Today was my last day at my school. I begin at the new school on Monday. During playtime today, I started thinking about all the life lessons I have learned from these little kids. As I sat just thinking and watching the kids play, I noticed Dean, off in the corner of the table pouting. Sadly, this is kind of a common occurance. He's not the best at dealing with his sharing problems and always wants me to come to the rescue. I decided that today was the today he was going to learn to solve his own problems! :) He put his head down, only to peek out from under his arm every so often just to see if I was noticing him pout. My thought was that I should let him sit there long enough that he would get tired of being sad and then he would forget about it and get up and play some more. This is usually what happens. As he sat miserably pouting, I thought, adults aren't too much different from kids. Yes we don't go around pouting (hopefully!) but just like Dean, we all want attention and we seek it in some pretty interesting ways.
As I was sitting there, Jenny came up and climed on my lap. I love it when she does this. Sometimes she is too busy playing, but many times she will spend the whole playtime happily coloring on my lap. Today she just sat with me, leaning against me. She didn't have a care in the world. It's really cool to be able to make a kid feel that way... I just found out that my new class will be 6 year olds. I hope they aren't "too cool" to sit on their teacher's lap :)
As Jenny and I were sitting there, I noticed Kate carrying a big basket of probably 100+ crayons. You probably already know where this is headed. SPLATTTT! I looked over and Kate had this horrified, guilty, please don't get me in trouble look on her face. After a moment of shock, I just laughed. A look of relief and a big grin spread across her face and she laughed hysterically as if it was the funniest thing in the world that these crayons had ALL spilled. Her look of guilt stuck with me. I wonder what would have happened at her home if the same thing occurred. Could it be her mom or dad's yelling from a previous time that caused this look of shame? Maybe....maybe not... Kids make mistakes. Of course I wasn't the most excited about cleaning up 100 crayons, but really, things are so much better if we just laugh at them! My friend Angie always says, "Life is so funny." So true. Kids make mistakes. Most of the time their mistakes are funny and don't require the big deal that we usually make out of it, as are most things in life.
I was genuinely sad to say goodbye to these kids. This week they had been talking about how they have new backpacks and new lunchboxes for their "cool new school!" I know they don't understand goodbyes, but it was kind of sad as they skipped out of school today as if it was any other day. I remember feeling the same way with my Chinese little kids. Probably never again will I see these kids. I am so proud of them, after only teaching them for 4 months! I just wonder what kind of people they will grow up to be. What will their job be? Where will they live? Who will they marry? I guess my teachers probably thought the same things about me...and here I am in Korea. Who would have ever thought!? :)
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