Tavares Elementary School in Florida

My son has been attending Tavares Elementary School in Tavares Florida for the past year. It is his kindergarten year and first year at this elementary school. I have been very impressed and at the same time a little disappointed with the school. I will say however that the disappointment is far less than the impressivenesses.

The school year started out wonderful. My son came home with a picture on the first day of school of himself and his new teacher. This was definitely a surprise to our family. I never thought a teacher would be this caring to get pictures taken and then manage a way to get the pictures developed all during this very busy day. The teacher also welcomed all parents into the class room for the first week of school just in case anyone had any separation anxiety.

For the first 2 weeks of school, the children wore name tags around their neck(just like the teacher does) so everyone could get to know each other. Also on these name tags were the teachers name and their lunch numbers for easy use in the cafeteria. The children and the teacher all learned the classmates names by the end of the first week. My son came home by the end of the second week and could tell me his lunch number to me with no thought.

Every week the kids have a very structured schedule. On Monday the children visit the library. They get to check out one book to bring home for the week and get a new one the following Monday as long as they bring the other one back. On Tuesday, they go to Music. For the rest of the week, the children go to physical education. Friday is also show n tell day in my son's classroom. He gets so excited about show n tell day and get very upset if we do not allow him to take something to school with him.

The class also has field trips about twice a year. I was not so impressed with this, as when I was in elementary school, we had field trips about once a month. I understand that things have changed now, but still wish my son had more trips he could attend. The first field trip was to Uncle Donald's farm. This of course is always a great place to go especially for younger children, but my son had just been there a few months before with his Pre K class so it was not anything new. He enjoyed it anyways. He came home and told us all about the animals that he saw. His second field trip for this year is coming up in April when the children will go to the local park and spend a few hours there.

All the staff at the school is great and everyone is friendly. The only thing I worry about at the school is the fact that anyone can go to the school and sign in as a visitor and wonder the campus. IDs are not checked and all you have to do is write your name, the child you are here to see, and their teachers name. I guess they assume that if you know all of this information you are allowed to be on campus. Also, when checking out a child, you sign the paper with your name, child's name and time checked out, tell the lady at the desk and she calls for the child. No IDs are checked or anything. I would understand if this was a person that they know and see a lot but I walked right in and checked my child out with no one even questioning me. I had never been to the office before that day.

On the bright side, all children in Kindergarten are escorted by to other classmates anywhere on campus. If my son would not have recognized the person picking him up, the three kids themselves would have made it apparent. This also lets the two others go back together to the classroom so no one at any time is alone.

The only other downfall about this school is how it is set up, especially for picking the children up in the afternoon. The car riding area is s to mall, only 4 children/groups can be loaded at once, this making it a very long dismissal time. I personally get to the school about 35 minutes before dismissal to get a halfway decent spot in line. I still am almost a block around the school at that time. I can imagine what time time the first people in line get there. I actually had to pick my son up early last Friday and was very surprised that there was 2 cars sitting there waiting to get into the car rider area at 1:40pm, and dismissal is not until 2:55pm.

Tavares Elementary School is a great school overall. As in any school there are things that some parents do not like and then things that parents love. I as a parent feel safe to let my child attend this school. All of the staff are great with the kids. I would never ask for a better elementary school for my son to attend. I will even be driving him to and from school for the rest of this year even though we moved about 15 miles from the school itself and he should now be attending a different school.