Watch Those Teeth!

Today I was summoned by a substitute teacher to come help her with a boy having a meltdown. According to the girl who came to get me, the angry boy was beet red and yelling across the room continually. When I talked with the boy, he animatedly widened his big brown eyes, shook his head back and forth, and loudly carried on about how everybody was trying to tell him what to do, and how HE DIDN'T NEED ANY HELP. HE COULD DO IT HIMSELF!!! As I let him vent about a variety of stressors, he made a unique analogy. Attempting to describe just how very put out he was with his classmates, he said, "It's like I'm a sandwich, and they're trying to take a bite out of me. They've reached the hamburger patty, WHICH IS MY LAST NERVE!" Happily, the child calmed down within a few minutes and was able to go back to class. While I didn't enjoy his outburst, I loved the creative language he used while getting his frustration out of his system!

Substitute Mimi

I've had lots of heart-warming experiences at school this week! Yesterday, I had a freckle-faced first grade girl eating lunch with me in my room. It was her counseling time, and we'd just finished our conversation and were setting up a board game to play. Before we got started, a substitute teacher tapped on the door with a plea for help. She was subbing in a difficult class, and behind her stood a shame-faced kindergartner clasping his hands in front of his body and wearing an uh-oh expression. The sub asked if I could let the little boy stay in my room for 5 minutes to calm down. She said he could join his class on the playground if he was ready to participate appropriately after that time. I agreed and asked him to have a seat in a comfy green chair behind our counseling table. He complied contritely, and I prepared to go ahead with the game.

However, the first grader I was with had other ideas. Whispering, she said, "Miss Mimi, I think I can help him." Thinking that she probably spoke the truth, I said, "Okay," and sat back to observe. The little girl walked over to the kindergartner, sat down on the floor in front of his chair, and said gently, "Hey, it's never too late to switch it around. I used to get in trouble when I was in kindergarten, but I switched it around." The boy said in a similarly respectful tone of voice, "Well, there's this new student, and he hasn't quite figured out how to get along with people, and he just won't leave me alone."

"Hey, when people bothered me in kindergarten, I would push and shove, but then I switched it around and just ignored them," said the girl. "But I can't ignore him because he follows me around and won't leave me alone," the boy responded. "Well, just ask your teacher for help, okay? Don't fight with him because then you'll get in trouble."

"I'll try," said the kindergartner, sounding calm but not too sure about that suggestion. "Do you think you're ready to go to the playground now?" asked the first grader. "Well yea, I think I am," said the boy.

Since five minutes had passed, I walked the boy outside, where another kindergarten teacher had a pep talk with him. He then went to play. Since I never heard from him for the remainder of the day, I don't know how he behaved. I also know that what he said about the new student is indeed true and that the two of them in the same class is a volatile combination. This little boy has his work cut out for him in the self-control department. The point of this story, though, is how precious it was to sit in the background and listen to two small children empathizing and encouraging each other about the stressors of everyday life at school. I told the little girl that next time I'm absent, I'll suggest that she become MY substitute!

Pure Goodness!

I saw the sweetest thing happen today! Our PTA is having a clothing drive for the Knox County Clothing Center, which provides clothes for needy children in our school system. To hold the donations, HUGE cardboard boxes, probably 4 feet tall, sit beside each front entrance to our building. The boxes have been nicely decorated to advertise the clothing drive and are eye-catching due to their size. In fact, I've thought all week how fun it would be to hide inside a box and jump up like a jack-in-the box when classes walked down the hall. After all, it IS almost Halloween! Anyway, I'll move on to the touching scene I witnessed early this morning. As I made my rounds through the building around 7:40, I saw a petite kindergartner standing on tiptoe, stretching her arms up as far as possible, and trying with all her might to get a new-looking hot pink polka-dotted coat into the very tall box. Noticing that she didn't have on a jacket and knowing that the temperature was very chilly, I wondered if the coat had just recently come off her body. "Hey Sweetie!" I said. "Is that your coat you're giving away?" Turning her head to see who was speaking to her, she said softly, "I thought some other kids might need a coat." "That is just one of the most precious things I've ever heard," I said, "but I don't think your mom would want you to give away your very own coat. It looks brand new! I can tell that you have a good kind heart and care about others' feelings, and you've made my day for having such a sweet thought, but I think you better keep your coat for the winter! Nodding her head, she said, "Oh, okay," gave me a hug, and moved on down the hall to her classroom. This little girl comes from one of the largest families in our school, and she doesn't have lots of extras. What a pure heart she has, and oh how we need more people like her in this world of ours!

