Excuse Me Josiah, if I Don't Eat Cheerios I Turn Into a Little Girl Monster
If you're just tuning in, this post is the second in a series I'm doing every monday with stories and commentary on the previous day's Sunday School class where I teach 2 and 3 year olds.
The lesson, by any measure of a sucessful lesson, was a complete failure. This week the mighty OPC sunday school gods deemed it necessay, and most importantly deemed it possible, for me to teach my 2 and 3 year olds the story of Abraham/Abram leaving Babylon/Ur/Iraq for Canaan because there God would bless Abraham and Sarah with children as numerous as there are stars in the sky.
Normally with these lessons there's a central moral point centered around a central & simplistic storytelling conceit. Example: Adam & Even disobeyed God. Adam and Eve were punished. Moral: do what God tells you to do. 3 year olds can get this conceptually. But try this one on for size: Abraham and Sarah didn't have any kids because Abraham and Sarah are really old. Abraham prayed to God for kids. God promised Abraham & Sarah children as numerous as the stars in the sky if they move to another land. Moral: er, uh, do what God tells you to do, God keeps his promises.
What a mess. The "artwork" the OPC provided to help illustrate the lesson didn't help any. Everytime I'd try to make the point of God promising to give Abraham and Sarah innumerable descendents like the starts in the sky, both Isabelle and Josiah would immediate showcase their newfound counting abilities to count the 7 stars in the picture. From which they immediately concluded that God was promising to give Abraham 7 kids.
And boy, try to explain to a 3 year old the idea of "not having any children." Feel free to use personal examples. Then get them to extend this understanding to Bible characters in such a way to create some sortof continuing tension driving the nearly counter-intuitive importance of obeying God. It didn't help that the artwork everytime I would emphasize Abraham and Sarah not having any children, just happened to have a half-dozen sheep in the picture. To which Isabelle & Josiah concluded that Abraham and Sarah did have children because they had all those little baby "sheepies". Stunning.
But class had some beautiful moments. And I probably should put these at the top. "Burying the lead" and all that. So Josiah comes late to class. I'm waiting with Isabelle at the door. Josiah walks into the outer room and they both see each other and run screaming towards each other shouting each others name right into a big embrace. It was ridiculously cute.
So like reuinited long lost friends I take them both by the hands and we head into the classroom. At this point Josiah & Isabelle continue with their now fascinating to me reunion by having a conversation which appears to be giving one another updates on the events from the past week (when they were appart). What's crazy is that they both carried on the form of a typical reunion conversation. "Oh man I've missed you. The craziest thing this week happened and it made me think of you." "Really? that's incredible, I had a similar thing happen here. My parents are great." bla bla bla. Isabelle would say something, Josiah would listen in what appeared to be an attentive fashion. He would respond while Isabelle listened.
What was weird though is I'm not sure that there was any actual content to the conversation. Isabelle rambled about lizards and wizards while Josiah talked about his grandmother. Each person acting like they were responding to the other persons recent comments, except they still remained completely in their own little abstract worlds. Talking with Paton about it later, we kindof concluded that its probably simply kids imitating the way adults communicate with one another, even if its merely in form and guesture. Kinda freaked me out thinking about the utter extent to which children will mimic their parents and other adults.
The funniest part of the class came towards the end. I was giving the kids a small snack of Fruit Loops. Which is usually good for getting them to settle down for 10 minutes. I use the time to emphasize sitting still, sharing, being polite and other basics of interpersonal whatever.
Every class I, of course, bring a diet coke with me. The kids all refer to this as "the yucky" and they never, ever touch it nor ask for a drink. After all it is the yucky. But they love to talk about it, like its some horrible forbidden evil consumed only by those bizarre "big people" who do all kinds of forbidden things. So this Sunday, during snack, Josiah asks me "why do you drink the yucky?" I realized at that moment I could tell him pretty much anything and he'd swallow it, hook line and sinker. It was a strange moment. So I tell him "if I dont' drink the yucky I turn into a monster." Josiah's response "a good monster or a bad monster." My response "a really bad monster."
