A Day in Kindergarten

I love my job. One of the best parts of my life is the fact that I am doing what I always
wanted to do: help the mini-men and mini-women grow to become educated, civilized and
responsible members of our society. They are our future, they are the ones who will lead this
country one day and they are the ones who will become the finest elites of their days. My role
as a kindergarten teacher is to help them lay the basis of their education, to point them into
the right direction from an early age.
I`m teaching and supervising a class formed of 14 pupils. Most of them are 4 years
old, an age I like to think of as The Sponge Age, since the way they assimilate information
and new things is absolutely amazing. They are also curious about everything surrounding
them. So, after the normal routine of receiving the children, having breakfast and watching
cartoons for 20 minutes (aici poti sa modifici ca nu stiu exact cum merg treburile), I
figured I would do something different than the regular English class which usually involves
learning words without necessarily putting them into a context that could occur in real life.
So, today Ive taught them what to say and how to behave when buying something from the
grocers. We have already been practicing the names of fruits and vegetables for a few weeks
now, so I thought that having the pupils put them in a context would be very helpful both for
practicing the words in a few slightly more complex sentences and for their general
knowledge.
I designed this activity as a role-play activity. First, I told them we were going to play
a game with fruits and vegetables. I brought the pictures of fruits and vegetables they had
colored during our previous lessons and taped them to the wall. I used one of the small desks
as a cash register and one of the pupils would sit behind it, playing the role of a cashier. I
gave them the example of someone who wants to buy carrots: I would like a carrot, please!
We rehearsed this phrase a few times, and then changed the vegetables: I would like an
apple, please! The pupil who was the cashier would give the other pupil a picture of a fruit
or vegetable (or several pictures, depending on the number of items the buyer would want).
The line of the pupil who played the cashier was: It costs 10 lei or 5 lei, or 4 lei. This way
we practiced numbers, too. Then, I divided them in groups of two and, in turns, each of the
pupils played the role of the cashier and the buyer. Instead of actual money we used small
pieces of paper in the shape of coins I had prepared earlier. They had to count them, so if
something cost 10 lei, they had to count all the way up to ten as they paid for their vegetables.
I had a bit of trouble because they could hardly wait their turn at the cash register, so
at one point everyone was almost screaming at each other. Then I told them that his was not
the way one behaves at the grocers and that everyone must patiently wait in line for their
turn. I also told them that we would not play this game anymore if they didn`t behave. They
understood eventually and they promised to be good children and silently wait for their turn.
They had a lot of fun giving each other drawings of the fruits and vegetables they
have learned. The rest of the day went as usual: they had lunch and they napped for about 2
hours. When they woke up, I let them watch a few cartoons, gave them a snack and at 5, I got
them ready for leaving. Today was a good day. Still, even in my worst days at the
kindergarten, the feeling that I`m doing something great never leaves me and I am sure that
someday, these pupils will become wonderful people, great examples to follow for their own
children.