Gasp!

In a second grade class yesterday, we were discussing using positive self-talk to calm down strong feelings of anxiety. We had learned the difference in negative thinking, which makes us even more nervous, and positive thinking, which gives us hope and a fighting spirit. Well, one of the scenarios we thought about was what to tell ourselves when we're nervous about presenting a science project in front of our class, specifically getting a volcano to erupt. We noted that thinking thoughts such as "This isn't going to work, and my friends will laugh at me" would make us feel more worried and that we probably wouldn't give the experiment our best shot. I asked the children to come up with some helpful, hopeful self-talk to use in this situation, and I got several good responses. Students said such things as "I worked hard on this, and it'll be fine"; "If it doesn't work, my friends will understand"; "I can handle this", etc. but when a small dark-haired boy sitting on the front row offered a suggestion, I cackled with glee. With widened eyes and enthusiasm in his voice, the child said, "When the volcano erupts, my friends will GASP!" What an unexpected word, and what positive thinking this expressive little guy used! Later, his teacher explained that gasp had been a recent vocabulary word, and she was thrilled that her smart little student had used it in everyday conversation. Oh the joys of watching children learn!

The Best She Had

Here's one of the most precious stories ever! Last week was Thank a Teacher week. Since I'm a school counselor and not a classroom teacher, I usually don't receive many affirmations, which I completely understand. I don't mention this in a whiney way, but just to show how meaningful the events in this story were to me. The first hour of the day is always my most busy and stressful, as I'm hurrying all over the building to encourage and monitor children. Well, as I dashed into the busy hallway while students were going to their classrooms around 7:30 on Thursday, a child touched my arm and called my name softly. A petite first grader with a shiny waist-length pony tail looked up at me and said, "I have something for you, Miss Mimi." Even though I was in a hurry, I stopped, and we backed up against the wall so the other children could pass. Taking off her backpack and setting it on the floor, the little girl opened it up and laboriously searched through several zipped pockets in search of her gift. Finding what she was looking for, she beamed as she handed me a highly decorated white envelope, which I need to describe. On the front was a big yellow smiley face wearing a blue-green hat. On the envelope's back were 56 brightly 
colored stars. "Is this for ME?", I asked in anticipation. Smiling, she nodded and stood back to watch me open her offering. As I pulled out a card, I saw a pink-striped invitation with a picture of a heart. It really looked like a valentine, and when I noticed the words "You're Invited", I'll admit that I was a bit disappointed, thinking that it wasn't a thank you card after all. However, when I opened the "invitation", I felt a rush of such love for this little child. On the left side of the card, where the page was white, she had completely covered it with art work. There was a big yellow sunshine with a smiley face, as I teach our kids to spread sunshine. The sun was surrounded by 26 orange stars, and the picture was complete with blue skies and bright green grass. On the right hand side of the card, she had written her own sweet message on the lines which were really meant for time, date, place, and other invitation details. Her words, in three different colors, said, "Mes Memi yu or the bist tehr." I've already mentioned that it's rare for me to receive cards during teacher appreciation week, but the sweetest part of the story is that this little girl is one of the most underprivileged children in our school. We have mostly white-collar, educated, middle to upper middle class families as our demographic. Therefore, the fact that this angel girl had used whatever card she could find around her house, had decorated it in such minute detail, had personalized it just for me, and had tracked me down to hand-deliver it, just absolutely touched my heart and was the highlight of my week! Hers was the only thank you I received, and although I saw children bringing beautiful flowers to their teachers every single day, I wouldn't have traded this little girl's heartfelt expression of love for the most extravagant of those bouquets! This story really reminds me of the tale of the Widow's Mite in the Bible, in which the poor widow gave what she could. Although her offering was a tiny amount, it was sacrificial and given with great love. Her motives were pure and meaningful, as were this tiny little girl's!

Now That's What I Call a Tome!

As I knelt at a gap-toothed first grader's desk and encouraged him to do his best in school today, he reached into his backpack, pulled out a book, and said in all seriousness, " Here, Miss Mimi. I thought you might like to read this to us in guidance class." Hiding a grin, I checked and discovered that the book had 1096 pages. Now that would be one 
l-o-o-o-o-n-g guidance lesson!

Now Where Did THAT Come From??

