The itsy bitsy spider...

Apparently, Margaret has been learning some songs at day care. She hasn't "transitioned" to the toddler room yet since we were told that she was "emotionally unprepared" to do so. We weren't sure what that meant - could our exceptional child be falling behind in some way? Especially troubling was the fact that Sean appears to be spending a lot of time in the toddler room. Now, Sean is a nice, very good humored kid. But he's a month younger than Margaret. And does he know the names of all of his classmates?!? Can he holler (somewhat nonsensical) orders to his caretakers?!? Do all of the caretakers rave about how "smart" he is?!?!? "Margaret is a genius!," I've heard Ms. LaDonya say a number of times. Do they also say that about Sean? I think not!

But after calming down a little bit, it turns out that Margaret is having some separation problems associated with the caretakers from the infant room. When one of them accompanies her to the toddler room, she's fine and starts playing with the other kids. But when she's on her own, she's unhappy. In the last week, however, she appears to be doing better in the toddler room, so it should just be matter of time before she's there for good.

But, to get back to the initial topic of this post, she seems to have learned some songs during her time in the toddler room. They've written notes on the reports that we take home about how Margaret has learned a new song, but I wasn't quite sure what that meant. Until she started babbling in a sing-song way while putting her thumb and forefinger together. The itsy-bitsy spider climbing the water spout, I realized. She especially likes to sing in the stroller - I'll hear a quiet lilting sound which, why you really listen to it, is quite clearly a rendition of the itsy bitsy spider. You do have to be fairly liberal in your interpretation of her vocalizing, but she's clearly singing and, given her superior intellectual skills, which obviously warrant a place of honor in the toddler room, there's no doubt that she's singing a specific song, namely the itsy bitsy spider.

(She also yelled - and I mean YELLED - "hiiii" and "bye bye" to numerous random people during an early morning trip to Safeway. It was cute until I realized that we were passing the same people again and again, and in any event, everyone within three aisles could hear her so she wasn't really making new friends with her enthusiastic vocalizing.)