I realize it's been a long time...

But I've had so much going on! This final year of grad school was a whirlwind, but I'm happy to say: I'm DONE! I am Lani Winskye, Master of the Fine Arts! Over the next few posts, I will be endeavoring to recap the 8 months lost to the depths of the theatre. To my avid fans, a hearty apology for the hiatus. I know it was devastating, but never fear, being jobless and school-less leaves plenty of time for mindless rambling on the internet! Check back soon for a Graduation recap and more!

Romance: Part 5

Me: I'll camp out near the...door.
Joe: I hope you weren't searching for the word "door."
Me: I was.
Joe: Come here (strokes my hair). Are you sure this whole master's degree thing is a good idea?"

A Gazelle's Wish

I'm in a Southeast Asian Puppetry Seminar this semester, and in my research, I found this video. It is an animation done using Indian shadow puppets. This is not the full length animation, but it was too beautiful not to share.

 Animated by Gul Ramani

I didn't understand but now I do

That is the greatest thing I can ever have a student say to me.

Today was my last day at one of the elementary schools I've been teaching at this summer. I finished with the intermediate school kids last week. Tomorrow marks the end of my summer teaching all together.

Despite the sadness of leaving these students, most of whom I'll probably not see again, it was a day of joy. When I walked into my first class they had already moved their desks and were sitting silently in a circle in the center of the room; this is how we start every class. They were excited to perform the story we'd been working on, with no direction from me, and eagerly showed their classroom teacher at the end of the period. Then they presented me with an envelope of letters they'd written.

Then they all hugged me. The first to hug me was one of the least focused boys in the class, who constantly needed to be reminded to pay attention and follow directions. I find that teaching theatre usually reaches these children the most. These are the kids diagnosed as ADD or ADHD or the ones that are "too wild" or "unfocused." This school was no exception. This boy told me that he was sad that he wouldn't see me next summer because he is moving to Virginia. *sigh* :)

Here is a sampling of my favorite comments from the letters (this is a 3rd grade class- I have not corrected any spelling or grammar, but I've translated in a couple of places):


"thank you ms Lani doeg drama weth us and pantomime and pasing aroad invesubl itums (passing around invisible items)"

"When we started drama I was so nervous. But when we were done I was't scared any more. When you said pantomime I didn't under stand but now I do."

"Dear Ms Lani, thank you for teaching us all about drama. It's really fun before I was nevous but now I's not because I got to know you. And now I'm having a lot of fun with you. I really like the pantomime, and acting out the book The circus ship (this was the story that we worked on throughout the summer). and every other fun games that we played. You'r the best drama teacher inthe world."

(in reference to acting out the animals in The Circus Ship) "my favorite animal is momkey I like how they swing to tree to tree"

I then went to my second class, 4th and 5th graders, but I was informed by two of the girls that I wasn't allowed inside the classroom yet. Since they have recess before me, that was fine, and I got in a couple of rounds of jump rope with the girls before class started. I think I'm too old for jumping rope. All the jump rope rhymes are unfamiliar, but they're all still about kissing and boyfriends (apparently I have three boyfriends--the girls told me my husband was going to be upset).

When the kids allowed me into the classroom they each presented me with a handmade card, and then we began class. I beat them at 4 rounds of Simon Says and we worked on the story this class was acting out: "Yuck" by Shel Silverstein. At the end of class there was some suspicious whispering as one girl ran from student to student...they had planned a group hug. One boy woulddn't let go and asked me to take him with me to my next school. They are so sweet at this age! Here is a sampling of the cards:

I love this because he was the least focused in class of all of the students and yet he learned listening and following directions.

I think the "mind" game was the "mime" game. I think.

During the last class we also played a game of invisible hot potato. I've never see a higher stakes game and they were working with an invisible ball. I was so proud. And we ended both classes today playing Freeze Dance wich of course turned into just a dance party at the end.

Have I mentioned that I love teaching? My heart is so full right now.

A Post about a Cat and a Jet Pack

At the end of my second class today, a class entirely of students moving from 2nd to 3rd grade, one student could not contain her excitement to share a story with me. Let's call her Rocket Girl. I ended the session, as I usually do, by asking the students to sit down, "bottoms on the floor, bodies facing me," and to take a deep breath. Rocket Girl's hand shoots into the air, wiggling, "Miss Lani!"

I ask the the class to let out the breath and whisper to her to put her hand down. We take a second breath, her hand goes up again. We let it out. Rocket Girl is wiggling uncontrollably with excitement. I finish my post-class ritual by asking the students to turn and face their teachers and not to move until their teachers give them instructions.