Friday afternoon, I heard a tiny knock on my office door. Opening it, I was thrilled to see one of my favorite boys from last school year, who has moved on to third grade at our sister school. He was just stopping by with his grandparents, who were picking up his younger brother from school. We both jumped for joy, squealing and flapping our hands with glee! Since I had just that moment finished eating lunch in my room and was in the process of cleaning up after myself, I reached for the hand sanitizer. " My hands smell like dill pickles," I said. Grinning and shaking his head, my freckle-faced friend said, "I'm not a pickle fan. I'd rather smell a camel than eat a pickle." This popped out of his mouth without a second's forethought, and THAT, my friends, is an example of why this child had the title of last year's second grade Mr. Personality, and why I miss him so much this year!

Mini-Chairs

Thursday morning, I went by to check on a little kindergarten girl before the bell rang. She and I walked out into the hall to chit chat and fill out a chart. There was a table right outside her classroom that I thought we'd sit at. The child said in a dismayed tone of voice, "Oh no! Let's don't sit at this table. The chairs are mini!" I glanced down at the chairs, and yes indeed, their seats were about 8 inches off the floor! I just love the way kids describe things!

A Double Giggle!

Two funny stories from my shaggy haired second grade friend, whom I write about often because he's always cracking me up:

He came in to see me while I was busy talking to a little girl. Settling down in his favorite chair anyway, he said that he'd learned something new from Charlie Brown. This child is a huge Peanuts fan and has learned all sorts of interesting trivia from reading compilations of this comic strip. Anyway, he went on to say that he knew how many ozzies were in a lib. We said, "Say what? Are you speaking English or Greek?" He repeated it a few times, and since you're being given the advantage of seeing this in writing, you've probably figured out that he was talking about 16 ounces in a pound! With purely verbal hints to go by, it took me a while!

Funny #2: His grandma lives on a farm with lots of animals, and my friend told me a tale of a boy dog and a girl dog who licked each other and somehow had puppies.

What a scream this little boy is! There's rarely a dull moment when he's around, for sure!

Hello-o-o-o-o, THAT'S Not Nice!

Let me set the stage by giving you a picture of the "star" of this story. When I entered his kindergarten
classroom at 1:00 Friday, all the children were sitting on the carpet anticipating my entrance. Since they'd just returned to class from the playground, they were hot and sweaty and tired. This was obvious in the children's appearance, as their faces were red, their hair looked damp and tousled, and some of them looked "slam worn out"! One short orange-haired boy stood out. His freckled face had vertical streaks of dirt down both sides. As she greeted me, his teacher noticed his filthy face, grinned, and asked him to go wash it. She later explained that the little boy had been crying on the playground and had wiped his eyes, evidently with very dirty hands! Now fast-forward to later in my guidance lesson. We were learning about making I-Messages, which are statements that help us express feelings respectfully and assertively, even when we're upset. After practicing making a few, we read a book called STAND TALL, MOLLY LOU MELON! Molly Lou kept getting mistreated by another story character, Ronald Durkin, and my students came up with I-Messages that Molly Lou could have used to deal with Ronald's meanness. Well my red-haired buddy, who was calm and happy by this point in the lesson, was very familiar with this book. He was bouncing with excitement because we were reading it and could predict that we'd be deciding how to help Molly Lou stand up for herself when Ronald Durkin struck. When I read about the first incident, which depicted Ronald calling Molly "shrimpo" due to her small size, the little boy pointed to the ceiling with an upraised hand and blurted, "Hello-o-o-o, THAT'S not nice!" Next, Ronald called Molly Lou "bucky-tooth beaver", making fun of her teeth. Again, my friend threw up a hand and said, "Hello-o-o-o, THAT'S not nice!" When Ronald made fun of Molly's unusual voice, "Hello-o-o-o, THAT'S not nice!" When he told Molly she'd made her snowflake all wrong, "Hello-o-o-o, THAT'S not nice!", all accompanied by that upraised finger. Seriously, I was so tickled I could hardly read. I have about 8 more kindergarten classes to teach this lesson to, and if it was possible, I'd take my "assistant" with me to all of them. I can guarantee he'd liven up the lesson and have a fan club by the time he left the rooms. He's already got a fan in me!

