13Nov

All I Ever Really Needed to Know I learned in ECEC

All I Ever Really Needed to Know I Learned in ECEC

by Robert Fulghum/Kim Deibert

Most of what I really need to know about how to live, and what to do, and how to teach, I learned in ECEC. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there at the registration desk of an ECEC conference. 

These are the things I learned: Share ideas. Play in school. Don't hit people. Put your minutes in the correct binder. Clean up your binder before you pass it on to a new executive member. Don't take on jobs that aren't yours. Say you're sorry when you miss a deadline. Wash your hands before you eat those great Executive meeting lunches. Flush. Chocolate cheesecake and daiquiris are good for you. Live a balanced life. Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work some every day. (Haven’t we all done these things at conferences?)

Wish you could take a nap every afternoon. When you go out into the classroom, watch out during supervision, hold hands with little hands, and stick together as early childhood teachers. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little bean seed in the plastic bag with the paper towel. The roots go down and the plant goes up (usually) and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. 

Presidents and local liaisons and treasurers and even the editor - they all step down. So we need to step up. 

And then remember the book about Piaget and Montessori, and the first word you learned, the biggest word of all: TEACH . Everything you need to know is in our classroom somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation, ecology and politics and sane living. 

Think of what a better world it would be if we all - the whole world - had Chocolate cake and daiquiris  about 3 o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap. Or if we had a basic policy in our school and other schools to always put things back where we found them (in the library) and clean up our own messes (especially the staff room fridge!). And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the world, it is best to hold an Early Childhood Educator’s hand and stick together. 

 

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