The Tykes are Back!

Actually the tykes were back last week, but I was in Bath so really *I* am back. You know what is tragic? There are only three weeks left with these tykes! I'm going to miss them.

You know what is funny about teaching tykes? A number of things. But what I want to specifically mention is the number it does on your sense of what size things/people should be. At the beginning of the day I walk into school and I think "How small you all are!" but that quickly normalizes and it seems as though the tykes are the size that people simply are. Today at home time a 2month old baby brother was brought in (awww! Such fluffy hair!) and suddenly the tykes looked GINORMOUS. Then, after the tykes had left and I had finally put everything away, I saw one of the nursery assistants placing one of their chairs out in the hallway and oh! It was so small! So full circle. There we go.

Today was eventful- the floor of one of the reception (kindergarten) classes had flooded so instead of three reception classes there were only two- with the third split between the other two teachers. This meant that A: I did longer reception classes and B: there were a LOT more kids. (Um, half again as many...duh.) Also- parent's open day is coming up and this means we need to perform! I guess. Anyhow- I had a bit of a lesson plan (though truth be told it was not 100% sorted out by the time I arrived at school) but that was soon bulldozed away and the head reception teacher and I hammered out a new one in order to make sure that all of the requisite topics were touched on- singing, movement, creativity, instruments, etc.

They're learning about forms of transport this term and so the song that they chose to learn is called "I like to ride my bicycle" I sang this all afternoon and still have no idea how it goes because as soon as I read those words Freddy Mercury starts singing in my head and that is a completely different tune. Thanks, Queen.

Another thing I learned today is that tights= maybe not the best idea. In every single class today I had at least one child stroking my leg. What do you do with that? Apparently Pierre, the French teacher (why do they have a whole class French teacher when half the kids are French?) gets felt up by the tykes fairly regularly. I've been told to trade stories with him.

Okay, ALSO? I've been starting to actually use some of the CD's in the various resources I've got because you know what? I don't play the piano. But what is hilarious is that they're all in British accents, right? So do I teach them in my accent? Teach them the accent on the CD? Sing along with the CD in my accent? Sing along saying "That's a fohm of transpoht?" (form of transport, they have much much much softer R's) Also, who says TRANSPORT?! (The Brits, that's who.)

Speaking of which- this bothers me: oriented v. orientated. Why the extra syllable, people?


Oh! Oh! In the nursery classes we are learning about MINI BEASTS! (Insects and the like, isn't that the BEST term?) So we were singing a song about our mini beast friends and they did such a good job learning the song. I was so impressed with them, big loud singing voices and all but two classes even learned the introduction/verse rather than just the chorus (not the third class though. The first time I sang through it one of the kids said "That song's too LONG" so we didn't go for it...)

In the song our mini beast friends (ha! makes me laugh every time I say it) are named Alf the Ant, Bill the Beetle, (Will the Woodlouse....we skipped that one), and Sid the Snail. Then, because I like having the kids give their suggestions and use them in the songs, we added a couple of other mini beast friends. The first class was fairly normal: Kate the Cricket and Sally the Spider (they LOVE spiders). The second class came up with this: Princess the Butterfly and Darth Vader the Spider.


I'll leave you with that.