Session 6: Anomalies

I'm late on this one.  Sorry loyal readers!  I wonder how many of you there are out there in the vast space of the internet.  At least a couple I hope.  Anyway, I've been ill and overworked for the past few weeks, so my apologies for the lateness of this post.

It was an interesting class.  Most of my class missed this week, for a variety of reasons.  The smallest class I've had through the first five was eight children; last Thursday's class was four.  CS, CJ, CM, and MZ.  I wouldn't like to have a class this small most days, as it really limits the perspectives that come into our conversations, but it was fun to have such an intimate setting and it provided some interesting moments.

This class will likely stand out as unlike any other, and, by far, the best moment of the day came when CM spoke for the first time.  Those of you who have been following will remember me mentioning her reluctance to speak, and when she raised her hand to share for the first time I got so excited!  I actually got so excited that I definitely forgot what she shared because I was so caught up in the moment.  In some ways I'm okay with that.  Normally I share those moments on the blog, fire them out into the ether and have no idea where they end up.  For this one, I get to keep it all in my head and all for myself.  Sorry...but not really.

I also had some pretty amazing moments that I do remember and will share.  We did the activity in Chapter 6 that asks the children to make a list, out of six options, of three things they can control and three things they cannot control (the options are:  Rain, Death, Fear, Happiness, a Rainbow, a Smile).  CJ, who has proven to be one of the most consistently insightful and outgoing of the group, answered that the things she could control were Fear, Happiness, and a Rainbow.  As I was about to ask how she could control a rainbow, CJ answered that she likes to imagine that she can control rainbows with her mind, making them come out after ever rainstorm so that she can see their beauty.  I couldn't find any fault with that argument so I thanked her for being so creative and optimistic and went on with my class.

Chapter 7 raises the idea of beauty and what it means to be beautiful while also revealing the first Manadoob, Loki Bella, to the children.  They struggled a little to embrace Loki Bella and her "strange" look, but all of them said that she was interesting and a few said she was beautiful; no one said she was ugly so I suppose they are ahead of the curve.  However, the amazing moment came when I asked them to define beauty.  I pointed out that everyone sees beauty differently and has a different idea of what it might be, and they responded with insight that wasn't unexpected but was still refreshing to hear.  The group came up with their individual answers and then I challenged them to come up with a group answer.  Led again by CJ, the group decided that whatever beauty is, it is definitely something that has more to do with who you are and the actions you take than what you look like.  They needed zero prompting from me to come to this conclusion and it was a lot of fun to hear them discuss what beauty meant to them and then bring it all into a general group definition.

Well off to other things.  I'm on a bit of a deadline so I haven't edited this yet.  Forgive any small oversights!