This was very nearly a big mistake. Immediately Josiah gets sad, really sad. "Mr. Josiah please don't drink the Yucky. I don't want you to turn into a monster." Now somehow Josiah had concluded that if I DID drink the yucky I would turn into a monster. Obviously something called "The Yucky" would 'cause evil things, like the drinker turning into a mean monster. I tried a few times to explain to him that by drinking the Yucky I wouldn't turn into a monster, but he wasn't buying it.
At one point during this exchange between Josiah and I (where I'm desperately backpedling trying to get him happy and feeling safe again) Isabelle chimes in, and says (I kid you not, this is verbatim) "Excuse me Josiah (little Josiah, not me), if I don't eat cheerios I turn into a little girl monster."
Isabelle had either figured out my game and was calling my bluff or had decided that by professing contingent "monstership" she could extort more fruitloops out of the fearful public. Either way it blew me away; even moreso she played it off to Josiah like he shouldn't be afraid of me turning into a monster because hey, she also turns into a little girl monster if she doesn't get what she wants. It probably doesn't matter, but somehow she missed that I was saying that if I don't drink the yucky I'd turn into a monster. It made me wonder if all fear-based moralizing is ultimate flawed 'cause kids are going to immediately translate it into the authorities perspective, namely, "you don't give me what I want and its gonna be ugly."
That's all. Hope everyone had a restful and worshipful Sunday.
-JQR
| By Josiah Roe | 10:23 AM
Comments
"Just give me what I want, and no one gets hurt."
Sounds like you have a blast. Maybe Genia and I need to get a Sunday School class...
Posted by: John H at October 18, 2004 10:31 AM
Josiah,
Couple of things. First of which is, I have a greater respect for you having read the last couple of posts about your Sunday school episodes. (I realize my opinion is subject to being irrelevant.) Nonetheless, I do. Just thought you should know.
Next, can't wait to have the free time so I can come play poker.
That is all.
Carl
Posted by: Carl at October 18, 2004 10:51 AM
Just wait until you get to "Thou shalt not commit adultery." Alex had a great time with that in the primaries class.
Posted by: Phil at October 18, 2004 11:17 AM
Oh, man! I know what you mean about OPC Sunday School material. I taught 2-3 yr old last year, and it was probably THE most challenging. I resorted to singing "Father Abraham". (And then all the Sunday School crayons melted in my car...*sigh*).
Love you stories! I'm dying laughing....
Posted by: Jeannette at October 18, 2004 11:30 AM
One of my friends teaches Sunday School for 8 year olds and always has great stories. Kids really are hillarious. Keep up your Sunday School reports. They're great.
Posted by: Christin at October 18, 2004 11:49 AM
Ha! Man, that's awesome. "The yucky." "Baby sheepies." I'm at work and I had a hard time keeping from laughing out loud.
Posted by: hugo at October 18, 2004 12:40 PM
are you using the "show me Jesus" curriculum? which of course never actually depicts Jesus. when we were doing the miracles of Jesus, almost every time someone would ask "where's Jesus in the picture?" and I'd have to say, "um, he's just over here, just out of view. see? they're all looking toward him." uh, yeah, right.
Posted by: bobw at October 18, 2004 12:45 PM
HILL-arious my friend. Do keep up the Monday updates - I'm rolling in the aisles... See you Tuesday, with loads of monitors.
Posted by: andy at October 18, 2004 06:10 PM
RED. SOX. (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
Posted by: jes at October 19, 2004 10:41 AM
Forgive the rant, but I am SICK OF HEARING ABOUT THE DAMN RED-SOX YANKEES MATCHUP. Yay, so the last two games went into extra innings, the Sox are just delaying the inevitable. The NLCS, however, has been top notch the entire series, and last night's game (short as it was) was simply one of the best I've ever seen. A pitching duel topped off by a heroic walk-off homerun. An eight inning one-hit shutout by a kid who had only 5 regular season wins. AMAZING defense by both sides. The 'stros/Cards may not have the bad blood and history, but damn, they've got the baseball.
