Some days after coming home from work I ask myself, "Do children really have compassion anymore?" Do they even know what that word means? I was lucky enough to hit on it when they were hitting on it during the school hours too. "Compassion" is the word of the month for May. They were excited that we were going to talk about it too.
It was sad that I had to go over what it meant though. We had to miss computer time because we needed to talk about it. My 2nd graders are so mean for 2nd graders. They will make fun of others because they are different, they will call each other name, and they won't go to with someone if they don't have to. It is so bad. I have even had one child say that she isn't friends with another child so why does she need to be nice to her. They also have a really bad time listening to adults. They don't even show compassion to the adults. It is really sad. It was so bad yesterday that we didn't go to computers, we set in the gym and read about compassion. We also watched YouTube videos on compassion and bullying. We talked about the opposites so they would hopefully understand each of them. We watched two of each and then talked about each o them.
The first one we watched was about Compassion. It was where the characters were bears and they were learning what compassion really was. It was a cartoon about those children bears helping an old lady that was grumpy all the time and very lonely. They found out it was her birthday soon so they threw her a surprise birthday party. It really made her happy in the end. The bears did something that the old lady needed to make her feel special and happy. The 2nd video we watched was also a little about compassion. It was actually called" A Kind Heart" but after we got done watching it, we take about what kind of compassionate things were in that video. A bear that usually wins all the medals from races went was almost to the finish line on this one race. Then, he decided to go help another friend that couldn't get pass the relay wall. Right there is where the children said there was compassion showing. One bear helped another bear when he was in need. Then at the end of the movie all 5 friends won the race together.
That was the last compassion video. Next, we watched two more videos about bullying because believe it or not, I have some kids in my group but does those things but have no idea what it is called. The 3rd video that we watched was about bullying. It was prefect for my group because it was about a mean girl in the 2nd grade. It was about about a girl that was being really mean to this new little boy in school. She called him a little shrimp and didn't help him do anything. She left him alone when it was time for lunch and she wouldn't play with him while they were outside. She even punched him in the tummy while they were outside. It also show that the people that were that girls friends at the start of the movie, they weren't her friends by the end of the movie unless she would say sorry to the little boy and she did. They were all friends by the end of the movie.
The 4th video we watched a bear who was scared of going to school because of the bullies around him. It showed the children that when you bully someone it makes them scared to go to school and will make them look down on themselves. This bear had a talk with his mom and his mom got him to feel better about himself and he went to school. He was going to be the one that looked the bully in the eyes and be confident in who he was and maybe try to even help the bully. His mom gave him some ideas on how to be a friend to that bully and why he needs to be even when he doesn't want to. He tried being that bully's friend and it worked at the end of the video. Between each video, we talked about each of the movies, what the videos said and taught us, asked them to give some examples of what it could look like in their world and school, and so on.
It was sad that I had to go over what it meant though. We had to miss computer time because we needed to talk about it. My 2nd graders are so mean for 2nd graders. They will make fun of others because they are different, they will call each other name, and they won't go to with someone if they don't have to. It is so bad. I have even had one child say that she isn't friends with another child so why does she need to be nice to her. They also have a really bad time listening to adults. They don't even show compassion to the adults. It is really sad. It was so bad yesterday that we didn't go to computers, we set in the gym and read about compassion. We also watched YouTube videos on compassion and bullying. We talked about the opposites so they would hopefully understand each of them. We watched two of each and then talked about each o them.
The first one we watched was about Compassion. It was where the characters were bears and they were learning what compassion really was. It was a cartoon about those children bears helping an old lady that was grumpy all the time and very lonely. They found out it was her birthday soon so they threw her a surprise birthday party. It really made her happy in the end. The bears did something that the old lady needed to make her feel special and happy. The 2nd video we watched was also a little about compassion. It was actually called" A Kind Heart" but after we got done watching it, we take about what kind of compassionate things were in that video. A bear that usually wins all the medals from races went was almost to the finish line on this one race. Then, he decided to go help another friend that couldn't get pass the relay wall. Right there is where the children said there was compassion showing. One bear helped another bear when he was in need. Then at the end of the movie all 5 friends won the race together.
That was the last compassion video. Next, we watched two more videos about bullying because believe it or not, I have some kids in my group but does those things but have no idea what it is called. The 3rd video that we watched was about bullying. It was prefect for my group because it was about a mean girl in the 2nd grade. It was about about a girl that was being really mean to this new little boy in school. She called him a little shrimp and didn't help him do anything. She left him alone when it was time for lunch and she wouldn't play with him while they were outside. She even punched him in the tummy while they were outside. It also show that the people that were that girls friends at the start of the movie, they weren't her friends by the end of the movie unless she would say sorry to the little boy and she did. They were all friends by the end of the movie.
The 4th video we watched a bear who was scared of going to school because of the bullies around him. It showed the children that when you bully someone it makes them scared to go to school and will make them look down on themselves. This bear had a talk with his mom and his mom got him to feel better about himself and he went to school. He was going to be the one that looked the bully in the eyes and be confident in who he was and maybe try to even help the bully. His mom gave him some ideas on how to be a friend to that bully and why he needs to be even when he doesn't want to. He tried being that bully's friend and it worked at the end of the video. Between each video, we talked about each of the movies, what the videos said and taught us, asked them to give some examples of what it could look like in their world and school, and so on.
All of the group was paying really good attention to the videos and they were responding really well with the questions I was asking. They were even laughing at the videos. I think it was fun for them but yet they, hopefully, learned something about the two things and what they really meant. Well, I thought that was the case or would be the case until one of my children called another child " a bully". This child has no thinking process when it comes to what is coming out of her mouth. I would say that the other girl was a little mean to her but one she was not the only one mean to this girl and how can a child say that to a classmate, just straight out like it was no big deal. For some reason, it just shocked me. It did make the girl that was called the bully cry and hopefully she took it the right way. Hopefully, she will think about her actions and she will talk to her parents about what happened and they were try to talk to her to help her be nice.
Other then that, I was useless or that is how I felt. It opened my eyes that even in the public school with "normal" children, there are big problems, they are just different. The problems could be little so that is why we have to keep our eyes open as teachers and caregivers if we are working at the schools. Parents need to keep their eyes open too. As an adult in charge of little ones, we need to take the time to teach the important life lessons to children instead of just all of the subjects. That is the problem of the world today. They don't get taught compassion, love, kindness, respect, responsibility and other things along those lines at home or school so we are raising up selfish and all about me adults. How can people not see that and think everything is okay? I saw the "problem" yesterday. Now I need to do something about it but what?
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