Laura Diaz
Instituto de Lengua Española
Apartado 100 - 2350
San José, Costa Rica
América Central
This a post office box and can't be used for UPS or FEDEX.
This is Central America, so expect up to a month-long for mail to arrive. Who knows?
You get bonus points if you write me in Spanish!
(Necesito practicar.)
I’m learning that you never know what to expect, especially in this kindergarten class! And during Language Arts, magic happened! Earlier, I had introduced the International Baccalaureate unit of animals and taught the students a few facts about the Harbor Seal. I wasn’t sure what the kindergarten retention rate of 2 hours would be after hearing the quick facts about the seal during Math time and needing to write about it during Language Arts workshop. But when I asked for a volunteer to share a sentence about the seal, the student who arrived late and refused to participate in the morning, suddenly sat bright-eyed in his chair and whipped his hand up in the air with a huge grin on his face.
Typically, this student’s speech is very hard to understand, a mix of Spanish and English, with a few key animal names marking the pause in his spew of excited words. But today when he raised his hand, out of his mouth came a clear and relevant sentence: “The seal is eating a fish in the water.” I wrote his sentence on the board, beaming, wishing I had my video camera to capture that moment.
Story #2: The Missing Lunch Aide
At 11:50a, the instructional aide strode into the classroom with urgency in her eyes. “Where are the lunches?” Apparently, the lunch lady, who usually picks up/delivers the kindergarten lunches, had not come to school. No one informed the kindergarten teachers of this, so we were all caught by surprise. All right, we’ll roll with the punches; another K teacher and I pushed the cart over to the cafeteria, loaded it up with the food, and steered it back to the kindergarten lunch area. We were just in time, as we could see the students lined up and heading our way. The other teachers and I hurriedly donned plastic gloves and assembled the plates: Hot dog, rice, apple, and carrots. Whew. We started to put out the plates on the tables, when a sea gull swooped down and made off with one of the hot dogs! I couldn’t help but laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation!
We decided to wait to put out plates until students sat down. But boy, do I have a new appreciation for the lunch aides, between students yelling “I want ketchup!” and “Can you open this?” it’s enough to fluster even the calmest of teachers. We decided to extend lunch 15 more minutes to allow both students and ourselves some semblance of peace before returning to the classroom. And that is why I bring my lunch to school.
Story #3: Losing a Tooth
A student came to me this morning with the exciting news that one of her teeth was lose. I told her to keep wiggling it, and it might come out. Later, she ran over to me at the end of recess time and showed me her tooth, it was hanging on by a thread. “Pull it,” I said, and she made a brave choice and did. As soon as she pulled it out, she looked at her hand, and burst into tears. I said “good job,” and she gave a teary smile. I led the whole class in congratulating her on pulling out her tooth, and sent her with a student escort to the nurse’s office.
A few minutes later, I am leading the class by the nurse’s office to their Winter Sing practice, when this student peeks into the hallway with a worried look on her face. “I lost my tooth,” she says.
I nod my head in agreement, “Yes, you pulled it out yourself. That was very brave.”
“No” she shakes her head, “I lost it!”
My eyebrows rise as I understand what she’s saying, “Oh, you mean, you dropped it?”
“Yeah, somewhere near the nurse’s door.” She points her index finger along the short hallway leading to the nurse’s office.
“Okay, I’ll look, but it’s alright if we don’t find it, because your mom will know you lost your tooth by the empty tooth box around your neck.”
I led my class to music, then returned to scan the area for anything that resembled a baby tooth. The problem was, this was the hallway students trample through when they come directly from the playground. So this little tooth had landed amongst scattered woodchips and little rocks embedded into the tiny cracks in the pavement. Not to mention, all the students’ shoes that tracked through there and could have carried the tooth to another part of school. All that to say, the hunt for the lost tooth was unsuccessful. Fortunately, the student wasn’t too upset, and I told her that now she had a funny story to tell. She could say: “Today I lost a tooth, and then I LOST it!” She laughed and I thought: Next time a student loses a tooth, I’m giving them a bag to carry it in.
Story 4: Mountains and Valleys
Gathered around the sandbox, I gave students very specific directions about what I wanted them to do. One partner needed to push the sand together to make a “mountain” and the other needed to dig a hole/push down the sand next to it to make a “valley.” Then, we would go around and each partner point to their creation and label it mountain or valley. Partners did an excellent job working together to create an extensive mountain range, and they were very excited to share their work with the class. 
It was the last student’s turn to point out his or her mountain and valley, and I couldn’t believe his work had lasted for 3 minutes with no one stepping on it. The student ceremonially cleared his throat, “Actually, mine’s a volcano.” I smiled and looked down, and, sure enough, the student had dug a hole straight through the center of his mountain. “Yes, it is; you’ll get to learn about that in 3rd grade!”
After finishing their sand mountains and valleys, the students returned to the classroom to wash their hands, and I showed them a YouTube clip of “America the Beautiful,” playing against the backdrop of some of America’s most beautiful geography. During the film, I was surprised that the students started singing the song! So I taught them some hand motions as we sang the lyrics, and afterward discussed what they noticed/saw in the video. Their observations were astounding! It was another calm and engaging way to end the day.
Story 5: Hands on Your Head
“Stay in a straight line,” I reminded the students as we walked back through the hallway from Garden. The students responded with showing me their “quiet starfish” hand motion and turning around to follow me, single file. I led the class around a corner, pausing to wait for the rest of the class to catch up and do another head count. As we turned the corner, one of the boys tripped on his shoelace and fell towards the wall. Teaching in kindergarten, I have come to know that untied shoelaces and tripping over them is a common occurrence. I issued words of comforting motivation: “It’s okay. Stand up.”
But as this student stood to his feet I saw his blue, long sleeve shirt covered from shoulder to wrist with tan paint. They had just painted the walls! The walls were freshly coated, and I still needed to get 10 more kids through the “wet zone.”
I needed to think quickly: “Okay, put your hands on your head and don’t touch the walls.” I guided the class as far from the walls as we could stand, but two students got curious and touched the painted student’s arm. “Keep moving, keep moving.” I worked to keep my voice level as I steered the three painted ones to the boy’s bathroom to get off what paint they could. Fortunately, the parents of these students have a good sense of humor, especially when I’m trying to explain what happened in Spanish!
