Shawn woke at 7:00!! Luckily, he entertained himself in his crib with some toys and music playing while I got ready for the day. Then, we were ready when Abby came over at 7:30.
Today was our first day of German class at Language Stars. We got four free trial classes through a special promotional offer. I’ve been really excited about starting, but our first class was snowed out last week!
We met our teacher, Nina, in the front classroom. There’s only one other girl in the class, three year old Rosemary, who usually has the class by herself! (What a great teacher : student ratio!) Unfortunately, she and her mom showed up 15 minutes late. Normally, Diego would start Spanish class and if someone’s late, they just join in. Nina explained that this family is always 15-20 minutes late. Since they are normally the only ones in the class, it doesn’t affect anyone else and Nina waits for them. She had told them that we would be joining for a few weeks and to please be on time, but I guess they forgot. This meant that class was more like 9:30-10:30, rather than 9:10-10:10. Not a big deal on most days, but today we had plans after class. Arg. Oh, well. Anyway, Shawn and Abby took advantage of the extra time to play with the box of toys and Nina and I got to get to know a little about each other. Once the others arrived and we got started, German class was a lot of fun. We opened with the nursery rhyme:
Alle Meine Entchen / All My Ducklings
Alle meine Entchen / All my ducklings
schwimmen auf dem See, / Swim in the lake,
schwimmen auf dem See, / Swim in the lake,
Köpfchen in das Wasser, / Head under water,
Schwänzchen in die Höh! / Tail up high!
This was a blast from the past because, although I didn’t remember all of the words, I vividly remember singing this song as a little girl. The tune was certainly familiar and I caught on to most of the words pretty quickly, though the enlarged poster on the wall with the lyrics was still a helpful guide. As we sang, the kids put a bunch of rubber ducks into a bin of water so they could “swim in the lake.” Nina even pointed out a rubber duck that had its “head under water, tail up high!”
I think all of the Parent and Tot classes have the same curriculum topics each week, regardless of the language. As it turns out, the activities are similar too, though the teachers present them in different ways. So, today we learned about colors, just as we had in Spanish. We even did the same activity with the pictures of an elephant that we did in Spanish last week with Diego’s sub. Abby knew right away what to do with the colored scarfs and the pictures of the strangely colored elephants.
Ein Elefant in lila / A Purple Elephant
Ein Elefant in lila, / A purple elephant,
In lila, in lila, / Purple, purple,
Ein Elefant in lila, / A purple elephant,
Hast du noch nie gesehen, / You’ve never seen one,
Und ich auch nicht / And neither have I.
Fortunately, German class had snack time just like Abby and Shawn were accustomed. And, as luck would have it, there were even goldfish. That immediately got Shawn’s attention and he decided that his hunger for goldfish outweighed his shyness of the strangers in the class. It was the only time throughout the session that he spoke, even though he was still following along and participating quietly.
After the snacks were cleaned up, we did the same project of making fruit loop necklaces as we had done in Spanish before. This time there was a plastic string to use as the necklace instead of yarn, which was much easier to thread through the fruit loops (at least, those that weren’t eaten first!), but it was very hard to keep tied once the necklace was done.
It was interesting to hear the tunes of some of the same songs that we’ve learned in Spanish, but with lyrics in German. My mainly mono-linguistic tongue and brain got mixed up more than a few times. I wouldn’t be surprised if, in addition to what I’ve learned in Spanish class, a long lost word from my high school French classes or even a tentative word from teaching myself Hindi got jumbled into phrases I tried to mutter today!
After German class was over, we quickly jumped into the car and headed to an outing sponsored by Mother & More. During our car ride to Little Monkey Bizness in Wheaton, we listened to quiet, instrumental music. The linguistic part of my brain was tired and needed a break!
Little Monkey Bizness was a lot of fun. We had such a busy and exciting morning that we didn’t stay for very long because both kids were overdue for a nap. In fact, at one point I found Abby trying to lay down to get some shut-eye in some of the playground equipment! If that’s not a sign of a child who needs a nap, I don’t know what is! But, we did get an hour of good playtime in and I got lots of pictures of Shawn and Abby being very independent and exploring the equipment.
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