Is destruction an act of creativity?

I want to give them the benefit of the doubt: there must be something more to holding something in one's hand and then, in sheer excitement, throw it all over the place; there must be a cognitive sense to building a tower of colored blocks for the sole purpose of kicking it down upon finishing.

Four boys have been the object of my reflection on this question - Is destruction an act of creativity? - because I just watch and wonder at them. I wonder at them partially because they are the complete opposite of what I ever was as a child. But what's more: they consistently push my perceptions and understanding of the purpose of childhood and - perhaps more importantly - the purpose of teachers.

Is this an energy to be reined in? Modified and conditioned? ... Or could it be understood? Could it even change the way I think about that child and/or that behavior?

This is where the complexities of being a teacher - with all the background expertise AND intuitive, on-the-spot insightfulness - take shape in my understanding of what teaching is all about. Maybe it's not about what I have to teach them, but about what they can teach me. How can I expect myself to be able to teach them effectively and appropriately if I am not willing to take responsibility for learning from them, first, what that will entail?

So, my eyes and ears are open as I watch these boys. We shall see what I find.

Draw and tell ...

This is my ow-ee [red, center]. This is me [orange, right] I climbed the tree and hanged there and then I got the ow-ee. My mommy [purple circle, lower right] carried me down.
Timmy, age 3yrs 6mos

I put my hand here first [yellow, traced hand] and here are trees [green and blue] and this is my TV [yellow above hand] and the hand goes from tree to tree.
Thomas, age 3

This is my sister [lower left, behind scribbles]. Can you draw a dress for him? ... This is my mama [toward the left within scribbles]. Now I'm gonna draw my own head. This is me! [green circle toward right within scribbles]. I'm in the danger [starts scribbling green], and then my mom is in the danger [spreads scribbles toward left] and my sister's in the danger. My daddy's [red face] going to save all the family.
David, age 3

Kinetics part 2: Whose agenda is it anyway?

Oi! Today came an instance, in which I became very very frustrated. With children. Believe it or not, that does not happen often. Time to deconstruct.

I can't say I felt well set up for success when one of my colleagues shoved a board game into my hands and said, "Here, play this with those four over there. They can't pay attention during storytime." Don't get me wrong - we all have our moments and our days - and this was a moment when I felt very disconnected from my colleague and her greater scope of intention. This is a very uncomfortable feeling for me, so I was not off to a good start.

There I sat, board game in hand - a game I'd never even heard of, by the way - with four squeamish children who would have never known the difference had I simply gotten up and left. Because that is slightly what I felt like doing at that moment.

Come on, I thought to myself, it's just a game. Something to pass the time for these kids while the others listen to a book. That was my second problem. I didn't agree with my colleague's decision to exclude these kids from the other activity.

Stop! I reminded myself: It is too easy to resign oneself to feelings of dissatisfaction toward the actions of others. If you have a problem with what a teacher has done, you be the teacher you would rather see. No use expecting others to live up to your standards if you aren't able to consistently do so, yourself.

Way to put myself in my place - my place being in the blue child-size chair, at the table, with the same four squeamish children.

We started playing the game. The children were supposed to take turns rolling two dice - one with a number, one with a color - and identifying the illustrated object (boat, car, shoe, ice cream, etc) in the corresponding square on the grid board. That whole taking turns thing lasted maybe half a turn, before they all were either grabbing for the dice or leaving the table completely to play somewhere else. This was not going well.

What made me think that? What wasn't going well? The children were not doing what I thought they should be doing, or, what I was instructed and expected to have them do. I am finding such phrases increasingly frustrating, because they are such strong indications of the top-down mentality that pervades schooling: the teacher tells students what to do, and students listen and behave. This is efficient, perhaps, but only when the teacher's agenda is taken into consideration. What would be the most efficient way to serve an agenda set by children?

Back to the board game: I begin rolling the dice myself and ask all the children if they can find the corresponding picture. The first one is a boat on the ocean. "Was ist das?" I ask, and two chime together, "Ein Boot!" "Genau! Das ist ein Boot!" I respond, and continue in German: "Let's make a boat with our hands and ride those waves in our boat: up and down, up and down, up and down..." Miraculously, everyone has joined in the action. We continue on our momentum, creating kinetic stories about tying our shoes, being a steaming kettle of water, and dressing ourselves appropriately for snow.

After 20 minutes, I am exhausted. It's the kind of exhausted feeling you get when you've just left your house on your bike and your first 20 minutes are all uphill. Steep uphill. And I'm not entirely sure I've just done a very good job, because the kids are still squeamish and I feel like I'm talking the entire time just to keep everyone together in our kinetic stories.

The other students finish their story and it's time for free play. My four students explode from the table off into different corners of the room. I go to the bathroom for five minutes, just to be with the silence. There is something wrong with this kind of teaching. This does not feel right. This does not feel like me. It feels like I'm holding on for dear life.



