Cold Spaghetti

After a rough morning of sickness, Will and I finally got out the door and made it to our first Kindermusik class. Kindermusik is at the same church where he is attending daycare. It is a class for parents and toddlers where the kids play with a variety of instruments, sing songs, move around, and play to music, melody, rhythm and dance. Totally up my alley. The class was great and Will did well, all things considered.

We stayed behind to speak with the Kindermusik teacher (“Mrs. G”). So, by the time we got over to the daycare building, it was about quarter past 9 and the other parents had come and gone. Kids were crying all over the building. In Will’s room, it was no different. Just about every kid was crying and the two teachers had lapfuls of crying or just-had-been-crying kids. The second Will saw the room he started serious sobs. I opened the gate and went into the room with him. When he realized that I was not going to leave him, he settled down (took a few minutes), and he stayed very clingy to me for the rest of the time. So, I got to experience the center.

My thoughts? It’s a Sunday Box-Social for busy-body church ladies. I was more nurturing to the children there than they were. (They were busy trashing the Mayor of my city, lameting on how none of this mess could possibly be the fault of the President, and just generally being clueless fools.) I was there for an hour. A music lady came room to room for about 15 minutes with a rabbit puppet and boom box and sang and played music — this calmed everyone down and Will even got engaged in the activity out of my lap. But that was the only activity they had and the other times, the kids were upset. I am no early childhood education specialist, but I could easily tell that all these kids needed was a little thought into some structure and activities and they would be fine. Two boys were having a rough time and one was completely hooked to me — when I left, I actually did it quietly because I was afraid the other boys would become upset. (My guess is that they probably did become upset — I feel pretty confident that any loving atmosphere that was happening in that room came from me, and I’m really not being all that harsh.) At one point, we brought the kids outside (with much compliant from the teachers of the heat.) The boys loved it. One of the girls completely broke down. No one helped her at all! The teachers were busy talking to parents who were on the other side of the fence (another Kindermusik class had just let out.) I picked up the little girl and was distracting her (Will was okay at this point playing in a car) and just as she was calming down, a teacher annoyingly snatched her up from me, bringing on serious tears and sobs from the poor little girl. (This particular girl was in Kindermusik with Will and I that morning and I felt like she at least recognized me a little… and I could not sit and watch a child sob for comfort while no one did anything!!)

So, Will cannot go back there. If he were completely self-sufficient, did not need comforting, and could play on his own, it would be fine. But in an environment where kids everywhere are crying and no one is trying to redirect their attention, it will not improve.

The trick: this is a small town and smaller church. If I want to stay in Kindermusik (also part of the church) I have to dis-engaged him from the daycare program nicely. (And I want my money back, so this could be difficult.)