Picky

O’s preschool class is on a rotating schedule for snacks. Each child (parent!) receives a letter every eight weeks or so as a reminder that the following week is their turn to bring snacks. Our letter states that while there are ten kids in the class, only nine of them eat.

I guess it was a lucky coincidence that our snack week happened to fall in the same week I planned to take cupcakes for O’s birthday.

While there, I got to watch most of the kids devour their cupcakes. One little girl, though, had a cup of pudding. She was happily eating her pudding when Mrs. F. offered her a taste of the frosting from one of the cupcakes.

Poor little J, who can’t be much older than three years old, was not amused by the offer. She refused.

Mrs. F. tried to hide the yellow frosting in the vanilla pudding. J wasn’t fooled at all. Mrs. F tried to explain to J that her mommy wants her to try new things but J wasn’t impressed with that reasoning either.

I have a picky eater myself. Alyssa likes bologna, hotdogs, macaroni and cheese, corn, raw carrots and that’s about it unless you’re talking about snacks like chips and candy. Ugh!! It’s extremely frustrating. And now that she’s on the verge of nine years old, my patience is wearing thin with her dietary restrictions.

I told my mom about J’s refusal to even try the frosting and my mom wondered why a three year old has to be in school anyway. I pointed out that J has Down Syndrome and so she’s probably in school for therapies.

And it made me wonder. Why do the early intervention programs stop in-home therapies at three years old? This pushes the littlest and often most fragile of our kids out into the school atmosphere so early. We did send O to preschool when she turned three but my mom went with her. At the time, given the school she was attending, we weren’t comfortable sending her alone when she was so very little.

Most of the kids in that class were so much bigger than she was and more aggressive. At three years old, O had only been walking for seven months, so she was still a little wobbly.

These days, two whole years later, Olivia climbs on that bus all by herself and she can definitely hold her own with the kids in her class. She’s still not the biggest kid in the class but she’s not afraid of those who are bigger.

I realize that the social benefits of preschool are one of the driving points for getting kids in the classroom as young as three but I also think that parents need to be the ones who decide when their littlest ones are ready. I know that O wasn’t. Maybe J’s mom feels like J is ready for preschool and if so, I’m glad it’s available. But if she’s like I was two years ago and is only sending J because she knows she needs the therapies that are only available through the school system, it makes me sad.

It makes me think there needs to be some changes made in the early intervention programs that will allow parents a little more say in where their kids receive therapies once they hit three years old. Of course, I’m lazy, so I probably won’t do more than post my thoughts right here. If only I were a woman of action…