Run Around the Field For Five Minutes Routine

I'm in the middle of P6/Grade 5 exhibition with my students.  They are intently focused I would say about 80 percent of the time, but sometimes their eyes roll back in their heads or I actually catch them passed out in front of their computers.

(In another blog I'll write about how important it is during exhibition for teachers and mentors and parents to help in the finding of sites related to their research so students can actually focus in on the research rather than spending the entire six to nine weeks on google fruitlessly culling through millions upon millions of useless sites...)

Meantime, when my students get exhibition fatigue, I give them permission to step out of the room and go for a run.  They just need to look up at me, give me a nod, I give them a nod back, and they know they are allowed to scamper out onto the field for five minutes to clear their heads.  I have some students do it two or three times a day; some students never do it, and most students do it a few times each week.

What I do know is this: each time a student comes back, they're ready to get right back into what they were doing with renewed vim and vigor.  Either that or they've realized they need to be doing something else, and they get going on another aspect of their work.

Giving students permission to take responsibility for not only their own learning, but their own need-to-take-a-break time is important.  My ten and eleven year old students can handle it.  I trust them.  They haven't let me down yet.

Making Stuff With the Kids: It's Not Always About Technology

With all the hi-tech electronic gadgets and the all-consuming iPad, I am gratified that our children are still excited about making the modern-day version of the tin can telephone.  They could be playing on our iPhone and texting back and forth, but instead they are downstairs with their daddy stringing some communication devices together with thread and paper cups.  I love it!  And how do you like this bouquet of construction paper flowers we made yesterday?

My hubby is the crafty parent in the family.  Yesterday he and our eldest daughter made paper chain Chinese New Year decorations; then he and the two kids made "love guns" with Lego, the only kind this mommy will have in the house.  I'm sure they are real guns when I am out of hearing distance, but I get sprayed with bullets of love whenever I enter the room!

Charlotte also made a wand using a pencil, construction paper and a glue stick.  This gave our daughters hours of enchantment.  They were also inspired by recent forays in the movie and book worlds to craft their own "light savers" and Nimbus 2000 broomsticks out of Christmas gift wrap tubes.  It's fun to watch Star Wars and Harry Potter merge into their version of fantasy play.  (Light sabers trump broomsticks.)

At brunch on Sunday, Don taught the girls how to make cartoon figures on the paper tablecloth with chunky crayons, and we followed it up with  a rousing game of Xs and Os. We haven't given in to arming our daughters with iPhones on our dinner outings just yet.  So long as there are tablecloths and crayons, we'll be okay.  Last year, Charlotte made herself an XBox out of a tissue box and happily carried it out with her to restaurants so she could feel like part of the in-crowd.  She wasn't disturbed in the least that hers didn't take batteries.  She's outgrown her XBox, but the girls occasionally bring their knitting needles along when we go out so they can work on their never-ending scarf projects.

No doubt, they will be clamoring to playing "Dragon Vale" on the iPad sometime in the next few hours, but so long as we keep that down to 15 minutes segments we're hoping our kids can continue to embrace their imaginary play with their taped-together weapons and Sharpie microphones and tin can phones.

We're not perfect parents and they're not perfect kids; the apps and the computer will always have their attraction (for all of us), but it's gratifying to see kids having fun without having to resort to electronic entertainment every minute of every day.