Needless to say, we both are not feeling our best, but I still went to the school. I contemplated wearing one of those paper masks. Awesome.
Before school we had a meeting to firm up lesson plans by talking through them and figuring out the 'kinks'. I am so impressed by the teachers, while they may not have a lot of formal teaching education, they are so motivated to create interesting lessons for the kids. Their interest in learning new ways of connecting with their students is truly inspirational.
As we were doing the planning inside, the kids were milling around outside and hanging on the windows, eager to enter. The picture at the left gives one an idea of what the daily scene is before classes start. Love this...no bells, no teachers or administrators yelling at kids to 'get to class'...not necessary when kids WANT to be in school.
With art day there was the general chaos of excitement before the lesson, but the kids did really well with getting settled and listening to Rachel's instructions. The project was natural 'printing' so Rachel had an assortment of leaves, potato stamps, and styrofoam plates for creating prints.
Even though the kids were about to bust with excitement, I was, once again, in awe of the fact that they were able to keep their hands off the supplies until Rachel gave them the 'green light'.
I have been working on behavior modifications for some of the students so I spent a lot of the art lesson time wandering between groups and assisting with issues. One great success we had was with Yesid, a rambunctious little guy that has been told he has to wait to have parent meeting before returning to school. He managed to slide into the activity unnoticed and when Karol (a veteran and daughter of the founder) caught on, she was not too happy with his sneaky behavior. I had a quick conference with her before she acted on anything and we decided the best plan would be not to send him home, but to privately give him the choice of having a quick discussion of his decision to not follow through with his consequence from the previous day of class, then let him come back to finish as a reward for making the choice to calmly take time out of the activity to talk with his teacher.
It went very, very well. Yesid really appreciated the chance to stay in the activity and was extremely helpful all day. I caught him organizing the paint bottles at the end of the day while all the other kids were outside running around.
When I talked with his teacher later, she was really relieved to see such incredibly responsible behavior from a student that often is a bit 'wild'. It is so fun to be working in a place where people understand that you 'catch more bees with honey' when it comes to behavior management...and pretty much anything you want in life.
Everything went very smoothly during the first hour and a half of the art lesson, but as printed pages were filled up, the kids became a little too creative with the paint. A few of the students started to use their own bodies as canvases. We were able to quash a paint war, but there were a few colorful casualties of an early 'battle'. Javier, Jr. was one and this picture says it all: "Javier, how did all that paint get on your face?", "I dunno...it's Duban's fault.". Oye vey.
In the other room, Natalia and Rob were teaching a pre-school lesson that they had prepared regarding the expectations of the school. They had been a bit hesitant that things would go according to their plan as the young ones have much shorter attention spans than the older kids.
After discussing their plan together before class, they utilized some of the strategies we brainstormed together. When I asked how things had gone, they were both happy to report that they had enjoyed a very successful lesson. It was very satisfying to be able to use my teaching experience to help other teachers create lessons that made their time in the classroom more enjoyable. Is this place for real? I hope so because I plan on being here for at least a year.
My favorite quote of the day came from Rachel, the art teacher and my roommate: "Why are so many kids making prints with 'Jesus' on them...must be some really religious folk." My reply, "Rachel, those are their names." Jesus.
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