OH MY GOD! or Christmas in August or A teacher has died and gone to heaven

Since we arrived to our school we've heard a phrase drop many a time. The phrase is, "It's been ordered. It's in a container."

Remember those container ships that I mentioned in one of my last posts, the ones that sit in port for 6 months before being able to unload? Well, you know, they are full of these containers of stuff (uh, hopefully not perishable!). Sometimes, these containers are full of stuff that our school has ordered. Had I mentioned that the container that contained the orders made in the 2006/2007 school year had never arrived? Well, it's here now. In fact, it arrived late last week, and starting on Monday they began to unpack it. Monday at lunch the cafeteria had several very large piles of boxes. Tuesday at lunch there were giant piles around the entire cafeteria and the stage at one end was covered.

Today was the day. Today, deliveries of sorted stuff came pouring into our classrooms. Men came with trollies piled high- at first there were three trollies and what seemed like loads of stuff. But then the guys said, "no, there's more." They came again, and again, and again, and yet once more, until our the inner courtyard of our class building was piled just as the cafeteria had been the day before.

I watched the boxes pouring in, and was well aware that we had just received more boxes into our classroom than my previous school received for the entire school in a year.

At 3:00 on the dot, we started the unpacking party. We did have to go through a fairly tedious process of doing a thorough check that every single thing on our order lists was indeed in the boxes. In the end we came up with a short list of stuff that was missing, and 4 boxes of pretty high tech science type stuff that wasn't on our lists and obviously belonged to the high school science dept.

Going through those boxes though... whoah... if DB gets excited over filling 13 pencil cases, she would have peed herself over these boxes. Just to name a few things (basically all in amounts big enough to make you pinch yourself): markers, crayons, colored pencils, blocks (OH MY GOD, the blocks- boxes upon boxes of several different types including the natural log ones), paper, paper, paper, paper, paper, more paper, colored paper, see through paper, stained glass paper, tissue paper, textured paper. newsprint, muslin, paint, fabric paint, water colors, paint brushes, pens, pebbles, beads, mosaic tiles, buttons, puppets, train sets, puzzles, bins (storage), bins, bins, and more bins, bean bags (as in to sit in), a new book display shelf, painting easels, clay, clay, more clay, chicken wire, dowels, art portfolios, glue, glue sticks, tape, clipboards, scissors, mirrors large and small, carpets...

Um yeah, and that ain't all of it.

Now, materials do not a good preschool make- HOWEVER, when you're running a good program (Reggio? check!), you've got experienced, passionate teachers (my team teacher, me, our assistants? check!) and you add in all these materials-- well, short of having the purpose-built EYC building that is in the plans, we've got the preschool to kick all preschools butt! And the best part is, that all those materials? We are NOT going to hand them out sort of standard issue- "pink piece of paper, a green piece of paper and a blue piece of paper, now make a flower in front of a blue sky!" No, these materials are so going to be up to the kids to be used! (Yeah, ok, of course we will guide them at times....but the projects, they are child driven!)

So, there you go... I'm kind of excited because it seems I may have "listened and observed" my first project. Four children asked me to help them build their tower taller than they could reach the other day. It worked, but eventually, the very skinny tower of Lego type blocks just kept collapsing on itself. So, I asked them, "Well, how could we build a tower that could be very tall, and would not fall down?" They sort of looked at me with inquisitive faces, and kept on taking turns holding the tower up. So- with a little guidance, we might restart this conversation, this inquiry- and then, we might start to draw ideas, construct ideas, etc, until we get to the point of building something- or, we might have to go on a field trip around school (or elsewhere) to find tall things that stand and see what is special about them, or look in books to see if we can find anything. It should be good. :) And can you honestly say, that through a project like that, children aren't learning? Yeah, I didn't think so. :)