Three-Year-Olds On The Playground

Yesterday at the end of last period, I stuck my head out the window of the second-floor chemistry lab and talked with the 3-year-olds running around on the daycare playground directly beneath me. It was a warm day, and it was more practical to open the window for fresh air than change the heating system over to air conditioning for the afternoon. I called out "Hey, Eli!" to a little boy who knows me, and almost immediately an entire group of three-year-olds came and clustered around, calling up, wanting to know who I was. I told them I taught the "big kids." Then one responded, "Oh, you're the big teacher?" Not so sure I like the connotation of that remark.

Then a latecomer looked up and said "Is it YOU?" I know he meant, and didn't have his grammar quite straight, to say "Who are you?" But the inflection was so cute--it sounded like "Oh!!! Is it you? You have finally arrived!!!"