Carnival Time

Summer at the child care center is a little different from the rest of the year.  Our child population is lower, and we have the school age children for full days rather than before and after school.  The children spend as much time as possible outdoors, and water play is a favorite activity.  Some special visitors come to the center (a magician, a yoga teacher, and a "mad" science teacher) and present their programs.  The schoolers hold a car wash and every Friday all of the children bring their bikes and helmets and spend most of the day riding in the parking lot.

One of our most popular special events is the center Carnival.  Each room is responsible for two games, and the center purchases little prizes, cotton candy, and popcorn.  The children take turns going from game to game, where everyone earns a prize, and eating lots of sugar.  This year was no exception, except that the day of the carnival the skies became cloudy and very dark and the channel 10 radar showed big thunderstorms heading in our direction. 

Obviously the children could not go to the playground for their carnival.  Although all of the teachers know to drop everything and come inside at the first rumble of thunder, moving all of the children out of the playground, across the parking lot, and into the building at once would be difficult.  It was decided that in the interest of safety the carnival would have to be held inside the school age room, which is the largest room in the building.  All of the games would work well inside the building - except for my game.

Each year I am a game at the carnival.  I put on a poncho, take off my glasses, and let the children throw wet sponges at me, and throwing water would not work in the building.  My dear friend, the assistant director, had a solution, however.  She decided that I could take a chair and sit on the walk outside the building and the children could throw the wet sponges at me from the building.  If lightening should start striking, the children would be safe and I could run as fast as possible with a long poncho and a wet face to safety.  This actually worked very well, except that I could not catch the sponges and throw them back at the children this year because the rug got wet.

The first child to hit me in the face was a little girl who had just turned five.  She has curly hair, hair ribbons, cute dresses, a sweet smile, and a heck of a right arm.  As I told her in my most adult professional voice, "You cay-n't hit me!", she let fly and hit me in the middle of my face with a soaking sponge.  The second child to score a direct hit was a child who had just turned three.  She was looking at the prize bin which was next to me when she straightened up, smiled sweetly, and pasted me one with a sponge that I hadn't noticed that she was still holding.  All of the children came back a number of times, but the most frequent visitor was the older brother of the first child.  He is an aspiring major leaguer, and did not want to let his sister beat him.  The boy kept coming back and trying again and again until - success!- he hit me in the upper right quadrant of my face.  He gave me a big smile and went off to other games.  (I do believe that the game is more difficult for the older children, since they are more aware that they are not supposed to be hitting a teacher.)

The thunderstorms went to the north of us, all of the prizes were used, the cotton candy was eaten, and everyone had a great time (even the human target).  The children fished for floating ducks, knocked over stacked milk bottles with a ball, threw velcro balls at a target, and had their faces painted.  Next year will bring another carnival with games, prizes, and treats.  Hopefully the weather will be sunny and I will be able to throw the sponges back at the children!