shaping children.

I teach a challenging group of students this year. They are six & seven-year-old Kindergarteners. They learned their alphabet and numbers last year. The struggles they had were learning their alphabet and numbers plus the hundreds of other concepts Kindergarteners must learn before being promoted to first grade... basically, they need to be reading, writing sentences, and doing simple addition & subtraction to be prepared for the rigors of first grade. Let's face it Kindergarten is hard these days.

I learned how to read in home living at a half-day Kindergarten. I don't remember much else about Kindergarten except putting on an apron and serving plastic pancakes for breakfast to my classmates. Somehow though... I learned how to read doing just that.... playing. I thought teaching Kindergarten would be like it was when I was in Kindergarten. Centers, hands-on activities, singing & dancing, etc.  It's not really like that. We give grades. I have some hard working students in my class with all As, and they got a really cool yard sign that says they're on the superintendent's list for honor roll.

Enter TJ. Six-years-old. Shoes are more expensive than all of my shoes combined. Knows his alphabet and sounds but refuses to say them when tested. Knows his numbers but intentionally says incorrect numbers. Laughs at inappropriate times. Falls out of his chair 46 times a day. Will not sing and dance. Puts pieces of crayons in his pockets during centers. When asked what he wants to be when he grows up, responds with..."a robber so I can go to jail."

The entire month of August, I worked and worked on breaking the attitude. The entire month of September, I worked and worked on finding out what motivates TJ to do things (maybe not learn.... but just to do something!!!) The entire month of October, I worked and worked on teaching him the rules & procedures of the classroom so he wouldn't go home in trouble every single day. The entire month of November, I worked and worked on teaching him manners. So far... so good. It's amazing to see how he's changed in 3 shor... I mean LONG months. :) TJ can sit for about 8 minutes during a lesson without interrupting me. He can be nice to his classmates and keep his hands to himself at recess. He can write all 26 letters and he can tell me the sounds associated with the letters. He can even write CVC words when I say them slowly (CVC-- consonant vowel consonant like cat, dog, pat, sat, rug). He can answer 50 addition facts in 5 minutes and get 90% correct. On the Thursday before Thanskgiving, he handed me a tray with a spork/napkin combo and told me he was trying to be nice to others.

Several problems are still lingering.... the goal of being a robber to go to jail, the refusal to do work (sometimes), and thinking making F's are funny. I still have to search his pockets (without his knowing) before he leaves every day to take out my linking cubes, crayons, and whatever else he hides in there during centers. I also have to distribue a LOT of stickers throughout the day to keep him motivated to work, sing, & dance, but the price of stickers is so worth it to me. He's not going to be instricially motivated to learn... not when life has been hard and it's too much fun to fail. My goal by the end of this year is to teach this child of God that he is worth something to His creator and savior and God has a plan for his life..... not to be a robber or whatever else may come to his six-year-old mind that has seen far more than I have seen. God's plan is for him to love others and serve. It's for him to grow up and continue his education so he can be something greater than we can predict in Kindergarten. We can "police officer, nurse," it all day long, but who knows what kind of jobs will exist in 2025. He's an important.... necessary piece of my puzzle of students this year, and although at the end of the day, it can be quite upsetting to think I've got only 6 more months to get this child ready for first grade, I know it's not me doing this work. It's God. God is using me to train this child the way he should go..... and I'm so thankful to be able to see His work each and every day (because this student is never absent.) :) :)