Teaching has been a blast so far. I have really been enjoying myself as I get up and teach/entertain these kids. I would say I’m part teacher and part clown. It goes over great with the younger kids. For example, I teach them generally like 6-8 new words with each lesson. Then we play a game where I hide the flash card with the new words then the kid who guesses the word correctly stands up and plays me in a game of paper, rock, and scissors. Whoever wins that scores a point either for the students or me for the teachers. At the end of class if they have more points than me I usually sing them a song or dance for them (neither of which are a reward for winning, but get the kids laughing and wanting to beat me), if I win they will sing me a song or some random kid will come up and do some kung fu move (which always leaves me deeply satisfied). After class gets over the kids usually surround me and grab at my hands and jump up and down. I don’t know why they do this, but they love it when I also start jumping up and down. Then I try and pull my way towards the door as 20 or so kids hang on to me, only to arrive at another class ready to do it all over again.
As goes with most posts here are some Sydney quotes:
(So this quote must be prefaced with the fact that Heather despises Sponge Bob Square Pants and has no part in exposing our kids to it, I however enjoy it and from time to time put it on for Sydney)
So we’re trying to teach Sydney about letters and what we’ve done recently is associated letters with different things. With “S” we’ve associated it with “Snake”. We’re also constantly trying to teach her manners. So when Sydney and I were watching an episode of Sponge Bob the intro started and at one point Sponge Bob’s name comes on the screen (which has plenty of “snakes”) and he appears in front of it to play his nose like it’s a flute (isn’t Sponge Bob great!) and so when the title to the show appears Sydney starts yelling to me “Daddy, Daddy, “a snake”” and I say “where Sydney?” at this point Sponge Bob is standing in front of his name and blocking all the “snakes”. And so Sydney says in the sweetest voice “Excuse me Sponge Bob” and motions with her hand to move. I was instantly melted with humor and Sydney’s politeness.
Also recently I got up with Sydney in the morning to make her breakfast and to get the day going. For whatever reason this particular morning I was feeling alive and well and decided to start beat boxing a bit, while making breakfast in the kitchen. When I finished Sydney clapped her hands and said “bravo Daddy, bravo”. Again she said it later and me, being the confused parent (because where do they get this stuff?), I asked her where she got that from and she informed me “the Diamond Castle” (which is one of her favorite Barbie movies). Thanks for all your help Barbie.
Till next time,
the petersons
