Back to School!

Hey, this is Clare. For once, I'm not blogging about crazy vampire stuff! Or even my own weird past. I'm blogging about something normal: our first week of school. :-)

On Wednesday, our school started up again for the autumn term. (Typically schools here begin on the first Wednesday after Labour Day unless that would cause it to be extremely early or extremely late.) Our first school "week" was only three days long - I guess the point is so we can settle in and get used to things before we get back into full swing.

I think of all of us, Charissa was the most nervous, because she was starting a school she had never been to before. She used to attend a special school for hearing impaired students, but the government decided that wasn't needed anymore and closed it, so all the kids from her old school were sent to different places. Charissa now attends the same school as Fiona, Kiwi, and Evelyn. It's the local Anglican parish elementary school. So far, Charissa says she likes it. I think it helps a lot that she's in the same class as Fiona and Kiwi, so she automatically has them as friends, and their friends are spending time with her too. It's hard to tell how the schoolwork will be for her because of her learning disabilities, but the teacher is willing to help her. I think Charissa was more worried about whether she'd have friends, anyway.

Summer and Kiwi were also a little nervous because they started school last May, so they only had two months before summer break. They were afraid it would be hard to settle in again. They said it was easier than they expected, though. It was easier than moving at almost the end of the year, at least. Kiwi is getting over how scared she was when she was kidnapped - I think the school routine is helping.

The one person having a little bit of trouble is Bree. Last school year she got caught up on the studies she'd missed because of family problems, but the one class that's still an issue for her is French. French is required here because Canada is officially bilingual. When she lived in the United States - she only moved to Canada last school year - Bree took Spanish, and they didn't even start that till high school. And honestly, according to her the school she attended didn't exactly have the most academic excellence in languages, so I'm not sure how much Spanish she actually speaks anyway.

The teachers here, though, expect that at Bree's age, she'd have been learning French for ten years or so. Last year it wasn't a big deal because Bree was so behind in all her subjects, but this year she feels pretty bad about the French. She's studying really hard already, and Felicity and Josefina have been helping her. Bree likes school, so it'll be nice if she can get to a point where she doesn't have to stress anymore.

The other girls are just starting a normal year at the same schools they went to last year, and it's going well for them.

I had a big change this year, though. I'm homeschooled now, and I never was before. I actually like it more than I expected to, because I can work at my own pace, but I admit I miss the social parts, at least from when I used to live in Nova Scotia. I didn't have many friends at my school in Colorado, anyway. Going to the public high school isn't really an option, though. Sunlight and all. Vampire. Newfoundland isn't super sunny, and a lot of days are cloudy, but it's not consistent enough that I could really be enrolled in regular school.

Kaya does online classes Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and I like that best because we can study together. We're in different grades so we can't really work together on our assignments, but at least there's some company. Tuesday and Thursdays are going to be harder because Kaya does her co-op classes with other local students that day.

Thursday actually was good this week, though, because Inna let me come to work with her. (She works as an art historian at the provincial museum.) I did my lessons in one of the empty meeting rooms, but at lunchtime I sat with Inna and during my breaks I got to look at the art, photography, and natural history exhibits. Inna says I can come any time that it's non-sunny enough for me to go out in the daytime. That'll be really good. School for vampires doesn't have to be that bad after all!

I hope the rest of our blog friends are enjoying the new school year, too! :-)

Love,
Clare