I just wish the media would get their heads out of their collective asses and show a little bit of love.
But then again, I guess mid-market teams just aren't worth the coverage.
Posted by: Nick at October 19, 2004 11:50 AM
One more time for the people:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/playoffs2004/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=1904835
Posted by: Nick at October 19, 2004 12:02 PM
Astros suck!
Posted by: ARoss at October 19, 2004 12:12 PM
my apologies for being a cubs fan and taking an interest in boston, since our team is out of the nlcs. and since when have baseball fans cared about 'inevitable'? is there so much excitement in the world it has to be stamped out?
Posted by: jes at October 19, 2004 12:22 PM
Man, it's stories like these that make me wish I would have been able to stay around Chatt, visit with my old pals and smoke ciguars. My friend, You are a gentleman and a scholar no matter what my sister says.
Great great story. loved it.
oh and Go Sox.
-p
Posted by: Pablo at October 19, 2004 12:36 PM
Da Bearss will take'em all out in the 7th game, if they can get Ditka back in charge.
Posted by: gosey at October 19, 2004 01:03 PM
This has never been about inevitable failure. It's about the glorious charge, the beautiful try, that comes before the inevitable failure. Kind of like life in that way.
David Ortiz is my hero.
Posted by: mesh at October 19, 2004 01:17 PM
And jes, when are you going to get yourself a blog? I could use a daily dose of dark laughter.
Posted by: mesh at October 19, 2004 01:19 PM
Don't take my comments too personally, they are directed at the media in general (especially television). Read the ESPN article, it's dead on.
And I will say this--last night's NLCS game 5 was in every way superior to the ALCS game 5. The ALCS game was sloppy and poorly played (with the exception of Tim Wakefield's pitching--that was impressive); all it had was a dramatic finish. The NLCS game was a defensive and pitching masterpiece, WITH the dramatic finish. I mean, compare the stat lines, that alone will tell you as much.
But that doesn't matter, legions of BoSox/NYY fans will shout me down (I think we're outnumbered something like 20 to 1!).
Posted by: Nick at October 19, 2004 02:08 PM
Nick, Louiza (sp?) pitched very well also except for that last batter or too. But compared to the way he has pitched since coming to NY it was incredible. But the rest of the game was pretty sloppy, as well as the umpires. There were some incredibly bad calls on both ends.
Posted by: ARoss at October 19, 2004 02:39 PM
It was a mess. One the ugliest, craziest games I've ever seen. And yes, Louiza was amazing. I remarked around the 13th inning that his stuff was getting unhittable. But what about that Boston bullpen? Redemption for Arroyo, and Wakefield pitched like he was atoning for the Boone wallop. Just heroic stuff. And let's not forget that battle between Louiza and Ortiz. What was it on, pitch 14, when Papi finally busted the single? So, no, not a pretty game (and the NLCS was gorgeous) but a wonderful game all the same.
Posted by: mesh at October 19, 2004 02:50 PM
I love baseball.
You know, if we can get a win in the next two games, this will be the first time the Astros have ever been to the Series?
If we win the pennant, I might just cry.
Posted by: Nick at October 19, 2004 06:04 PM
Okay, after the "little girl monster" episode, I'm planning on becoming a regular reader--so, is the psyco analisys a regular feature? This approach could make leading youth group (or at least doing nursery) a lot more interesting!
Posted by: Currie at October 19, 2004 06:12 PM
Got a just a few comments I see. Still can't resist letting you know: I want you to teach all of my kids Sunday school.
Posted by: Sember at October 20, 2004 11:18 AM
Is that the Great Commision curriculum that Nancy Mehne wrote?
Posted by: Nat at October 20, 2004 11:47 AM
Yes, the "show me Jesus" curriculum, which I think was a weak allusion to a Vossian something or another.
Posted by: JosiahQ at October 20, 2004 11:50 AM
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