Rocket Girl immediately turns back to me, hand desperately in the air. I once again, gently, ask her to turn back to her teacher and wait to tell her story until another time. As students are dismissed one at a time to line up for lunch, Rocket Girl is one of the last to be called, the yearning in her little heart to get this story out making it impossible for her to sit still. When she is finally called by her teacher to stand up, I call her over.

"Rocket Girl," I call, beckoning her over. "What did you want to tell me?"
"I made a jet pack!" she exclaims proudly.
"You did what?!"
"I made a jet pack."
"Did you fly in it?" She shakes her head 'no.' "Are you going to be a rocket scientist when you grow up?" I ask her.
"Yes!" Her class is leaving, so I tell Rocket Girl I will walk her out. We follow the line as the class heads out of the library.
"That's great!" I am trying to exit this conversation now, as we reach the door.
"I strapped it to my cat's belly." Uh oh. All kinds of scenarios are now running through my head.
"I made her paper wings and she had wings and a rocket so she could fly."
"Is your cat afraid of heights?"
"No!" This is said by Rocket Girl in a 'of course not, you ridiculous adult!' tone of voice.
"You are so silly! Have a nice lunch," I say as we exit. Her class is getting further away. One teacher is lagging behind to keep her with the group. The conversation should be over. It isn't.
"I shot her straight up in the air!"
"Crazy girl! Go to lunch," I say with a smile.
"And then, she went up like this," Rocket Girl gestures with her hand to demonstrate.
"Wow. You ar going to miss lunch, go catch up with your class..."
"And then..."

Anyway, you can see how this is going. Eventually Rocket Girl got to eat lunch and I got to ponder the physics behind sending a cat into the stratosphere on paper wings. I hope she does grow up to be a rocket scientist. Then maybe I can fly on paper wings, too.

Credit to RaineDrops18 at DeviantArt for this downloadable image.

Recess

Remember recess? That much anticipated time of day when you could just run around the playground and do whatever you wanted? I got to witness recess again at one of the elementary schools I'm teaching at. It went something like this:

Boy with ball: "Miss, this ball can bounce higher than any other ball."
Me: "Oh?"
Boy with ball: "Yup! I'll show you." Boy with ball runs over to the covered walkway outside his classroom. "I can make it touch the ceiling." Bounces ball. "See?"
Me: "Wow. That was really high." Boy with ball runs away, beaming.

To my left are some over-sized tires, on their sides and half buried in the ground. Three girls are playing a game where they stand on these tires and shout fruit at each other:

Girl on green tire: "Hey orange! Hey orange! Hey orange!"
Girl on orange tire: "Hey pear! Hey lemon!"
Girl on yellow tire: "Hey pear! Ok, now we have to switch." They scurry down, change tires and continue calling to each other. Fruit seems to correspond to the color tire they are on. Another girl walks by and they call out to her to join them. Only they know the rules to this game.

I turn behind me to see a boy run up to the flag pole and cling to it out of breath, shouting: "I win, 'cause I touched the pole first!"

Sometimes I miss those days.

Also, I had a boy in class last week who, when asked to say his name, repeated the phrase "I like cheese" and giggled. I informed him that I also liked cheese but was worried that he'd forgotten his name. The other kids in class started whispering his name to him to help out! I have no idea what 4th graders find funny, but I love them for it.

Magic

Some people spend their Sunday mornings at church. It's a time to reflect, renew and find a new joy for living as we prepare for the week ahead. I like to do that too, but I don't go to church. I went to the library. This is my happy place, a calming place, smelling of books and full of wisdom.

Do you remember going to the library as a kid? For me it was always magical, exciting. When I was very young my grandma would take me to the main branch library for story time and afterward we'd feed the ducks in the pond outside. My parents took me to our local library all the time because my book habit would have bankrupted us if we always bought what I wanted (I'm still bitter that my Babysitters Club collection has gaps where Mom wouldn't buy a book and made me get it from the library instead). When it was library day at school I'd come home carrying as many books as I was allowed to take. My dad would pick me up from school on Book Fair days and I'd have bags of books, excited at my haul and ready to read them all that night.

I like books.

This morning, I got to relive that magic. I signed up for a library card. Do it. It's awesome. Do I sound like a public service announcement? Good.

The best part of the experience wasn't the browsing, though. It wasn't the armload of books I walked out with. The best part was the noise and chaos in the children's section. If it means that parents are reading with their children, then I never want another quiet library ever again. There must have been 20 families at the library this morning, attending a reading and activity session. Once it was complete almost every family stayed; I was thrilled to see parents helping their young children carefully choose books to take home with them and read. These are parents instilling a joy of reading in their 3,4,5 yr old children! I saw older kids too, walking out with bags full of books. Bags. Full. Of books!