AKA Cindy Smith

Although I don't use children's names on the posts I write, I have to use a fake one so this story will make sense. You see, it's all about names! In kindergarten guidance classes, I always give out puppets for children to hold while I read them a story. Since I can't carry 20-something puppets to every class, we have to take turns. As I go down the class list and call students' names to come choose a puppet, I rhyme their names the way they're done in the "Name Game" song. For example, Jimmy's name would be "Jimmy Jimmy Bo Bimmy Banana Fanna Fo Fimmy, Fee Fi Mo MImmy, Jimmy!" Sandy's would be "Sandy Sandy Bo Bandy Banana Fanna Fo Fandy, Fee Fi Mo Mandy, Sandy!" I know this is silly, but it's fun! Well one day last week I called a little girl's name, which I'll change to Cindy Smith. "Cindy Cindy Bo Bindy Banana Fanna Fo Findy, Fee Fi Mo MIndy, Cindy," I chimed. With a big smile, the petite child jumped up to select the puppet she wanted. As she headed back to her spot on the carpet, she glanced at me in all seriousness and said, "Actually, my last name's Smith." As I've said in several recent stories, can you say LITERAL?? The teacher and I looked at each other and shared a giggle!

Natural-Born Peacemaker!

We've been learning to be peacemakers in kindergarten guidance classes and to show that we care. As part of this process, we're learning to tell how people feel by picking up on clues given by their faces, bodies, and what's going on around them. Understanding their feelings will help us be a good friend by treating them the way they need to be treated. Today, I showed large photographs to a class, and they figured out how the people shown in the pictures felt. Afterwards, they told me what the person might need, an action that a peacemaker might take based on someone's feelings. For example, a happy boy wouldn't necessarily need us to do anything except be happy with him. A sad girl might need us to ask what was wrong or try to cheer her up. Well, we came to a picture of a furious little boy. He had sqinched up eyes, a furrowed brow, a beet red face, a tight little mouth, and arms bent and held tightly against his torso. After the children correctly labeled the feeling of anger, I told them that when someone is THAT mad, we usually need to stay away from him until he calms down because he might yell at us for trying to help. As I gave this explanation, a blue-eyed boy on the front row softly said, "You could tell him that God is always with him." His teacher and I glanced at each other in mutual admiration of this little child's love and faith, and my heart began to melt. I don't think that this particular peacemaker needs much help learning about empathy
!

No Barbies For Me!

Today, we had a birthday boy in one of my kindergarten guidance classes. Our lesson included looking at pictures of children exhibiting a variety of feelings, labeling those feelings, and classifying each as comfortable or uncomfortable . Our clues were to notice the pictured child's face, his body language, and what was going on around him, the context. Coming to a picture of a girl opening a present and showing big wide eyes and an open mouth, the children correctly figured out that she felt surprised. "Is this a comfortable surprise or an uncomfortable one?" I asked. "Comfortable," the children said. "Yes, this is a comfortable surprise, but sometimes surprises can be uncomfortable, such as when a field trip to the zoo gets rained out at the last minute." Immediately, the excited birthday boy piped up from the back of the group, "Or when somebody gives you a Barbie doll for your birthday!" I cracked up as the other boys moaned and groaned at the horror of such a thing happening. Let's just hope that this is one uncomfortable surprise our birthday boy didn't have to deal with today!

They Aim to Please!

At the beginning of the school year, I try to give kindergartners immediate success experiences in guidance class. Not only do I want them to be active participants in my lessons, but I want them to feel good about their ability to listen, follow directions, and learn learn learn! During our very first lesson, I teach students 5 ways to be peacemakers, and one of those ways is to listen to each other. Onto that thought, I add the fact that good students need to listen AND follow directions. In guidance class, we usually stand up a couple of times and bounce as we chant teaching points of that day's particular lesson. A couple of days ago, I introduced the lesson concept and said, "Okay, we're gonna bounce. Please stand up." To make a game of it, I said, "I'm hiding my eyes, and when I get to zero, I hope everybody will be listening and following directions. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, zero!" As I prepared to open my eyes, I hoped to see all twenty-something students standing. If that happened to be the case, I intended to clap and jump up and down and say, "Yea! You were ALL listening and following directions!" Peeking at the children from between my fingers, I realized that my hopes had been surpassed. With big smiles and quiet feet, every single child was silently bouncing up and down as if on invisible pogo sticks! They had not only heard the stand up instruction, but they'd also gone ahead and started bouncing, not waiting for me to tell them what words we were bouncing to. Adorable! These sweet little children REALLY want to please, and on that day, they succeeded!

