60% weather

Today, Paul and I had a different two groups - one full of energy to the point that it felt out of control at times, and the other pretty passive, but we were able to learn a great deal about each group. I noticed that both times when we asked the children what the weather was like today (which was, PS very shitty, cold, and rainy) they said "60%." I've never heard that question answered with a percentage, it took me aback.

The first group of six that we had was very hyper active. They had a lot of trouble staying focused and the boys were constantly out of their seats and play fighting with each other. The language barrier was pretty strong with this group as well, as only one or two spoke English, even though most claimed to understand it. We had been told the previous day that the functioning level of these children would be lower, so we prepared a slightly different take on our already existing project - we decided to bring in tissue paper and colored paper for the children to tear up and attach to the butterflies. This tactile directive seemed to be good for lower functioning children, however, these kids were much higher functioning, and found it to be more of a play time. I felt like I had to go into "teacher mode" several times during this session, telling kids to take a seat, quit fighting, don't make fun, and share materials. One boy consistently tried to put glue in people's hair and started a wrestling and fart match with another boy. I even threatened to bring this boy to his teacher/the principal.

Ironically, this boy that caused so much trouble used a very interesting tactile technique on his butterfly. Most of the children in this group felt perfectly fine leaving the inside of their butterflies empty. I have noticed that with each class, the children heavily influence each other on how they will do their project. In this group, all used the tissue paper even though they were offered the markers and crayons, and several of them put messages inside the butterflies that read, " I love you" and "I miss you very much." There seems to be some sort of a sentimental connection with the butterflies.

The second group was much calmer, and after the excitement of the first group, Paul and I decided to start out with just drawing materials and then introduce the tissues. This seemed to work out better for them. This group, which was slightly lower functioning, resorted to coloring their butterflies first. This is interesting because the previous day, the lower functioning group also resorted to coloring. I wonder if they are habitually trained to color in the lines when they see an outline. The kids in this group mainly used large blocks of color and all used the pastel crayons. One girl and one boy continued on another butterfly, carefully using tissues. One part that irked me about this group was that certain boys of higher intellectual functioning seemed to make fun of those that are lower functioning. I know this is a common thing worldwide, but I don't know what to say to get the message through to them that making fun is not allowed in the art room. Creating a safe space is a challenge when we don't know how many kids understand our rules of respect.

Paul and I also finished hanging up our caterpillar in the school hall - it looks great! I still need to take pictures though. We saw a group doing an occupational therapy session. I think OT is fascinating and would like to learn more about it.

The rest of our day was free, so a few of us went into town and went up to UCT again. We went out to dinner and came back early - finally some time to relax! Tomorrow is another long day.

Here's a picture or two of some of today's work.
outside of Mary Harding today - gross!



Bye til tomorrow!

-k