Serious Question

March 2018 by Heather

My learning goals for this term are:
learn to communicate and express my feelings verabally
Learn different strategies to reslove problems during social
interaction, such as sharing, taking turns, listening to others,
negotiatitng and co-operating
School readiness activiites such as learnig to write lower case
letters and letter sounds

My Te Whariki goals are:

recognising print symbols and concepts and using them with
enjoyment, meaning and purpose | he kōrero tuhituhi
recognising mathematical symbols and concepts and using them with
enjoyment, meaning and purpose
using a range of strategies and skills to play and learn with others
managing myself and expressing my feelings and needs

I bring you Mariam to school in the morning

and take you home in the van most days. On
our way home, we have some wonderful
conversations. We have talked about family,
planets, how old people are and how many
days in a year, fun things we like to do and
about what we did at school today.
This day Mariam, you said me “Teacher Heather, at night before I go to bed
I get to ask mum and Dad a serious question. Is it appropriate for me to ask
you a difficult question?’ I said “Yes! What is
your serious question?” thinking to
myself ….. I wonder what I am getting
myself into.
Mariam, you thought for a while then asked
“Hmm! Do all dinosaurs and animals have
tails?”
Wow! That was some question but not as
difficult as I had imagined thankfully.
I thought for a minute then said, “I think all
dinosaurs have tails but a baboon doesn’t
have a tail.”
You were silent for a little while then said “OK but they have big noses”.
This made us both laugh. By this time we
had reached your house so that
conversation finished that day. The next
day while taking you home, I asked “Do
you want to ask me a hard question? You
replied “No” so I asked “Do you want to
ask me an easy question? Again you said
“No! It wasn’t a hard question or an easy
question I was asking. It was a serious
question. My question today is and you
asked me the same question as the
previous day but I heard do all animals
have teeth so this started a new line of
questioning.

Lots of fun trying to come up with new conversations and answers each day
as you want to learn something different every day. The latest question
is ”Do Batteries kill you if you put them in your mouth?” how do you answer
that to a four yoer olds satisfaction and
without frightening them? Together
with your knowledge and
understanding Mariam, I am sure we
will come up with the right answers to
satisfy you.
I am looking forward to our fantastic
conversations in the van in the future
and will try to incorporate your
interests into our school programme.
We can look up answers on the internet
together.