Learning Rocks!

When I begin teaching kindergarten classes in the fall, I have LOTS to teach them. In our first lesson, they learn that peacemakers spread sunshine, along with ways to do that. Next, they learn ways to tell how people feel. When we can understand how others feel, we can be a friend to them, which is a part of peacemaking. The clues we look for are face, body, and what's going on around the person. In order to make this easy to remember, I teach a rhythmic chant that we stand up and bounce to: "Face, Body, What's going on!" We discuss how facial expressions change with different feelings, along with how bodies change. For example, mad eyes are squinchy, teeth might me clenching, face might turn red, heart might beat faster, arms might be on hips, etc. Then we look at pictures and detect how people feel. Well yesterday, in preparation for having a kindergarten class stand up and bounce to "face, body, what's going on" for the first time, I asked the children to practice SAYING the chant while they were still sitting criss-cross on the floor. I wanted to make sure they'd be able to repeat the words while they were bouncing, as opposed to simply bouncing and laughing and not learning a thing! I was prepared to model the chant, then have them join me in repeating it several times, and then see if they could do it without my help. At that point, we'd stand, bounce, and chant together. As I began modeling the words we'd be bouncing to, an adorable freckle-faced boy who was sitting attentively on the floor began gyrating from the waist up, pushing out his shoulders along with my rhythm, grinning from ear to ear, and belting out confidently, "Face, smile, spread sunshine!" His teacher and I shared a sneaky sideways glance, tickled to pieces at his enthusiasm. Obviously this little child had paid attention to his first 2 guidance lessons, and although he mixed up a few messages, he made up for it in spirit! Oh the joys of teaching excited little souls!

AKA Phlegm

As I do every morning, I stopped by to check on a very emotional first grade boy. Unfortunately, the minute I walked into his room he realized that his desk had been moved out of the group in order to keep him from becoming so distracted during work time, and he burst into tears. We walked into the hall and sat at a table to talk, which helped him calm down rather quickly. The handsome little boy, who was smiling by this point, tried to clear his throat and asked to run get a paper towel in the bathroom. Half a minute later, he returned, grinning from ear to ear. "Miss Mimi, do you have any children?" he asked. "No, I have ZERO children," I answered. "Well if you GET some children, I hope they don't get woogies in their throat like I just did," he went on. "I call them oysters, and yeah, they can be pretty gross," I said. Two thoughts crossed my mind: What interesting conversations primary school educators are accustomed to, and at my age, how thrilling to hear that my first grade friend thought I might still "get" some children of my own!

Whatever You Say, Miss Mimi!

While introducing my Care Cat puppet to kindergartners for the very first time, I pointed out the heart-shaped pin on his chest. Since Care Cat is a staple of my program and my ambassador for peacemaking, I made sure that the children understood that the heart shape stood for love. Then I read the pin's message, which said "I Care", and asked the students to repeat it. "Say 'I Care' for me," I requested. All together, in obedient little voices, the children said, "I Care for me." Can you say LITERAL??!

New (School) Year's Resolution

After recently teaching a kindergarten class for the first time, I was powerfully reminded of an important lesson. A little blond boy had been extremely high maintenance throughout the 40 minutes I'd spent in his room. Instead of sitting and listening, he stood up several times and then sprawled flat on the floor sideways, drawing impatient reminders from his classmates. Since I knew nothing about this child except what I was seeing before me, the teacher, who was privy to his background information, discreetly beckoned him to a comfy stool at the back of the group. While the child did stay on the stool, he lay on his stomach and spun around frequently. Since he was behind the other children and not bothering them, I was able to ignore this behavior. About halfway through the class, the time came for me to give out puppets, which I always do before the story we read. Choosing 7 names from the class roll, I made sure to give this little fellow a turn. Because he was having such a hard time attending, I didn't want him to see me as a mean old witch and forevermore dread the thought of guidance class. In other words, I was attempting to balance the negatives with something fun for him to do. As I read the story, his teacher tiptoed over and took the puppet away from the boy because he was slinging it around. I heard her tell him softly that he could have it back when he was able to keep it still, and within a minute or so, he earned the puppet back. During our song and dance time, the wiggly child stood and sang and danced appropriately, although his puppet had some wild and crazy moves! As I was packing up to leave, the little boy came up and gave me a big hug around the waist, which I appreciated, as I wanted our first lesson to end on a happy note. Because this class occurred at the very end of the day, I was able to talk with the child's teacher soon afterwards. Her story was heartbreaking. This little fair-skinned boy had been hit in the head by a relative while he was very young, and the perpetrator is in jail because of the abuse. Upon hearing this tragic tale, my eyes instantly filled with tears, and of course I fell in love with the child immediately. The lesson I was beneficially reminded of is that children will usually behave when they can. If there's a stand-out misbehavior occurring repeatedly, there's a reason for it. I need to have more empathy and less judgment with everyone with whom I come in contact, not just children. Not too long ago, I read a quote that fits this story well: "There isn't a person you wouldn't love if you could read their story." My resolution is to take this lesson to heart and be more aware of and interested in people's motives, which I hope will make me a better counselor and friend!

