Playing School

Matthew carries his desk chair out from his bedroom. He drags it to the spot in front of his chair exposing the underside of the front door rug in the process. 

“It’s circle time,” he announces.  Dutifully I sit on the floor with Samantha next to me in her bouncy seat. As class helper I had been instructed to fill out the attendance sheet. 

Aside from Samantha and I the other classroom pupils are of the stuffed animal variety. Matthew takes out a red sword to show us and in a bossy tone asks, “Now what is this used for? Does anyone know?” 

After a long visual tour of swords we move on to story time. He takes a book called 1, 2, 3 Pop off the shelf and ‘reads’ it to us.  The book pages are illustrations with sight numbers but he makes up the words to go along with the pages.

The teacher

Circle time

Attendance list

 Matthew tapes a line made  cut from construction paper to the wall. “Now it’s time for below the line.  What are some things that are above the line and some things that are way at the bottom of the line?” This is an exercise they do at his real school to set expectations and rules. 

After a brainstorm session on this topic Samantha is starting to get hungry and starts to suck on her hand.  “We need to take a break now, “ I glance at the clock to see that it’s already past dinnertime.

“Okay,” Matthew puts his scissors down. “School is all over but come back tonight for our opening house.”