Ready, Set, Go... to Kindergarten!

Kindergarten registration is tomorrow night. I don't know how I feel about it yet. Part of me is so happy to see my little girl growing and learning and experiencing so many new things, but another part of me is afraid to let her go. I worry about the "big" kids and what they will teach her and I worry about how her personality will change once she is around a lot of other children and their ideas about how she should act and dress and talk. I have tried to decide whether home school would help her, but then I worry that by the age she would really need sheltering she will be fighting me to go to school. I wish we could afford private school so she could be in an enviroment that reinforces the morals and values that we are trying to instill in her, but right now that would be difficult and then when Lydia starts it would be impossible and I don't want to send one if I can't afford to send both, so it appears she is off to public school. I tell myself that I went to public elementary school and I turned out just fine, but that was then and this is now. We went for the Kindergarten visit last week. Two hours of touring the school and sitting in a classroom and meeting the teachers. They got to do activities that the Kindergarteners do and the highlight of the day was riding on a real school bus. Emma was so excited. She talked about it all week. She is a book worm and she loves school. Then we arrived. Her first reaction was " it is big" and she took on somewhat of a deer in headlights appearance. She never spoke a word the whole time we were there. She sat on her carpet square and stared at the smartboard while the teacher asked them their ABC's. She has known her ABC's since she was 2, but she sat frozen while the teacher smiled a sympathetic smile and called on someone else. She refused to do the excersize portion of the class, because she refuses to do anything she deems embarrasing, and when it was time for centers she sat on her carpet square and stared at the wall until the teacher took her hand and walked her to the puzzle table. I felt so bad for her. She seemed so small compared to the other children there. She couldn't reach the smartboard- she was to short and she seemed overwhelmed by how many kids were there- about 15. I told her there would probably be more in her class and she said " I hope not". The bus ride was fun though she decided she wanted to be a car rider because there were no seatbelt to keep you safe. ( That is fine because she was going to be a car rider anyway). You might be saying to yourself- why send her? If she is that little she may not be ready, but she is turning 5 in June way before the cut-off and like I said academically she is ready. She knows how to write basic words, count to most of the way to hundred, she is reading sight words and tying her shoes. Her pre-school teacher said she would be to bored to stay in preschool another year. They believe she is ready and that she will come out of her shell once she is there. I don't know if I am ready for her to come out of her shell, but I guess the time has come to let her go... even if it is only a mile down the road. Thank goodness lydia's birthday is after the cut- off so I still have three more years before I have to go through this stress again!