My son started attending a co-op preschool this fall. At a co-op, parents take turns working in the classroom with a preschool teacher. Last week it was my turn to be the co-op parent in my son’s classroom.
Stepping in a classroom of two and three year old kids is crazy. Within a span of about five minutes the kids went from trains, to trucks, to painting, to dress up and so on. The one thing the kids were the most focused on all day was snack time.
Snack time at the co-op works like this. When it is your turn to be the co-op parent, you are in charge of bringing a snack for the class. I showed up with bags full of bananas feeling pretty good about my snack choice. My confidence quickly went away when the teacher optimistically said, “Hopefully this will work out better than the last time someone brought in bananas.” All together, ten kids probably ate one entire banana total. Oh well, at least they also had animal crackers too, and were shoving those in their mouths by the fist full.
My first day co-teaching was going great, until the teacher sad, “Ok class, today we have a special guest coming into our classroom.” Cool I thought, I wonder what it will be? Then, I heard the chirps, squawks and tweets coming from down the hall. Birds. Freaking birds. One of my least favorite things on the planet is being in a room with birds. Birds are not meant to be kept indoors and I am not meant to be indoors with birds.
It’s no secret that I don’t like birds. My wife has even accused me of using my children as a shield between me and those nasty rats with wings. I deny it, but it may be partially true.
Anyway, the guest speakers were a family that brought in their collection of pet birds. All the kids sat and watched as the nice people explained what the birds ate and how they communicated with each other. Everything was going pretty well and then the bird lady decided to take a bird out of its cage and hold it in her hand. Of course, once the bird was let out of the cage it escaped the bird lady’s hands. That thing was moving a million miles an hour circling over our heads, then I swear it sensed my fear and came right for me. It landed two feet from me in the middle of a pile of children. Most of the kids were freaked out, so I tried to keep it together as they scrambled around the room.
Overall, my first experience back in the classroom was a positive one, but the “bird incident” definitely left some kids with extra full diapers at the end of the day.
Happy Parenting!
-Pete
