Our girls finished their first year in a public school
system here in Kazakhstan. It was a hard year but at the same time a very
rewarding one. The girls have adapted to the new school system, language, and
culture and absolutely exceeded our expectations. Three of them finished the
year with straight As and one had just a couple of Bs and the rest were As.
Some of the hard things that we encountered were going to school on Saturdays,
having kids in the morning and afternoon shifts, constant change in schedules, dealing
with bureaucracy, problems with transportation and others. To be honest once or
twice I came very close to taking them out of school and just homeschooling. I am glad I didn’t though. For the girls the first 4 months were the
hardest but then something clicked and all of them took off flying. They made
new friends and they learned Russian while learning everything else in Russian.
Going through these challenges and coming up on top of them gave them an
incredible sense of accomplishment. We are very proud of them!
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| First Grade (Class 1"G") |
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| Sophie and Lexa with their teacher. She was AWESOME! |
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| School is over! Sophie, Lexa and James Peterson are on the front steps of the school |
The school year ended on May 22 here. And on May 23rd
Veronika had her big graduation ball. She finished elementary school (here it
is 1-4 grade) and is moving to the middle school. Here it is almost as big of
a deal as graduating from high school. The last week of school they didn’t have
any classes but were getting ready for the ball: learning dances, songs,
practicing skits.
Generally parents are not invited to the school events but
for the graduation an exception was made. Spencer was in Washington DC at the
time, so he missed it. The kids did a great job! They put up quite a concert
with some of amazing numbers. My favorite ones were Kazakh folk dances. Overall
it was a really neat experience and I am glad that Veronika was a part of it!
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| Nika with her best friend Kate |
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| Fancy! |
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| Waltz |
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| Singing a good bye song to the teachers |
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| Kazakh dance |
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| I love Kazakh national costumes! |
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| These girls were AMAZING! |
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| Nika singing "The Rainbow Connection". She sang that song for the contest in March and ever since she was asked to sing it again and again at different school parties. |
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| Getting a certificate for Excellent School Work from assistant principal |
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| Flash mob dance |
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| Fourth grade class with some of the parents |
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| Veronika with her teacher. All of our girls were lucky to get such good teachers. |
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| Nika, Lina, and Kate Peterson in front of their school. |
