"Again!" — The childhood love affair with monotony

AND

GOD

   SAID ...


We know these words very well. 

Sky and Trees families have spent one or two days learning about every day of the creation story. 

Many of our worship themes change from year to year, but this one stays the same. And as the story grows, we do not ask the children to remember the previous chapter, we always start at the beginning. We sing this song every day, make the signs every day, always starting at the beginning ...

Why?

This blog writer can offer you three reasons.

Reason number one is simply that it is good and wonderful to learn that all that surrounds us in Creation comes from God...

To celebrate that God gave us light ...

and sky ...

and water from the seas...

and earth...

and rocks ...

and green...

"Look! Some of God's green!"

I could show you pictures of fish and birds and beasts, 

but let's move on to ...

Reason number two :

In his book, Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton writes this...

“Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again!"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again!" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again!" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.” 

...Can any one of us defeat this 'exultation in monotony' that we encounter in these young ones? And why should we? Every book on early childhood education will tell you that from repetition will develop knowing. It is the act of doing, redoing, and doing again that solidifies stories and ideas and truth into the mind of a child. How wonderful it is, then, that they themselves want things again and again! Imagine if they did not? Imagine if they were as easily bored by monotony and impatient for the new as we are in our adult 'wisdom'? And as Chesterton reminds us, how God-like.

'In His image He created them', indeed. 

Then God looked
at all the things
That God had made...

He took a rest,

And all was blessed.

The Seventh Day!

...This brings us to reason number three! 

We here at school are busy. Our job is to move and build and write and draw and clean up and do it all over again the next day. After all, God has made us so that we can do so, so much. Nobody reminds us more of that than our three- and four-year-olds... 

At a Reggio Emelia conference in New York in 2015, we heard a Reggio teacher make an observation that I'm sure we all can see to be true: Young children are the only age group who are always giving themselves jobs to do. 

They love to work! 

We often see it as play, and it is play also (as play is the work of children) but the children most often see this as very serious work. 

So, is it our job to just let them work and work and work as much as possible all day? It is not.

As learners, it is so important to stop.

And look.

In these moments where we rest (not passively, but are intentionally still), wonderful things happen.  Reflection, wonder, critique, delight ... This where the other half of learning takes place. 

It is important to do, do over, and do again — but then to stop and look and think about what you've done.

Stillness creates wonder ...

It is only when we stop to marvel at simple things ...

That we can see them for the marvels that they are ...

It is only by stopping and checking our work, that we can make sure it is as beautiful as we want it to be ...

Stopping and enjoying a material before you 
work with it ...

... helps to create beautiful work. 

It is in being still for a moment that we can even become aware of ourselves — how our bodies work and how they move through space. We are the work of God's hands and we, too, are beautiful. 

When we stop the noise and are just quiet together, we can grow as a community...

And it is only in stopping to see the darkness...

that we yearn to find light...

And work to create it... 

As you can see in a picture above, we take time at the end of every day to sit quietly, sing, light a candle, and pray. We reflect on and delight in our day together. 

You can do this at home too! A time without screens or bright lights or loud noises before bed to share a song with, pray with, and delight in your child.   

God has blessed us ...

... each and every one!