Goodness gracious! I dont even know where to begin with this reflection! 09.09.09.-- a day so bursting and buzzing with energy and anxiety and challenge of all shapes and sizes. I arrived at school for the Back to School Assembly at which I was introduced with all of the new teachers-- I don't think I've ever had so many widely-curious eyes on me at one time without me even opening my mouth! The class teachers all tempted their students with a tiny sneak-peek of the year to come, and the 23 or so high school students led everyone in what was surprisingly my absolute favorite part of the whole ceremony-- a rhythm symphony of sorts in which each grade was responsible for a different beat composed of various stamps and claps and slaps. The final performance was rockin, really! Then, I again had to wait for a period-- the waiting has been the worst; absolute worst. Finally, though, at 11:50 I had my first class-- Grade 6. Met them in the classroom and after being introduced by the class teacher, I led them on to the large grassy field next to the school in a [relatively]silent single file line and we circled up. I started by getting them running in the circle a little and then without introducing much of anything, I led them through a Star stretching series and a simple Sun Salutation that is paired with a verse. I'm hoping to do this at the beginning of every class. Surprisingly, they all did-- probably because they are just a smidge scared of me, the new teacher, but also certainly because I didn't tell them that it was yoga-- they are, in theory, not too enthused by the idea of yoga they told me late- ha!--and they actually seemed to enjoy the challenge of some of the poses. After this, I told them a little about myself and then, because of my selfish need to hear their names quickly, we played a name game. Unfortunately, it seemed a lot better in my head, I but I guess I'd forgotten how at age 12 and 13, being asked to stand and perform a gesture or movement that reflects one's personality, which is what they were to do; repeating the names and gestures of those before them-- in some way it incredibly difficult-- even as an adult it's sort of nerve-wracking depending on the context! So this lost a lot of energy in the process and the gestures were pretty dull, expect for a couple of clapping push-ups and a cartwheel, and my somersault to a standing positing ;). But I did learn their names well enough to get myself around the circle so it served its purpose. And at least we ended the class with a bang by doing a timed relay challenge... Picture this:
All 25 kids lie on their stomachs on the grass in a line-- there is at least an arm's length of space between each kid. Then, the person at the designated end of the line gets up and must step over each of his classmates as quickly as he can and when he reaches the other end, lie down as quickly as possible because the people behind him have already started their way across...The race ends when the last person in the line has crossed over everyone else and lay down on the grass. They were able to do this in 40 seconds, and today, since I see them again, we'll redo it to see if they can beat the time
After lunch, it was Grade 7, followed-- without a pause, by Grade 2. All I can say is WOW. The distance between these two classes, literally [I have to sprint at 2 pm across the entire campus just to get there- not quite on time! The school's lack of passing time is still a bit of a frustrating mystery to me] but so much more significantly EMOTIONALLY and MENTALLY and PHYSICALLY in the bodily sense-- is so so vast. On top of this necessary adjustment for me as the teacher, I personally haven't had to ever teach in any solo and organized way, a group of elementary school kids at all... Let's just say it was a shock to the system, and the lesson plans when out the window in favor of total improvisation. My biggest ZING of an epiphany was that verbal instructions aren't, with this age group, incredibly-- okay, really AT ALL-- effective. I was repeating and repeating myself-- getting giddily interrupted with total nonsequiturs that I'm sure made total sense to these kids in their heads [and I thought those Eighth Graders in English class were bad ;)] and I was finally beginning to get pretty fed-up, just at a loss really at how to handle the situation which seemed totally unstructured and unfocused, when I simply started doing the exercise-- a verse with attached gestures-- on my own and OH MAN! I cannot tell you how quickly I had each and every one of them hanging on each movement-- totally in the moment and enjoying the challenges of processing new words and getting new postures and stretches and balances in their bodies. It was remarkable. That kind of intense, genuine focus, "in-it-ness," but most notably the JOY and FUN that they seemed to get out of the simplest thing was actually inspiring and exhilarating for ME! So I rode that wave of a little while, coming up with simple and not so simple imitative stretching sequences and then finally by some animal forms...This carried me through the rest of the class-- it just unfolded from here, with the kids choosing their favorite animals and figuring out how that animal would move, etc. Then, I set the "creatures" free in a designated area and told them that now only now did they have to move as their selected animal but they also needed to think about how their chosen animals would react to and relate to the others around them...This was a blast! We had some great chases erupt and great alliances arise; and whenever they got out of control, I froze them, and had them choose a new animal. Good times-- and hours of entertainment! But I wanted to at least get one game in so I made up a variation on DUCK DUCK GOOSE in which the animals used, if they happened to be "It," their own animal names, followed with a "Goose" that was an action that they, as their animal, perform [for instance, my cheetah said, "Cheetah, Cheetah,...etc POUNCE!" They got a kick out of this... It was possibly one of the longest, and yet simultaneously one of the quickest, 50 minutes of my life. I began, I think, to realize then that, yes, the newness of this job would be a challenge as I'd anticipated but really, a FAR greater all-around SHOCK TO THE SYSTEM than I could have dreamed.
I was home at 7:30, after yoga and some errands, and in bed by 8:10 pm, barely up long enough to wonder over my utter and total exhaustion. Zzzzz...
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