A few blogs ago, Miss Allison wrote about planting the seeds of leadership in her classroom. My youngest, Natalie, was a recipient of that careful sowing. Over the last couple weeks of the semester, Miss Allison would hand each caregiver/child team a humongous scarf and turn on “All Around the Kitchen” or sing “Sugar and Tea”, and the grownups and children (each pair holding onto their own end of the scarf) would take turns being the “leader” all around the classroom. You should have seen the children’s faces light up when they realized they got to be the “boss”. The fact that Mommy and Daddy are “the bosses” at home has been a difficult idea to accept at our house lately. Poor child. She’s the youngest of three, and just really wants to be the boss of something!
A few days ago at our house, Natalie brings me a red humongous scarf and hands me one end. She begins singing, “Lead through that sugar and tea, and lead through the candy…” and then takes off at breakneck speed through the house, pulling me along, utterly delighted that she could be the boss, so to speak. She spent the entire day taking turns in leading or following her brothers or her dad or me with the scarf.
The next day I tried some scaffolding with her. Scaffolding is an interactive learning process. I copy her idea, (when it was my turn to lead, I went in the same path around the house she had led me in), and then I made a slight variation on the activity. This provided appropriate challenges to bring her to new levels of learning. (When I was leader, I crawled under the table and around the chairs– and behold – a whole world of ideas opened up for her about where she could go with me on the “following” end of the scarf).
Scaffolding enabled her to begin to think about new ways she could lead. The next day, (yes, we’ve been doing this for a lot of days now…) when it was her turn to lead, she began to move different ways. For instance, she took 3 jumps, and then turned around to make sure that I jumped, just like her.
Through play, I can begin to give my daughter the tools to be a creative, resourceful leader. This skill will assist her in becoming an adult who is an innovator, in whatever field she chooses.
So with a scarf (or a robe belt or a piece of fabric, or whatever you have handy), and go find a child who wants to be “the boss”. (Really, that shouldn’t be too hard. I have three here at home if you can’t find one at your house!). Turn on a piece of music and have fun learning to lead.
Here are some ideas for music:
All Around the Kitchen – Milk and Cookies, CD2 #9
Lead Through that Sugar and Tea – Milk and Cookies, CD2 #17
Come Follow – Dew Drops #10
Follow My Leader to London Town – Away We Go, CD2, #20
-posted by Miss Analiisa, who thinks after all this, Natalie will grow up to be the boss of something!
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