I was invited by Veg and then accepted by the Director to attend Lunch at School today for the first time. Gotta say I was a little nervous...
Would I follow the rules just right? Would I do what I was told? Would I embarrass Veg? Would I get the Teacher Look when I did something bad or not be invited back? So many worries... *SMILE* Hubby was so nervous, he wouldn't go with me. :-)
But WOW - What an Experience. I'm so glad I went and will certainly do it again soon. I told his teacher to tell me all I needed to know and what time to be there. She said to arrive at noon, but that Veg would show me everything I needed to know. This is the first time I've seen the kids in action during a very busy part of the day.
23+ kids all under the age of 5, in an orderly fashion all lined up to wash their hands. (me at the end of the line)... The hum of the crowd but no one speaking too loudly. Each washing with soap and water then drying with towel, throwing towel in the "towel garbage" then finding their name tag and seat.
If they can open the food containers,they do, but if not, they raise their hand to ask for help. A teacher readily helps those that need it. And my goodness, to see all their lunches. I've never seen so much health food and organic stuff together in my whole life. And I saw at least 3 kids with Peanut Butter Sandwiches made in to shapes. (I'm certainly not the only person in this world that does that) One girl had a triangle and square shape. So she built a house before eating hers.
Within minutes everyone is in their seat and eating happily. Drink pitchers are set up at each table and the children poor their own drinks. Water, Milk, and Juice are set up for them to choose. (specialty milks, like veg's soy, have his name on it and is ready for him to pour) He poured his glass then poured mine, saying he was glad to share with me. :-) Napkins go in your lap, and if you need silverware, then you have to ask the person at the middle of the table to "please pass a spoon" for example. A very nice young man was at the center of our table, and he passed me my Spoon along with a fork for veg, and passed the water pitcher to another student at the other end of the table. Seems whomever sits in the middle is very busy during lunch time.
There were about 6 people at our table, and yes all the seats are toddler size, tables, pitchers, plates, mats...EVERYTHING is toddler size. I felt like a giant in a doll house, and I'm only 5'2.. The sweetest thing was listening to all the conversations going on around me. It was just like sitting at a restaurant. Each table had a quiet hum of activity, stories being told in young people ways. No one is supposed to talk with food in their mouth, so while one is chewing, one is talking. and then each replies one at a time. Before you know it lunch is done... and then the real work begins.
Veg stood up to say "Mom, this is what you do next" and he did every bit, and showed me how to do every bit... Here was the list of things you have to do when your done eating (and they do this every single day).... Keep in mind these are mostly 3 & 4 year olds and there were over 23 of them all doing this by themselves with NO HELP and no direction!!!.. Now you can only do one thing at a time.. So for example you can't take a glass and plate at the same time.. Oh and everything is Glass, no paper or plastic.... You have to do EVERYTHING one at a time:
Get all your Lunch box stuff back together and put it near the door! Take cloth napkin to the napkin basket, go back to seat, take glass to the glass tray, back to table, take plate to cleaning table, where you use a scraper to get all your crumbs in to the crumb garbage and then set your plate in the soapy water! Go get Silverware and place it in the proper cleaning bin.
Then grab a small brush and pan..sweep your mat, seat and chair, then put the sweeper stuff away. Grab a sponge from soapy water bucket and ring it out, then wash off place mat, table and chair. Put the Sponge back in the bucket and grab a big sweeper and pan.. Sweep up the floor around your chair, push chair in and empty crumbs from pan in to a different garbage can. Then take your place mat to the Matt Holder.
When all is done, you stand by your chair with your hand raised very high (and yes I had to do this too), then the teacher will come inspect your spot. If all is good then you are excused from the table. You take your name tag and place it back in the name tag holder, then you are excused.
To see all of this happening around me was such a delight. Keep in mind too, that there are only a few of each cleaning supply, so they are taking turns and moving to the next thing as if its a well choreographed dance routine. A busy bee colony of kids all having specific jobs to do.
When all is done, the older kids "5 year olds" have to help put all the big stuff away. They each have a job to do.. And I remembered thinking when I was told this stuff that the older kids must begin to resent having to do so much work. But that wasn't the case at all. One young man walks up to me and says with a huge smile "I have Jobs to do, watch all I can do by myself" He was so proud of his "JOBS".. He did each of his "jobs" and smiled and giggled the whole time. Next thing I know Another walked by me with his hands full and he says with a laugh "this is my job for the day" and my Lil'veg says "When I get a little bigger, I'm going to have Jobs assigned to me too"
and I learned quickly... The older ones enjoy having responsibility that is just their size and they are proud when they complete their tasks.. then they either ask for more, or help some of the others. And the Younger kids look forward to the time when they can take on more too. Within moments the class is back to normal and you would have never thought a lunch room existed. All items are put away, and the classroom is prepared for lessons.
The 6-12 year olds eat in a different class room now, so I didn't see too many of them today.
At first Veg said he wanted to stay for nap time and more lessons, but after he went to the bathroom, he decided he would rather come home with me. On our way home, we discussed my Lunch adventure and he said I could come back any time.. "maybe even tomorrow" he said. :-) He also told me that I did really good following his directions. :-)
I enjoyed being a part of their little Community for 30 minutes out of the day.. 30 minutes that I will probably never forget. I was amazed to see how much they are capable of and how they all thoroughly enjoy every bit of what they do. Nothing is forced, no whining, no complaining. Gotta say I was skeptical about how giving so many choices to so many kids all at the same time would really work. But to see this in action, the majority of them choose the right thing. And there is really no discipline as we no it.
If you misbehave then you go to the back of the line, the more you do that, the less time you get to eat. If you don't clean up your space correctly, then you don't get to leave the lunch area. If you don't leave the lunch area, then you don't get to play. So they are given the choice, but they are also taught the consequence to the choice. And that is the remarkable part..
Here is an example from a couple weeks ago: Veg spilled something one day.. He spent much of his lunch cleaning it up. and then only had 5 minutes to eat so he didn't get to finish and was hungry when I picked him up. Not once did they say "you should be more careful" and they never told him the consequence and didn't even need to tell him how to hold the Glass again, or anything... But He explained to me what happened when he got in the car that afternoon and said "I didn't hold the glass correctly and I spilled it all over. I spent all my lunch time cleaning it up and then ran out of time and didn't get to eat my lunch." he said "Next time I will be more careful and hold the glass correctly so that doesn't happen because I didn't like being hungry"
So he learned all by himself without any adults saying a word, the consequence to his action that day and how his choices make a difference (good and bad).. And I did see kids doing things they shouldn't or acting up, and there are a few roudy ones in the bunch... But they are the ones that may not care if they miss lunch or don't get to play etc. So they were handled a little differently. And mostly the kids were telling the kids what to do. It was so funny.
Needless to say.. it was a great day!!! I wish I could package it up and put a little Montessori in every house and every school.
