Sara!

Se nos acabó el verano and 1st grade is awaiting us with much more to learn, live and love…y todo con mucho español!

What are some of your best memories from the summer and are you all ready for back to school?

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