Literacy Picnic

This morning, at Zahra's school, there was a Literacy Picnic. Every year at Golden View, there's a day when kids get read to by someone special in their lives (parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle, neighbor, etc.). People bring blankets and chairs, lots of books, and something for the kids to snack on. I read to Zahra every night before she goes to bed, so this kind of felt like an everyday thing to me, except that we're usually at home, lying around while Max is asleep, and today we were surrounded by hundreds of other kids being read to at the same time.

This is right as the picnic began, before we actually started reading or eating or anything. I had been kind of wondering how Maxwell would fare in the whole deal, since he doesn't really like sitting in one spot much, but overall, he did pretty well. It would have been easier just to be able to fully concentrate on Zahra and reading, since she is ever the receptive audience, but I think she is getting used to having a sibling around and not being able to always have my full attention. She was pretty patient when I had to break from reading a couple times to scoop up Max or otherwise try to reorient him to a task that was compatible with me reading.

Max, eatin' a banana...

(This kid loves eating!)

... Later, you will see where some of the banana ended up

(although most of it made it down to his tummy)

This is how it went most of the time.

Zahra and I concentrating on the book

and Max, well, just being a baby...

I can hear him saying "My turn!"

(except, wait, he can't really talk yet)

We never ended up finishing this book.

One hour was too long for this enviornment. I think Zahra could be read to that long at home, where it is quiet, there are no other kids around, and Max is asleep... but here, it was just too tempting to watch what everyone else was doing.

The Book Mover

(this task was entertaining to him for quite awhile)

Zahra took this picture of Max and I

(pretty good photographer, huh?)

As you can see,

lots of people turned out for the picnic...

Getting tired of sitting around...

it turned into tumble time.

And yes, that's banana on his eyelashes and mouth.

See how he's standing up on his own without holding on to anything.
I took the picture with my hand held out to the side.

Overall, it was pretty fun. A neat way to do things a little differently on a November Wednesday. At the end, Zahra and a little boy from her class decided to walk off in search of their teacher. I kind of kept my eye on them because they seemed to just not even know where they were going, just walking off near the other grades. I couldn't find Mrs. Conton at first either, so I followed Zahra and Brandon and caught up with them. I was afraid they were just going to get totally lost, although I could see they were constantly trying to find Mrs. Conton. So I had them come back with me and I made sure they met up with their other classmates who had begun to line up in front of where Mrs. Conton was standing. It was pretty cute, albeit a little scary, to watch them walk off, confident and unaware, by themselves. Good thing I kept up after them!