Teacher! Teacher!

For my teaching observation assignment I was assigned to P. Kindergarten (I use P. instead of _____ so that this blog won't show up in google searches) where I would be pollinating the minds of 3-4 year old Thais to be... Now, it's been a while since I was 4 years old, but I remembered a few lessons that were hits with me: John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt... wheels on the bus... duck, duck, goose... you get the idea.



At P. Kindergarten, we start every morning with jazzercise to a remix version of "I'm a Barbie Girl", followed by yoga and meditation to Enya. You can't go wrong with this formula. I only wished that I grew up in such a trendy Kindergarten. This place was totally decked out with every piece of climbable plastic toy imaginable, an outdoor swimming pool, and even karate instructors... because teaching kids how to fight teaches them discipline... or something like that.

The kids were pretty bright in that they learned Thai, English, and Chinese. Yup, 3 languages at 4 years old! Every class is also equiped with a Thai aid who walks around with a stick made out of colored tape and whips kids arms or asses if they act up or get out of line. Due to the sheer fear of the Thai aids, the kids were extremely well behaved for the most part... until the aid would leave. As soon as the kids realized the drill sergeant was gone from room they quickly erupted into a jumping, dancing, screaming, plethora of 4 year old. My initial reaction to this was to clap my hands twice very loud, but this only provoked them to copy me. 4 years old and they already knew how to mock me. This would last for a good 2 minutes until the aid came running back to the rescue fighting her way through the crowd with her trusty.. tape... stick.. thing.



Despite moments of wanting to peg a few of the little runts with a dodge ball, these kids were great. In the end, we made it through the alphabet, the numbers 1-50, fruits and veggies, household appliances, and the difference between "Teacher" and "Teeshirt". It was incredibly cute how eager these kids were to learn and how well they spoke English at such a young age.

After 2 weeks, and with a final Asian peace sign, I said "Sawadee Krab" to my wee Thai friends and booked it on up to Bangkok... time for the real deal.