Charades

We continued the mirror exercise today, to start. To try to break up the kids who were likely to be unruly if they were paired with one another, we didn't let them choose their own partners; we used colored cards with symbols on them to pair them up "randomly" (though we actually tried to pay attention to who we paired with whom). Despite our best efforts, there were still some pairs that couldn't focus on the exercise.

Everyone, however, was eager to get up in front of the group and try to "fool us" (keep us from guessing who the leader was). Chloe and her partner, one of the few whose names I still haven't quite gotten (a boy, though), had a tricky method, or so we thought: they just didn't move. Turns out, though, that they actually hadn't chosen a leader at all -- must have misunderstood the directions, even though it seemed like they knew what we were asking them to do.

Next we split into two groups: kids with yellow cards came with me, blue cards with Patrick. In our groups we had the kids pair up, swap stories, and then each told his/her partner's story to the group. My group was in a physical mood, climbing all over me and one another. They would insist that they were "ready" to tell their stories, and then when it was their turn forget the story they were supposed to tell. Interestingly, Korea had real difficulty with the idea of telling someone else's story as if it were her own. I remember when she started telling Zach's story:

"One time, Zach threw some popcorn in somebody's hair, and he -- "

All the kids started correcting her. "No, I! One time, I threw popcorn..."

She looked confused. "One time...one time...I...One time, I got pushed..." And she started telling her own story.

"Try telling Zach's story, but pretend it's your story," I told her.

"One time, I...Zach...one time he threw some popcorn..." It wasn't computing for her. I let it go.

We finished up with animal charades. It was difficult to keep the teams settled and organized, and they kept forgetting the rules, but in general, it went fairly smoothly. It took us right up to 4:55. Aliyah was upset because her team lost, though Liz told us not to worry, that she gets upset in that way "all the time."