Here was my favorite moment:
I'm sitting on the floor, browsing the graphic novels, pile of books already in my lap (I'd already hit up children's lit and young adult fiction) and I see two boys sitting on the floor to my left, with a book. The boys couldn't have been more than 6 years old. Dad is sitting in a chair just a couple of feet away, reading a book of his own. These boys have the book spread open across both of their laps and they are flipping through it together, discussing the pictures, enjoying the book together. Pointing at the page, I hear one say to the other, "Look at his tail!" His brother replies, "Yeah, it has a hand. That's clever for using underwater."

I have no idea what they were reading, but I'm sure the clever one was really their father, sitting in the library on a Sunday morning, listening to his kids learn to love reading.

School is Out

That's right. In case you don't follow these things like I do, school is out for summer. And I don't mean my school. We've been out since May; in fact summer sessions have started already. What I'm talking about is school of the youth variety: Hawaii Public Schools are out for summer. I am well aware of this fact for several reasons:

1. The incessant screaming that comes from our neighbors' children now starts at 9am and lasts until 10pm. It used to start at 3pm after they got out of school. I swear it's shrieking and not gleeful laughter. I wonder what their parents do all day. There is obviously someone home with them and that someone is very busy with something that clearly prevents them from telling their kids to KEEP IT DOWN. Something involving noise cancelling headphones, I imagine. Don't get me wrong; I love kids (more on that in a minute). I really do. I just wonder where they get the energy to scream all day.

I at least, have the luxury of leaving the house to go to work. Joe is stuck here all day listening to the "fun" being had on this lovely summer break full of freedom, and gleeful abandon. To hear him tell it, the boy must be a prize-fighter engaged in a never ending bout and his sister is trying to communicate something in Morse code which she can only do by screeching it very loudly to the universe in the hopes that the universe will hear her and screech back. Ah, children.

2. My usually tranquil beach spot, only overrun by others on the weekends, is now covered with people every day of the week. Vacationing families, and local parents who actually want to spend quality time with their kids while enjoying all the thrills that mother nature has to offer have stolen my grass, my shade, and my peace and quiet. Going to the beach (read: grass that overlooks sand and sea) used to be only occasionally interrupted by Japanese weddings, elderly joggers and the odd picnic or two. A person could easily read, listen to a podcast or people watch with little distraction. Time that used to be spent eagerly watching and waiting for the paddle boarders to fall off their boards, or wondering where the guy with the duck on his shoulder found such a tiny lei for it to wear (I can't make this stuff up) is now spent wondering if small children are going to drown themselves in the lagoon because their parents are nowhere in sight and hoping that someone will catch the giggling child running at me full sprint before she can reach my blanket and deposit that shovel full of sand on this stranger's feet.

3. I finally have steady work. That's an odd reason to acknowledge school being out, right? What it means for me is that summer programs are in full swing and summer programs mean summer teaching. I was lucky enough to make the right inquiry at the right time earlier this year, and consequently find myself teaching drama workshops at three different summer programs in Ewa Beach this summer through the Honolulu Theatre for Youth. I just finished my first week which featured all middle school students and I have to say, I am having a blast. Next week I begin with the two elementary schools that I will also be working with, and I can't wait. I've worked with a lot of high school classes this past year, so it feels good to get back to teaching some of the younger grades this summer. For 6 weeks I'll be rotating between these 3 schools, seeing each class for 8 sessions by the time the summer programs conclude.

4. My reading list is a mile long. Even though I'm not taking summer classes, I've requested the reading lists from as many of my fall classes as I can. I'm taking more than a full time course load come fall and I need to get a head start if I'm going to hold down 2 part-time jobs and keep up with that kind of course load. In case you are wondering what kind of reading I've gotten myself into, it looks something like this: for my Asian puppetry seminar, two Indian epics (The Mahabharata and The Ramayana) which are both VERY long and anything I can find on No Child Left Behind and how it affects the Hawaiian school system along with other recent legislature related to education in this country for a class on Theory of Educational Foundations. I'm also reading The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp as personal inspiration and scouring the internet for everything I can find on teaching theatre through the rehearsal process, both in scholarly journals and on blogs and websites as research for potential thesis topics to be mentioned on some future date. Really light beach reading, right? I will also sheepishly admit that I'm reading Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. It isn't anywhere as good as Angels and Demons and the writing is clunky, but everyone needs a trashy page-turner and I have fun reading his books. In the interest of full disclosure, I've also read all of the Sookie Stackhouse novels (you know, the books that True Blood is VERY loosely based on?). Also poorly written, but so much fun!

What is on your summer reading list? If you've got good recommendations, leave them in the comments of this post.