Game with children not as strong in German, and very active - blending of both PLUS getting over my agenda to serve children better

Anansi with a Halloween twist

I told my first story in German today with our preschoolers. As I waited behind the wooden table I had set up on our blue rug, I watched the kids try to make sense of this new person at reading time (it's usually one of the other teachers, while I clean up after snack), and a new format of experiencing a story. Their eyes were big, and they hesitated at first, until they realized: Puppet Show! (sort of) Then there was hardly anything to keep them still, as they wriggled to find a place and kept sneaking up to look at the puppets behind the table. Can you really punish curiosity? All I could do was begin to satisfy it...

From behind the table came my right hand in a black glove: Anansi, the spider.

There once was a spider named Anansi. Anansi wanted only one thing in the world: to own all of the stories of the world! But at that time, they belonged to Nyame, the Sky God in the sun. So he spun his way all the way up to the sun to find him. When he asked to be given all the stories of the world, Nyame responded: "Hah! Do you think I will just give them to you? You must pay the price, Anansi! You must bring me three things: the fierce hornets of the forest, the great snake of the swamp, and the mighty tiger of the jungle. Then, and only then, will I grant you all the stories of the world!"

So, Anansi spun his way back down into the world and set about his tasks. He went to find the fierce hornets of the forest with a few things to help him: an empty gourd (pumpkin) and a big jug of water. He settled down close to where the hornets would come, and waited ... waited ... waited ... until - there they came! - the hornets came close. At this, Nyame started throwing the water from the jug up into the air, making the hornets all wet. "Hornets! Hornets!" he cried, "The rains are coming!" "Oh, Anansi, what shall we do? We hate the rain!" they called back. "Come into my gourd, where it is nice and dry," said Anansi. They did, and when they were all inside, Anansi closed up the opening with thick leaves. First task ... done!

Next, Anansi took a long bamboo stick with him into the swamp to find the great snake. When he found him, he made a bet: "I bet," said Anansi, "that you are not as long as my bamboo stick." "That tiny thing?" scoffed the snake. "Of course I'm longer." So he laid down next to the bamboo stick and streeeetched his head up toward one end and streeeetched his tail down toward the other. All the while, Anansi was weaving his silk around and around and around the body of the snake and the bamboo stick until the snake was entirely tied to the stick and couldn't move! Second task ... done!

Now, the third - surely the most difficult - task of all. Anansi crawled up into a tree and waited for the tiger to walk by. He waited ... waited ... waited ... until - there he came! - the tiger trotted by on his way home. Anansi followed him all the way back to his cave and watched exactly where the tiger slept ... (snore!) ... The next morning, when the tiger left his cave, Anansi set to work spinning a thick and strong web over the place where the tiger had slept. When the tiger returned that evening and laid down, he didn't see the web and laid down right on top of it. Anansi took the edges of the web, tied all the ends to each other, and had captured the tiger in his great, thick web. Third task ... done!

And so, Anansi spun his way back up to Nyame, this time with the hornets in the gourd, the snake on the bamboo stick, and the tiger in the web, and paid his price. Nyame was very surprised, but knew he must keep his promise. When Anansi spun his way back down to the earth again, he brought with him all the stories of the world, to tell to all the creatures of the earth. And do you know what? He is still telling them today.

(Adapted for German-language-learning preschoolers; I originally learned the story in Elder and Wong's (eds) Family of Earth and Sky)

It's the simple things ...

I wish I had a video of my time with Michael today.

Do you know those Knex-type spheres, that collapse and expand to your heart's desire? Michael was struggling with it a little today, and upon helping him, I found myself uncontrollably adding sound effects. When we collapsed the globe, I made an "ooo" sound that went down in pitch, and then made the same "ooo" when we expanded it again, this time going up in pitch, sliding along with my voice. Michael's face lit up with surprise, as did mine, and we continued collapsing and expanding and "ooo"-ing for a good ten minutes.

This is when I remember: It truly is the simple things that bring us the most joy in life.

May there always be sunshine

Oh, those two-year-olds ... I am so proud of them! Somehow, all of the energy they were putting into their detachment from their parents at the beginning of the day has now translated itself into the attachment that they can still feel, even when Mama isn't at school with them. Everything they make on a piece of paper - crayon drawings, paint blotters, gluing tissue paper - is "for my mommy".

It's getting to the point where I have moments when I look around, everyone is engaged, and I think: the only thing that needs my direct attention at the moment is my bladder! And that is just lovely (the fact that the kids are engaged, not the fact that I have waited too long)

In one of those very moments, I found myself recalling the prayer shared by a young Russian boy that somehow ended up a Raffi song:

May there always be sunshine
May there always be bread
May there always be Mama
May there always be me

Life just couldn't get any better than that, I think. I cringe to think of everything else I have asked for in my life. But: sunshine, bread, Mama (my fam), and me ... that is enough. It was enough then, and it still is.

Lass die Sonne weiter scheinen
Lass es Brot für alle geben
Lass die Mama immer da sein
Lass mich immer weiter leben

No, silly!

David [dressed in play armor]: I'm a knight!

Me: Sure looks like it.

David [pointing to dragon on armor]: That's a dragon!

Me: Really?

David: Yeah, it breathes fire.

Me: Ooh, like this? [I muster up my best dragon impression...]

David: No, silly! That's Sleeping Beauty!


(I think he thought I was snoring. I'll have to work on my dragon breath.)