Happy Earth Day.
I subscribe to this preschool program that sends me a box filled with my monthly curriculum and art projects. Sometimes I think my group is a little young for the topics I’m supposed to cover and I end up improvising. Today’s circle time topic was Mother Earth. Apparently it’s Earth Day and I’m supposed to teach the kids about the importance of taking care of the environment:
Me: CIRCLE TIME EVERYBODY!!!
Kids: YAY!!!
Me: (singing) Circle time, circle time, let’s sit down for circle time.
(Gino runs to get me a chair.)
Me: Thank you Gino! Isn’t it a beautiful day out today everyone!?!
Kids: Yeah!!!
Me: Well today we are going to talk about EARTH! Did you know we live on planet Earth!?!
(Blank stares.)
Me: Ahem. Well we do! And we have to be sure to take good care of our planet or we could lose our home…did you know the trees and sky and animals ALL belong to the planet.
(Blanket stares and short attention span body twists.)
Me: Is it ok to throw our garbage on the ground???
Kids: Noooooo!!!
Ms. Kathy: No it’s not. We need to RE-CY-CLE don’t we?? Do any of you recycle your garbage at home??
Kids: Noooooo!!!!
Me: Maile and Laina do YOU recycle at home??
Maile and Laina: Nooooo!!!!
Me: YES YOU DO! Kids do you know what happens to all the garbage when we DON’T recycle???
Kids: Nooooo!!!!
Me: It goes to a land fill. Can you say LAND – FILL??
Kids: LAAANNNDDD FFILLL
Me: Landfills are icky! They have dirty diapers and moldy food and needles and little poor children run through those dirty icky landfills and get very sick. Do YOU want to run in a landfill???
Kids: NOOOO!!!!
Me: No, that would not be fun. To keep our garbage from polluting the Earth and to stop using the Earth’s non-renewable resources we MUST recycle. Can you say NON-RE-NEW-ABLE RE-SOURCE????
Gino: Ummm. Ummm. Ms Kaffy, Ms. Kaffy.
(Gino clearly has something important to add to our conversation.)
Me: Yes, Gino???
Gino: Ummm. Ummm. My, ummm
(Uh oh, he’s pointing at his crotch. This can’t be good.)
Gino: Ummm, MY undaware…I got…THOMAS!!!
Me: Is Thomas the Tank Engine on your underwear Gino?
Gino: UH-HUH!!!
Me: Gino do you see that that has nothing to do with recycling or renewable resources or Mother Earth or anything we just talked about??
Gino: Ummm. Ummm. And my pans…and my shut.
me: Gino do you care about saving Mother Earth?? Doesn’t global warming concern you??
Gino smiles nicely.
Me: Ok everyone, we’ll talk more about Mother Earth tomorrow. You’ve been great listeners now let’s head over and make some ART!!!
Kids: YAY!!!!!