“You Look at Them”

Our ongoing desire to understand more how empathy evolves in young children has led us to provide opportunities with the children to discover ways to understand themselves and others.

Facial expressions and body language are rift with nuances that take growth and experience to become better aware of and ultimately, understand.

While we’ve begun exploring playing with creating and noticing faces, we continue to couple these experiences with dialogue fostered through reading stories that offer opportunities to think more deeply about others and their feelings.

 

In the story Wolf by Sara Fanelli, Wolf goes to town to make some friends, but everyone is frightened of him, even when he puts on a mask. Discouraged, he wanders toward home, encounters another wolf (this time a smiling face), and pours out all his troubles. The townspeople who were chasing him see the error of their ways, and everyone joins in a picnic with a family of wolves in the forest

We’ve heard many of you play and talk about wolves, what do we know about them?

“They’re scary!” -Charlie N.
“Creepy.” -Tait
“Wolves are coyotes.” -Ian
“Wolves can eat coyotes.” -Tait
“Wolves and foxes and coyotes can eat bunny rabbits.” -Case

“No friends but wolf.” -Louis
“Because they thought he (wolf) was gonna eat them.” -Rosalie
“Maybe he could do it by just smiling.” -Ruthie
“Wolf could say hello and then leave.” -Travers

After reading this story for a bit, the children quickly realized that at each encounter, the wolf was chased away and did not meet a friend as he had hoped.

We wondered with the children why was he being chased?  How could he make friends?  What could he do?

 

“Why did everyone chase the wolf?” -Charlie N.

“He was just trying to make new friends.” -Louis

In the story, The Rabbit Listened, a young child named Taylor creates a block building that is broken when a flock of birds fly into it.  Very sad at this loss, Taylor doesn’t know where to turn.  All the animals are sure they have the answer.  The chicken wants to talk it out but Taylor doesn’t feel like chatting.  The bear thinks Taylor should get angry, but that’s not quite right either.  One by one, the animals try to help Taylor process this loss, and one by one they fail. Then the rabbit arrives.  All the rabbit does is listen, which is just what Taylor needs.

“You have to listen to what someone says.” -Charlie N.


“You have to listen to your Mom and Dad.” -Caroline

Why was Taylor different when the rabbit came?  What did the rabbit do differently?

“He didn’t see it (the rabbit).  He felt it.  His warm body warmed every part of his body (Taylor’s) up.” -Tait

“They didn’t listen to what he was saying.  The other animals didn’t listen but the rabbit did.” -Rosalie

“Taylor didn’t listen to the chicken and she didn’t listen to the bear cause she didn’t want to remember…she didn’t feel like doing it.  Elephant didn’t want to listen and the bear didn’t want to listen and the chicken didn’t listen until Taylor was alone and the rabbit came and Taylor could feel the rabbits’ body and the rabbit listened.” -Charlie N.

We returned to these two stories with the children.  Remembering how Wolf simply wanted to find a friend and how Rabbit found another way to be with Taylor in his grief and we wondered aloud with them, 

How do we know what someone is feeling?

“You just need to tell them.” -Caroline
“You look at them.” -Wes
“Like if your feeling mad, you… (shows mad face).” -Charlie N.
“You look at their eyes.” -Charlie S.
“Or their face or their mouth.” -Charlie N.

Our lively conversation had us remembering how Wolf encountered another wolf who was smiling.  What did that mean when the wolf smiled at him?

“I want to play with you.” -Charlie N.

“I like you.” -Caroline

“Or I love you.” -Miles

“Or I love all of you.” -Tait

“Or I like you and want to be friends forever.” -Charlie N.