"That's okay"

Tonight we met the woman who will be Jonathan's kindergarten teacher this fall. The school had a kindergarten open house this evening, so we went to that--Rich for the first part of the hour, I for the whole meeting. The school has both French Immersion and English kindergarten, and when we all met together with the principal and teachers, I realized I was the only parent there for English kindergarten! (They have 3 French classes and only one English.) But that was actually wonderful because I was able to go down to the classroom with the teacher and talk one-on-one with her for about half an hour. She told me all about how she organizes her class, how the daily routine unfolds, etc. She seems like a very suitable teacher for Jonathan--a little older than most kindergarten teachers (by her own admission), and somewhat old-fashioned in her appearance and demeanour. I can see him becoming very attached to her, just as he has with Laurie and Janet, his nursery-school teachers.

Because no other parents were present, we got to talk about some of the issues which we'll discuss in more detail at the larger transition meeting being held next Wednesday (with the principal, special ed teacher, etc.). It was really neat because everything I would bring up as a possible area of concern, she would reply, "That's okay."
"He's pretty delayed in his language: his longest sentence would be 'there it is'."
"That's okay."
"He's not toilet trained yet."
"That's okay, I had a child last year, and they got an EA to come in and help him with training. Besides, he may come a long way over the summer."
"His fine motor skills are not that great yet; he can really only scribble."
"That's okay, we'll start wherever he is."

She seemed pleased and eager to have Jonathan in her class, and now that I've visited the classroom and met her, I can more easily imagine him as a little kindergartener in September.