One thing I love about working with young children is that I get to practice my acting skills, taking on the role of strange characters that we create together. When we play, I get to be all kinds of monsters, a wizard, a criminal, grandma, daddy, etc. For years I've been employing a character who always gets things wrong. He's been called different names, depending on the class, like Mr. Wrong, Mr. Mixed-up, Not-Smart Guy, etc. He usually came out at snack time. He calls kids by the wrong name, mixes up colors and shapes, and gives outrageous answers to simple math problems. He speaks in a goofy " duh duh" kind of voice and sometimes falls over or runs into things.
This year's class has created a version of the character called Silly Billy. He's got more of a southern Indiana Hoosier drawl and he seems to get way sillier than previous incarnations. I'm not usually around when the kids eat snack this year so Silly Billy comes out on the playground. They all love him. I only bring him out when they request him, which is often.
The other day I became Silly Billy as soon as we got out, carrying on about how beautiful the pink grass and blue dandelions were, and how freezing cold it was (it was 87 degrees). The kids began correcting Silly Billy, and as he thanked each one of them for correcting him, he mixed up all their names.
Then the kids start asking him math questions. "Hey Silly Billy what's 2 + 2?"
He answers something like "56 million." They all laugh and say "wrong!" and at least four of them shout the correct answer. After a few rounds of this, Silly Billy says "hey I can do math! Umm...squirrel plus flower equals bicycle!" and "toilet plus toothpaste equals pizza!" This usually gets the children to start coming up with their own absurd yet creative "math" equations.
As a teacher I've wondered and worried-- is this really an educational exercise? Does it need to be? Is it just confusing the kids? Then I was amazed to read on one of my favorite teacher's blogs that he actually does something very similar. He doesn't necessarily have a character but he frequently gets things wrong on purpose as a way to teach his preschoolers to question authority. In his class the adult is not always right. Seen in this light, my use of characters like Silly Billy forms an important part of the curriculum. Plus, as I mentioned, someone (usually a kindergartner) always shouts out the right answer, and the younger children' ears are there to hear it, and they are perhaps more engaged than ever thanks to the humor and playfulness of the whole exchange.
So, I shall continue to trot out characters like Silly Billy, to teach that adults are not always right, to inspire creativity, and to give the children an opportunity to teach each other math.
I think this is great for many reasons. EVERYONE is engaged when you play Silly Billy (Mr. Wrong, as I remember him) because it's so hilarious. Engagement is the biggest hurdle sometimes. Or most times.
ReplyDeleteSecondly,I've been learning about how we learn (ha) concepts, and a very helpful and important way to learn them is through non-examples. We learn through discrepancies and differences, so you're wrong answers actually help the kids better discriminate and know the correct answers (in my opinion).
Finally, I remember learning about the Milgrim experiment (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment) in high school and college, and I've revisited it recently (Discovery just did the experiment again with the same results). I was trying to figure out how I'm going to teach kids to not be like some of the participants in that experiment and to be like those that refused the authority of the experimenter, and stopped. I decided that I have to raise rebels. I have to teach kids that it's okay to challenge authority if you don't think something is right. That's why we try to never tell the kids "because I said so" or "that's the rules" when they question us...we try to explain to them the reasons and logic behind certain rules and decisions (and I always like to throw in when the specific rule can be broken, :-)).
Basically, Silly Billy is brilliant. And so are you!