Anxieties over fieldtrips and health inspectors

The title is true to its name - having anxiety over fieldtrips with preschoolers.. and health inspectors paying their annual visit.  That is exactly what the last two days have been like and for once, my mind isn't racing and wondering if I forgot to do something.

In one of my previous jobs as a childcare worker, one of the aspects about the job was taking your class on fieldtrips all over the city.  Whether it was going to the zoo or the closest playground to the centre itself, the expectation was that at least once a month (weather permitting) you went on a fieldtrip with the kids and room partner.  Of the four years I was there, we had literally gone to all quanderants of the city; NE, NW, SE, SW.  You name it - we did it.  And about 95% of those trips involved taking a C-Train at some of the busiest times of day.  Sometimes, my room partner and I would have to make comments to between ourselves in a loud voice, if people were unwillingly wanting to give up their seat because they weren't done their Quarter Pounder yet or just enjoyed watching kids falling over like dominoes.  Although there were some rough days, we always made it back to the centre with each child, not losing anyone or anything at any given time.

Nowadays, as a preschool teacher, I find my attitude towards fieldtrips has changed but I think it is heavily due to parental influence.  Parents questioning why not every parent can come along.. how much food should they be sending..worrying if their child will have separation anxiety.. arguing if whether or not the child should even go because the timing is out of the norm (..which was a complete lie, this past fieldtrip was the same hours as regular class time).  Although most of the time I just held my tongue and said "It's up to you.", what I really want to say is "Stop being such a bubblewrap parent!".  I wanted to explode on telling them the amount of trips I did with 20 four year olds and one other adult, the amount of times we took public transit, the amount of times we sat in a public space (meaning a park!) and ate lunch, and the amount of times both the parents and kids were happy with their trips at the end of it all.  But I can't.  And I won't. 

So needless to say, when planning trips with these groups, I mentally prepare for the 40 questions from parents, rather than 20.  And, when I get those questions, I think about them at night while trying to sleep.. and the ball gets rolling.. the buildup keeps growing.. See where I'm going with this?  I feel I haven't met the neutral ground with fieldtrips because I have gone from one extreme to another.  And it's not like these parents were concerned about safety; it was about if whether or not their child could handle it.

I appreciate families being concerned and wanting to be involved in every aspect of their preschoolers' life, but sometimes, you just gotta let them experience things independently.  How else are they going to be independent?!

And now, for the health inspector visit.

Our preschool is in the midst of renewing our licence so as part of the paperwork and checks, they need a report from a couple of departments giving the "PASS"stamp on the facility.  One of these is the Health department and not to say our school is a dirty place, I just get really agitated when they come. When it comes to anyone else, I could careless.  No anxiety..no sweaty palms, no stuttering.  Just the health department.

I think this might have to do with a bad experience I once had, though. Granted, this was many years ago but once I had a health inspector show me how to wash my hands.  First, he asked me to show how I did it.  So I did, and he timed me.  Despite me singing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" in my head, I had gone too fast and therefore needed to be "retaught".  Then he showed me how to properly dry my hands and asked me to demonstrate in return. At the end, he said maybe I should try singing the "ABCs" instead.

The guy was jerk. 

Anyways, since then, I'm expecting the worst when they come even though everything is completely where it should be in terms of accuracte levels, sanitization, first aid, safety measures, etc.  Today was our visit and both my assistant and I were making sure these past few days that everything in the classroom was a little extra more spic-and-span.

So, in she came with her white booties, clipboard, and bleach strips and away she went.  Checking levels, opening cupboard doors, rumaging through a well-organized first aid kit.  Well, to make long story short, everything did go smooth.  She wasn't even there as long as I thought she was going to be and made little comments like how clean and organized the preschool was. ...Isn't it suppose to be really clean and organized?!

Once she left, both myself and my T.A seemed to be laughing and breathing again.  It was over and we passed.  Again, not that we had any doubt, but hey.. we could have been shown how to wash and dry our hands!

Feeling pretty good right now and hell, it's only Tuesday.  

January: the quiet month

I took a break with the blogs in December because of the extreme business that takes over all of us; literally from the 1st to the 31st.  I also held off becaue of school shooting that happened in the U.S primarily because it has taken me quite awhile to comprehend what happened, without getting upset.

But now that things have settled, been accepted, movws on, and attacking those so-called New Year resolutions, it's time to get back to blogging those preschooler moments!

As an early childhood educator, I always found January to be a quiet month in regards to program planning.  Although you can do the standard "winter" themes which I am guilty of for the past few years, I also deem it a month when you can teach something different.  There's no special holidays (New Year's doesn't real mean much to a preschooler), no significant themes you feel obligated to do, and I put the months of November, March, and June in this category too.  Again, there are the obvious ones for each of those months but really, can you drag on Rememberance Day or Father's Day for a whole month?! 

So with that said, I've decided at our school that will be dedicating January to science!  As per usual, each week and day will be designated to some kind of aspect related to science.  Hot topics are going to include weather, the human body, life cycles, rocks and minerals, space, senses, and all the inbetweens.  We're also going to do a short, quick experiment each class, every class that will only consist of 5-10minutes of paying attention.  I figured I would do this when we're in a transition mode like from snack time to outdoor play.  Not only will expose them to think outside the box, but it will also let them SEE outside the box with things they never thought possible.  For example, watching a bottle of diet cola EXPLODE because of a mento.  Or creating various colours with food colouring and milk.

Needless to say, Pinterest is really helping me out on this.

Anyways, the 3 day groups have a scheduled trip to the science centre at the end of the month and the two day groups have a biology teacher coming in.  Should be fun!  I'll keep you posted on progress but oddly enough, as much as I was the kid who absolutely HATED anything related to science - I'm pretty pumped to be teaching it!