It might be true – that whole thing about learning everything you really need to know back in Kindergarten. I’d forgotten, until recently, when I returned to Kindergarten as a temporary helper. I have been remembering my lessons from Kindergarten: how much more fun it is to paint a face rather than a piece of paper, how worked up adults can get over irrelevant things, how annoying it is to have to wait in line.
But those other things too; how quickly hurts go away when a hug is involved, that learning is exciting, and how much better everything is when you have a friend – teeter totters, building forts out of hockey nets and parachutes, and sharing secrets.
Every child at every age is a miracle, but there is something special about little ones in their very first year of school. Never again will they hug their teachers or classmates with such love. I watch them and wonder how long it will take for them to stop being amazed at what they hear and see at school. Will they be able to maintain this sense of wonder?
In every child in every classroom hides the learner that they were in that first year. Perhaps they were precocious, like Karly, over-enunciating to correct me when I heard “blue” and handed her blue construction paper. “No Monica! G-G-GLue.” Or maybe they were shy and sweet like Darryl with his sunshine smile and gentle hugs. Whoever their Kindergarten teacher met is still there. And so is their sense of wonder and curiosity. So is their kindness and playfulness. And judging by the way those characteristics have come back to the surface in me as I have spent time with the five year olds, I’d guess they are not so deeply buried in our fourth graders, our sixth graders, and even (dare I say it?) our eighth graders.
We’ve survived September. The routines are set and everyone is settling in. But let’s not settle too deeply. Let’s keep looking for what sparks imagination and brings out the natural learner in each of our students. Let’s keep looking for their best selves.
Here are a few fun moments from my time in the K, 1, 2 class.
During sharing, a kid who is new to the school was on the hot seat. She didn’t have anything specific to share so the teacher asked if anyone had a question for her. Several hands shot up and the little girl pointed to the one being stabbed most furiously into the air.
“How many teeth have you lost?” the little boy asked.
“Six,” she replied without hesitation.
There was nodding and murmuring from all over the carpet. Six was good. She wasn’t ahead of too many of them and she wasn’t a baby. Hard to know for sure, but this disclosure may have been responsible for her instant acceptance into a riotous game of British Bulldog later in the morning.
In the gym, a little girl ran screaming by me in the World’s Biggest Tag Game. Then she stopped and ran back to me, stood perfectly still and calm and said, “Guess what?”
“What?” I asked.
She put her finger on her cheek. “Once a spider bit me right here.” And she was gone, running and screaming into the mass of bodies.
On the playground, the kids saw an old friend. They ran up to the adult they all clearly loved and gave her hugs. One ran off while still updating the woman. I didn’t hear it all, but by the time the little one got to the top of the play structure, her voice carried nicely across the playground. “Kindergarten is WAY too long.”
It happened so fast, I couldn’t even react. We were outside. It was hot. One kid took off a heavy hoodie; another, a sweater. They had t-shirts on.
“Good idea,” I said.
Suddenly bare tummies were everywhere. Half the class was topless before you could say ‘bellybutton bouquet.’ Then I forgot about the various stages of undress and took them all inside for a drink. One made a break for the room and I grabbed her with her warm little fat-puppy tummy and directed her back outside.
“No, we have to go outside and get our clothes on before we go back in the classroom.”
I made a point of reassuring the classroom teacher when I clarified the shirts-on policy with her: “Don’t you worry,” I said. “I had mine on the whole time.”
I wandered around with the pink sweater for several minutes, showing it to the five year olds I thought might own it, then just asking kids if they even recognized it. Finally I got to Karly who promptly said, “It’s Julia’s.”
“I should have come to you first,” I told Karly.
She shrugged. “I don’t mind helping.”
Monica is the author of "Thanks for chucking that at the wall instead of me."
