Today I played the "swingset kick" game on the playground with a couple of 4 year-olds. It's a classic that I've spent the past few years perfecting. Basically it goes like this:
The children who are swinging on the swings start asking if they can "kick" me. Then I go stand in front of one of the swinging kids and start saying "but I don't wanna get ki----" and as their feet approach my face I make a smacking sound with my hands behind my back, battachio style, and go flying backwards into the sand without finishing my sentence. Then I get up and stumble around in a daze mumbling gibberish until I'm "kicked" again by a different swinger. Sometimes their feet actually graze my face but I have yet to be injured from this game. Children love this game. They laugh hysterically and request it again and again.
Also, I am often the butt of their jokes, many of which are actually about butts, and poop, and pee, and stuff like that.
When they mix up potions like the one in the picture above, they offer me a drink, and after I take a pretend sip they yell "poisonous!!!" I pretend to get sick and gag. Sometimes I'll even pretend to vomit, if I'm really feeling it.
We have the children dictate stories to teachers and then we read them out loud during our circle time. For a few weeks it seemed like almost every story they wrote was about bad things happening to me. I would fall down holes in the floor, get attacked by wild animals or monsters, and bonk my head a bunch of times. Even one of the youngest in the class, not yet 3 years old, composed a story that went, "Chris fall down. Chris fall in water." It got a lot of laughs at circle time. As did any story that featured me experiencing hardship of some kind.
So who am I to these children? Just some goofball, like, a weird uncle type who does the "pull my finger" trick and stuff like that?
I would like to think there is more to it than that. Maybe they are getting something valuable out of my silly behavior and their stories about me. Maybe they need to see the "all-powerful adult" --who is bigger and stronger, who helps them zip their coat and write their name, who reminds them of the classroom rules--they need to see him fall and fail sometimes, so they know it's okay to fall and fail. Or maybe I'm just trying to validate my goofball behavior. At the very least they are also getting lots of laughter, big full belly laughs, and laughing is one of the healthiest activities we do.
And I suppose I get something out of it too. The children are truly keeping my ego in check, smashing it to bits even. It's good for me to remember that I'm not all-knowing or all powerful. I'm not an authority figure. I'm down on the ground with them, face in the sand, sick from another poisonous potion.