Thank You, Lord!

Can you say WARDROBE MALFUNCTION? Well I nearly had a DOOZY of one yesterday! I was visiting a first grade classroom to check on a little blond spitfire who is working on following first request and showing respect. Each day I drop by early, his teacher gives him a 1-10 score on each of his two goals, and he colors in that many squares on a bar graph, which we call a rainbow chart. As he stood beside me and colored his chart, I stood up to straighten my skirt, which had turned itself around so that the zipper wasn't in the back, where it was supposed to be. As I fumbled to find the wayward zipper, my eyes flew open as round as possible, I probably turned white with fear, and I gasped in horror. Miss Maner, the teacher, said, "What's wrong, Miss Mimi?" "Oh my goodness," I said. "My skirt is all the way unzipped, and I was too lazy to fasten the hook and eye this morning! It is a MIRACLE that it didn't fall off right here in front of your whole class!" The little boy beside me jerked his head around to look at me, quickly turned it away again, grinned, and slapped both hands over his eyes. "I wouldn't have looked, Miss Mimi," he said. Miss Maner chimed in, "No, Miss Mimi, we wouldn't have looked." "Yeah right," I giggled. I sat back down, still almost hyperventilating with the aftereffects of sheer fright, and continued to chuckle about my near mishap. The child put down his crayon, turned to me with a bright smile, slapped me playfully on the chest, and said, "Here, let me put your heart back in!" All day long I cringed every time I considered what might have happened if my skirt had fallen to my feet in front of MISS MANER and her crew. WHAT a nightmare that would have been! Lesson learned? No matter how tedious it may be, ALWAYS fasten hooks and eyes on skirts!

Love Your Brother

I still have a touching image of brotherly love in my mind, and it's based on an incident that occurred at bus duty early this morning. Since our children begin arriving about 7:00 and school doesn't begin until 7:45, they wait in either the cafeteria or the gym until 7:30, when they're dismissed to go to class. Teachers take turns overseeing students as they wait. This week is stressful for the staff at our school because it's the first week that all 300 plus kindergarten students come to school for the entire day. During the initial 2 weeks of school, kindergartners have staggered attendance, coming only one day per week. This allows their teachers to have small groups of 4 or 5 children in order to teach them the rules and routines of school in a more intimate, comfortable setting. This week, morning bus duty has scads of tiny, hesitant 5 year olds coming to the door of the lunchroom and just standing still as they look around the crowded area. Many staff members are on hand to gently guide them to the correct waiting area. Well this morning two little dark-haired boys slowly walked in together, one half a head taller than the other. They were both handsome and looked very much alike, telling me that they were most likely brothers. Seeing that they were proceeding timidly through the crowded cafeteria, I checked to see whether they needed help. In a shy voice, the older boy asked if he could stay with his kindergarten brother, who was obviously anxious about being left alone in the unfamiliar setting. I told Big Brother that he could walk his little brother over to the kindergarten section, but that he'd have to go to the gym with the other second graders afterwards because we were out of seats in the kindergarten area. Although the boys didn't argue, they quietly turned to each other and gently put their hands on each other's shoulders. The big brother placed a tender kiss on his young sibling's head as the little one fought back tears, and they just stood there in that position. I gave them a few seconds to gather their courage, and then I put my hand on the kindergartner's back and led him to a table. Looking back across the lunchroom, I noticed that his older brother was still in the very same spot, checking to make sure the little one was safe and settled. Only when I went back and reported that all was well did the older boy leave the room to walk down to the gym where the other second graders were. My heart was warmed because these little fellows so obviously had a tight bond of family loyalty, and Big Brother played his role of protector to the hilt!