I went into the next few days of teaching the old kindergarten kids with full confidence that i would have just as much success as day #1. And if you can call days full of screaming, running, crying, and a mob of rebellious children a success, then that's exactly what it was.
With a stomach full of fish and dill dumpling soup, and a second stomach full of bread, i looked up at the clock to see that i was only five minutes into our opening exercises, It was at that moment that i questioned my sanity and wondered what the heck have i gotten myself into. Even though we had just covered rule #3-listen to the teacher, not one of the kids wanted to listen let alone sing, and to actually sit in their spots for more than a minute was just out of the question! Gym time just turned into chaos as they all found that watching ms. allison tearing at her hair was much more amusing than learning prepositions like, "up", "down", "behind", and "in front." Repeating back what we we're saying would just be too predictable, so the children decided to shake things up and all yell ( i do not exaggerate this word) out what we said as well as any random numbers, colors, and Russian words, some of which i don't think would have been appropriate for a sophisticated conversation...because children have sophisticated conversations. Can you believe that our #1 rule is, "NO RUSSIAN!" ha! good luck with that one.
Allie, who has decided to be the class pet, would crawl around on all fours like a cat, but squeak like a mouse, and when i told her to sit down she would say to me, "i don't want to play, i want to sleep" and would then then crawl away and either hide underneath a bed, or find a sunny spot and curl up into a ball.
I finally had a moment of silence when i had the kids coloring and decorating their cups, of course they also zoned me out of the picture entirely. They wanted to color, who cares about English when you have markers, foam stickers, and so much creativity at your fingertips?
While playing follow the leader i accidentally led them into a dead end and on just instinct sent them all under the beds....at the same time.....not good. the second i did that i was like...what have i done?! I just stood their, numb, as the scuffling began to become more frantic...and then all i could hear were muffled yells and screams as it began to grow louder and louder.
Yaygwar, who dreams of being a police man, decided to leave the sweet heart breaker side of him at home, instead packing extra amounts of turd. Tackling girls to the ground, pulling on hair, and grabbing things out of my hand was his new passion. I knew that him listening to me was out of the question so i did what i do best, bribery. I came up with this brilliant idea of a teachers special helper badge for whoever is the best that day, so that the next day they can be my helper, making all the kids envious so that they had no choice but to behave and become my little slaves. I was so proud of myself, it had to work, there was no room for error! You can only guess how yaygwar's eyes light up when i showed him the golden shiny badge. yes, i had him! But then i tried to explain to him that if he was good TODAY i would let him be my helper and wear the badge TOMORROW. this did not register, he wanted it now. not later, and what do children do when they want something? what we all do! cry.
Yaygwar began to cry because he wanted the golden badge, allie started to cry because she got hit in the cheek by a ball and then crawled underneath the bed, alica tried to get allie out from under the bed and allie flicker her in the forehead to go away, so alica started to cry and crawled under the bed. veronica tried to help alica and hit her head on the bed, she started to cry. Nastya got mad because she wasn't getting enough attention and stepped on a girls toe, who...you guessed it, started to cry. Those who weren't crying ganged up nastya, who then did the loudest piercing scream possible. Can you picture the predicament i was in?....standing in the middle of the classroom, mind blank, mouth open, hair a mess, while half the class was crying under beds and the other half ganging up on nastya who was just screaming like there was no tomorrow. Finally a Russian teacher came in and calmed everything down, and then all the little girls gathered together into a group hug nurturing each other in Russian, and i felt like i wouldn't have a heart or soul if i told them to stop speaking in Russian, so i made just that one exception.
But it doesn't end here oh no, with still fifteen minutes left of class the kids wanted to do nothing but count their stars, so the children did something that i never believed possible. They formed a freaking mob! Alisa, who decided to make herself the leader of the mob, stood at the head, one leg up on a stool, fist pumping as all the others were gathered around her chanting, "count the stars! count the stars! count the stars!" I didn't know what to do, I was not trained for this! So i did what first came to my mind (blast this darn instinct of mine) and caved in. The children counted their stars like champions as ms. allison and ms. kylee sat there defeated....bewildered as to what just happened. As i gave yaygwar his badge i knew i would never see it again, there was no way he was going to bring that back, he didn't understand my brilliant plan, he just wanted the badge.
I never thought the day would come that i would become so stressed that i would actually get to the point of tearing at my hair, but oh......today....today was that day.
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