Kindergarten Halloween

What does a kindergarten teacher dress-up as for Halloween?

A character from a book -- of course!

I'm the coconut tree from Chicka Chicka Boom Boom!!

Welcome to Holland

I wanted to share something with everyone who reads this blog. It's a short reading that has driven my life over the last couple years. I do not have a child of my own - but every child in my classroom becomes my own. This story has "struck with me" since the first time I read it. 

Click HERE if you would like to download a PDF version. You will want to keep it!!!

Welcome to Holland 

by: Emily Perl Kingsley (1987)

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guidebooks and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills.... and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very, very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

An open-minded Halloween

I read this today on a friend's Facebook page. I posted it here so I wouldn't forget it.

Tomorrow, a lot of creatures will visit your door. Be open minded. The child who is grabbing more than one piece of candy might have poor fine motor skills. The child who takes forever to pick out one piece of candy might have motor planning issues. The child who does not say "trick or treat" or "thank you" might be painfully shy, non-verbal, or selectively mute. If you cannot understand their words, they may struggle with developmental apraxia of speech. They are thankful in their hearts and minds. The child who looks disappointed when he sees your bowl might have a life-threatening allergy. The child who isn't wearing a costume at all might have SPD or autism. Be kind, be patient, smile, pretend you understand. It's everyone's Halloween. Make a parent feel good by making a big deal of their special child.

Let us not forget -- a child's disability or special needs is a family's way of life. It is not a hinderance or a difficulty -- it's their life. And life happens everyday... even on Halloween.

The one that finally got me.

When I tell people that I am getting my Master's in Early Childhood Special Education, I usually get one of two questions:

"What is that?" (answer -- early intervention services for infants and toddlers with disabilities and delays & special education pre-school)

or

"Isn't that so hard? Doesn't it make you so sad?"

Yes, at times it's hard. It's hard to learn about infants with short life spans. It's sometimes difficult when I realize many of these children have been through more in less than 5 years than I have in 26.

But, it's not as hard as I expected it to be. To be successful in this field, you cannot "feel bad" for the children and families. I cannot and do not pity them. I cannot and do not get stuck in a "what if..." mentality. This is their lives. My job is to improve, support, enrich their lives. To help families meet their own needs and function in their day-to-day life.

This week -- it got to me. This week in one of my classes -- for the first time, I cried. I was watching a documentary simply stunned by how selfish and unappreciative "we" are for the lives we have.

Deaf-blindness. It's "the one that finally got me."

Until now, no disability, no delay, no abnormality, no health issue has hit me like this. To the point that I was simply devastated. 

Children with vision loss rely heavily on their hearing to receive information, to experience the world, and to communicate. Children with hearing loss rely heavily on their vision. They help to compensate for one another. 

But, to never see the world -- to never hear the world. To lack the motivation to move and interact with others because the world is just too scary and confusing. 

We take it all for granted. This was the one that finally got me -- and I want to be better because of it. 

Monday mailbox

A few "jewels" for your viewing pleasure. My kinders are amazing artists. Honestly better than I could do! :)

"I am going to Mrs. A." -- according to this little artist, that is Frankie on the left and Ecko (our leopard gecko) on the right. Cute. Cute.

This little one is amazing. Her drawings are so accurate and detailed. That's me (with my ID badge on - love it) standing by my cart (with the document camera on it. Wow!) My favorite part are the little ones sitting cross-legged on the carpet. Love this!

Bow Wow! - number comparison game

My kids love this game. It's simple, easy-to-learn, fun, and great for practicing number identification and comparison.

I played this game this week with some of my students at math small group instruction. It's quick enough to play multiple times -- and the kids love the simple competitive nature.

Plus, it's dog-themed. Winner in my book. :)

It's basically the old card game "War." There are 3 colors of number cards (easy sorting!) The kids simultaneously flip a card onto the game board, say the number, and decide whose number is the largest. This person takes all the cards! When there's a tie, players flip another card on top (their favorite part, of course!)

The number cards also have a matching number of pawprints for kiddos who are still working on number ID, or those that need to see a visual to decide which number is larger.

     

I hope you enjoy the game! Click on the pictures above... HERE for the game board and HERE for the game cards.

a POSITIVE change in society

We all hear it. We all say it. We all notice it.

"Society has changed."

"Kids nowadays are so different."

"I remember when..."

We all do it. We compare our society/culture nowadays to the world we grew up in.  Our two-year-olds can work an iPhone. Our teenagers are having babies (and getting on t.v. for it!) Our society is obsessed with monitoring preservatives, lead-based paint, organic products... how did we *ever* survive before? :)

But, yesterday, something in my classroom made me think -- Wow. What an awesome change in our world today.

This week is "Red Ribbon Week" at our school. We talk about staying drug-free, and taking good care of ourselves in general. I don't talk to the kinders about drugs, specifically, but yesterday, as I handed out their ribbons at the end of the day, we discussed things that are good for our bodies and not good for our bodies.

The kids came up with some great examples. Good for our bodies? Eating vegetables, exercising, drinking milk, taking vitamins. Bad for our bodies? Eating candy all the time, watching too much t.v., taking medicine without mom or dad's permission.

Then, of course, a little guy brought up drinking alcohol. I answer it the same way I do every year: "That's a choice grown-ups can make, but alcohol is never for kids."

Another little one brought up smoking cigarettes. And here lies the heart of this story.

Student 1: "Smoking cigarettes is bad for your body."
Me: "Yes. It's bad for your lungs and body."
Student 2: "My dad smokes. I always tell him to stop, but he doesn't listen."
Me: "Yes. Mrs. A doesn't smoke, but kind of like alcohol, that's a choice some adults make. But smoking is never for kids."

-- Then, one of my sweet little darlings looks up at me with a puzzled look...

Student 3: "What's smoking?"
Me: "Well, have you ever seen someone outside with something in their mouth and there's smoke coming out of their mouths? It smells really yucky."
Student 3 (still puzzled): "No. I don't know what that is."

AWESOME!!! Hooray for our society! We spend so much time focusing on the negative changes in our world and society... this is a perfect example of a positive change in our society. A couple other kinders also looked quite puzzled... and I was thrilled. What an awesome change.