Monday, April 7, 2008

Kindergartners Rock My World!

I have stumbled (believe me, that's the word for it) upon the perfect discipline solution for my kindergartners. It is effective, without me having to be a meanie or even having to raise my voice. Since we reward the kindy kids with stickers at the end of class for being good, I decided to use the stickers as leverage. Every day now, I draw happy faces on the board when the kids are good, and sad faces when they aren't. Three happy faces mean stickers for everyone, but three sad faces mean no stickers. Discipline problem solved!

My four littlest ones are so awesome to teach. Just over a month ago they spoke no English, and now they're chattering away and able to follow a myriad of commands. I'm so proud of them! They astounded me today by knowing all of their flashcard words and being able to answer "I'm fine" when I asked how they were doing. Keep in mind, these kids are only three and four years old. Impressed?

My second kindy class were on stellar behavior today. We whizzed through the material, and they got really excited over the new review game I came up with. I drew a picture on the whiteboard of a tree with bananas in it (which we counted together) and then taped up a picture of a monkey. For every question they answered correctly, the monkey got to climb up one rung of the tree. If they answered incorrectly, the monkey went down a rung. Once he reached the bananas, he gobbled them up (complete with sound effects, of course)!

My second class really love the "chicken dance," which I taught to them last week, so they begged me to do it again today. Since they had been so good, we not only did the "chicken dance," I also invented a "frog dance" and a "duck dance" (the "duck dance" was basically a can-can with lots of quacking). They were delighted. After we finished an encore round of the "chicken dance" (still their favorite of the three), Erin asked, "Now cow dance, teacher?" Fortunately, it was time to give them their stickers and release them! I have a feeling, though, that I will be creating a lot more dances in the future.

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"Passage—immediate passage! the blood burns in my veins! Away, O soul! hoist instantly the anchor!
Cut the hawsers—haul out—shake out every sail!
Have we not stood here like trees in the ground long enough?
Have we not grovell’d here long enough, eating and drinking like mere brutes?
Have we not darken’d and dazed ourselves with books long enough?

Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go, And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

O my brave soul!
O farther, farther sail!
O daring joy, but safe! Are they not all the seas of God?
O farther, farther, farther sail!"

~Walt Whitman, "Passage to India"