What is the idea of “Me?”
We’ve been asking this question since we were born. Discovering our self-concept is a life-long process and at 4 & 5 we’ve only begun to form our life narrative. At our earliest, our self-awareness means discovering our bodies and our emotions and realizing differences in relation to others. Nuances emerge and we begin our journey forming and realizing what it is exactly that makes me, “me.”
This week we began to take a closer look at a part of what makes us who we are. A part of us that speaks in so many ways and the very part of “me” that others notice first — our faces!
Taking care to look carefully at our faces in a mirror and using our well-known photographs of our faces from the beginning of school, we searched to see what we noticed about ourselves; what made our faces our own. Tracing our faces as a beginning to our self-portraits, we strived to understand the shapes that made up our faces.
“I notice my skin. My skin is yellow. What’s your skin color?” -Mika
“Mine is a little bit light.” -Amelia
“I have dark pink lips that are really dry, see?” -Tessa
“My ears and hair! It’s the same color as hers! I don’t know why!” -Jack
“I have brown (hair) and you have beige and my hair is longer.” -Kyla
“I see a scratch on my chin. I don’t know how I got it.” -Charlie Menke
“Mine are a little blue (eyes). And they’re round!” -Luca
“Oh! This is my chin!” -Alex
“Black eyes! Mine are more circley.” -Eva
“Mine are more up! -Zack
“I have to draw the eyebrows!” -Emma
“When I spray down my hair in the morning it looks more black.” -Sam
“I saw the back here. Do you know the thing that hangs down your throat but doesn’t get stuck? I saw that!” -Johann
How will our idea of me take shape as we look closer at ourselves?
How will we come to understand ourselves and how others see us as we explore the layers that make up “Me?”
Real Share
As another way to get to know ourselves and each other, we are going to be trying something new during our meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Each child is going to have the chance to share something real about themselves. It can be a true story or they can bring in something that they’d like to share that is meaningful to them. This Real Share should help us get to know them. Examples could include, but are certainly not limited to, sharing a story about how they were born during a blizzard or bringing in a special blanket that was given to them or sharing a magic trick that they’ve learned, or sharing a rock from their collection. In addition to learning about each of them through this process, it’s our hope that, by giving each child an opportunity to lead a group share, we can begin to help them understand what it takes to have a conversation with a group. This week, we will introduce this idea to the children and will talk about agreements for our Real Share time. We will wonder together…
What does a conversation look like?
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More on Games
“At my game at home, you can’t cheat.”
ALEX
