Kindergarten

I am bearing witness to online kindergarten, and of course have many thoughts to share about it. I’ll start here: it’s strange, moving, and hilarious.

It’s strange because kindergarten is not conducive to online learning. These kids are at the age where their natural inclination is to learn by exploring, touching, moving around, etc. They ought to be getting tempera paint on the classroom carpet and screeching at each other about fake cereal boxes in the play kitchen, not worrying about whether they remembered to un-mute themselves after getting called on by their teacher.

It’s moving because everyone is making the best of it: teachers, parents, and kids.

And it’s hilarious because… have you ever met a kindergartener? Harnessing the energy of 15 of them into one Zoom session will obviously produce amazing results.

I get to be part of this world because I’m supervising my upstairs neighbor, Sugar (that’s not her real name, I’m changing it here for her privacy), as she “attends” school in the mornings, while both her parents are at work.

Here are some things her classmates have un-muted themselves to announce to the class when the teacher asked if they had questions about the lesson:

• “My dad is making me oatmeal.”
• “Can I go to the bathroom?” Yes, you may. “OK. Sometimes when I go to the bathroom it doesn’t take long, but sometimes it does.”
• “I don’t know where to put my booger.”
• “My brother is supposed to be doing school on the computer too, but he… [searches for the right words] has issues.”

As for Sugar, she and I had this fantastic exchange last Thursday, during a break:

Sugar: [staring at me while we’re coloring]

Me: [notices her staring] Can I help you?

Sugar: …

Me: [goes back to coloring]

Sugar: Why… do you have holes in your face?

Me: You mean my nostrils? You have those too.

Sugar: No, the ones here [points to her cheek].

Me: Oh! You mean my dimples? [points to a dimple]

Sugar: Yes!

Me: That’s just the way my face is. Some people have them, some people don’t.

Sugar: I don’t have them.

Me: That’s right.

Sugar: Because my face is normal.