Since this all I do these days, I’ve compiled another Kindergarten Update:
1) Thursday is when it all goes down hill…the tolerance level drops, the patience meter plummets, and kids no longer want to sit in a circle quietly. Even the puppets are exhausted as they are pulled out of their basket and flung around the room in celebration of Thursday’s collective naughtiness by the students. One puppet even has several strands of her black yarn hair pulled from her stuffed head. The puppet’s yarn is braided back into her head and then she is put into early retirement.
2) Three kids peed their respective pants on Thursday and one kid emitted these frequently ferocious farts. Turns out he had skipped lunch (again) and his stomach was turning against him.
3) Lunch duty is absolute pandemonium. Every kid wants milk at the same g.d. time. Kids escape out the back to recess before cleaning up their area–lunch boxes still open on the table. One little boy, the one who is known for wandering into the bathroom and staying for days, is found fast asleep on the bathroom floor with his pants halfway down. The struggle of going potty by himself proved to be too exhausting for the little guy.
4) Wednesday the faculty prepped for our Friday workshop with two authors who have co-wrote a book about the traits of geniuses. We are broken up by chapter, spend thirty minutes reading our chapter in silence, and than discuss the reading in our groups. We then present the contents to the rest of the faculty. My chapter is about empathy. Many succesfull scientists, artists, and doctors have gained knowledge by putting themselves emotionally (and sometimes physically) into the place of their study. i.e.: A scientist becomes so engrossed in his work he can put himself in the place of a proton or a neuron. A doctor becomes so emotionally overwhelmed by her patient’s maladies that she has to leave her practice in order to preserve her mental stability. A man who studies ants had a dream where he himself was an ant telling other ants that he had a dream about being a human. And of course actors, we’ve been reminded about The Method acting of Marlon Brando and Dustin Hoffman every since Drama 101. I realize during the workshop that out of all the tools of genius I am a faithful empathizer.
5) One of the puppets interrupts play time by ‘calling’ the lead teacher’s cell phone. She makes a big deal about answering the cell phone and yelling, “Plucky Duck?! Is that really you?” into the phone. The kids are transfixed, some of them totally believe the puppet is on the other end, others are more skeptical, and a few didn’t even glance her way. (Turns out Plucky Duck had some problems with some bullies over at Green Lake).
6) We continue to have ‘meanness’ among the girls. The little girls, ages four, are latching on to the older girls (five going on six, thank you). This is a mixed blessing for a certain older girl, who loves the attention but feels frequently smothered. I even heard her sigh, like a martyr, and say, “I just can’t believe how many kids want to hold my hand!” It’s a tough job being popular. On Melt Down Thursday (which trickled into Friday), she’d had enough and was locking herself and whomever happened to be her chosen best friend in our single bathroom. Sometimes they’d take books in there for a real pow-wow. The point was to exclude the four year olds, who sat outside the locked door hoping to be ‘chosen’ to come inside. I finally broke it up with the rationale that the bathroom was for solo occupants only and definitely not a place for reading.
7) Speaking of the bathroom, I caught a boy and a girl inside the bathroom together. I open the door and the girl is giggling on the toilet with her pants down and the boy is giggling and turning the lights on and off. I shoo the boy out with words of ‘invading her privacy.’ Five minutes later they’re back in the bathroom again.
8) A lot of crying happened on Friday. I forget how easy it is for little kids to cry–boys and girls alike. It really is pretty incredible how we lose the ability to cry when we get older. Even the hardest, toughest, adult male can’t brush it off and claim he’s never cried. I don’t believe you, macho man. I’ve seen the toughest little boys start crying over a ball in the face or a teammate rejecting him for another boy. Sure, the girls cry a lot more and over stupider stuff….but the little boys burst out with just the same amount of emotion. Granted the little boys will start rolling around in a fist fight, and the girls will dive into a slap fest, but after the violence both genders will settle into weeping.