Extracurriculars

Last October, while sitting on some characteristically uncomfortable wooden bleachers, watching my 4-year-old little sister purposefully jump, roll and tumble her way through her weekly gymnastics class, I began to descend into a pathetic state of self-pity. "Oh, poor us. We live on a little island in the Caribbean, instead of in a suburban city in the States. My son will never be able to take gymnastics like his aunt or learn to play an instrument like his (9-year-old) uncle. Poor, poor Parker. Sure, he'll be plenty book smart, but he'll never know the joy of rolling and tumbling or making music. Boo hoo hoo." In an attempt to shake myself out of such abject despair, I decided that, upon returning home, I would start to teach my son both rudimentary gymnastics and how to play the violin, in addition to continuing to homeschool him. This, despite the fact that I am notoriously uncoordinated (I myself dropped out of gymnastics at 6 because I couldn't complete a cartwheel) and haven't seriously played a musical instrument since I was 18 (and, to be honest, "seriously" might be too strong a word to describe how I used to (attempt to) play French horn and tenor saxophone). I went so far as to browse Amazon for "how to teach kiddie gymnastics" and "how to teach violin via the Suzuki method" books, as well as for tumbling mats and a pint-sized violin. (Have I told you about my superpower of self-deception?) Though I didn't actually order anything from that fulsome internet superstore, I remained resolute: I would supplement our homeschool sessions with extracurricular activities even if it killed me. I would!

Well, my son must have the luck of the Irish (he is almost half Irish, after all); he never did have to suffer through the sad spectacle of his maladroit, functionally unmusical mother trying to teach him how to do a backwards somersault or play some scales. At a playdate last November, a week or so after Parker and I returned home from our epic Stateside journey, a mommy friend of mine presented me with the 2010-2011 class schedule for the St. John School of the Arts, a nonprofit academy here on island dedicated to offering St. Johnian kids instruction in all things (or most things, at least) artistic. Maybe she had intuited my quixotic plan to add extracurriculars to my son's homeschool sessions and decided an intervention was crucial. Probably she just wanted to spread the good (art school on island!) news. Her son had apparently been enrolled in Tumbling and Music Circle at SJSA for over a year; he loved attending the classes, and she couldn't say enough good things about the teachers and the curriculum. I returned home that afternoon tremendously relieved, and immediately sent an e-mail to the school, asking how to go about enrolling my son in some classes.

What's that old adage? Be careful what you wish for! Soon after sending that e-mail, a sense of trepidation descended upon me. Was my (heretofore solely homeschooled) son ready to heed the lessons of a teacher (one who is not me, I mean)? Would he get along with his classmates? Would he even want to go to class? I suddenly pictured scenes of Parker crying at the classroom door while I simultaneously pleaded with him to go in and tried not to appear too embarrassed by his antics. I did, of course, realize that my anxieties did not offer any rational reason why my son shouldn't at least try a class or two of Tumbling and/or Music Circle. He could conceivably even benefit from experiencing being taught by a teacher who is not his mother, in a setting that is not his home, with other kids besides him, instead of all alone. If he really hated it, we could try again next year. Knowing this, though, did not lessen my anxieties appreciably much. Not until the first time I took him to Tumbling--he happily joined the class and followed the teacher's instructions, laughing and enjoying the company of his classmates all the while--did I calm down. Man, this parenting stuff can stress a mother out!

It hasn't all been cartwheels and kumbaya since. Parker's Tumbling teacher is super "old school" in the way she manages her classroom and motivates her students. It's pretty much "be quiet and do what I say." Kids who perform well receive loud, effusive praise, and kids who get a little chatty or cut in line or act too animated get yelled at. It's easy to understand why: how would you go about teaching tumbling to a class of twelve extremely energetic and enthusiastic preschoolers? And, lest you wonder, "Well, why does she persist in taking her son to Tumbling, if the teacher is such a tyrant" I do have to say that, teaching style aside, the class is by and large fun for all involved. The kids giggle, the teacher grins, the spectating parents swell with pride. But, if you're a kid who has never stepped foot inside a traditional classroom, one where students are expected to sit down and shut up, where behavior is controlled via rewards and consequences, where students must constantly work to produce tangible results (worksheets, exams, reports), you might very well experience something akin to culture shock the first few times you're yelled at for talking to a friend or ignored for not completing a forward roll. I can see my son struggle with this aspect of Tumbling. He flat out refused to go to class one day last month, though he'd seemed excited enough in the car on our way there. Talking to my husband later that night, I realized that I'd been pushing Parker to practice somersaults at home; he'd been having trouble tipping over, and I misguidedly decided it was my job to help him succeed. I'd even gone so far as to say, "Won't your teacher be surprised when she sees how good you are at somersaults now?!" Well, my son has never enjoyed playing the role of performing monkey. I'd carelessly induced a full-blown case of performance anxiety in him. By ignoring him when he failed to complete a forward roll and showering him with praise when he did manage to actually tip himself over, my son's teacher had already put enough pressure on him. The last thing he needed was me making him feel like everything hinged upon a silly somersault.

Parents participate in Parker's Music Circle class, so it falls on us to control our kids, rather than the teacher, but there is a similar--if much muted--expectation of performance. We sit close together, facing each other, singing and playing miscellaneous percussion instruments. Well, I should say we parents sing (most of us anyway) and the kids sometimes play along using drums or shakers or what have you. It'd be awesome if the kids sang along, but they seldom do. And I'd love it if the kids--the very students!--would consistently use their instruments to practice keeping the beat, but clappers inevitably become clamping jaws and rhythm sticks inevitably become hammers and nails and bells get ignored in favor of jumping up and down or cuddling in parents' laps. But I recently stopped and thought about what I want my son to get out of his Music Circle class. Do I want him to learn that he must obey the teacher and perform accordingly, or do I want him to be exposed to music, to develop a love for it, to learn that making music is accessible to him, if he should ever desire to do so? (I think you can guess the answer.) Apart from the actual music, I really appreciate that Parker's music teacher begins each class with a song of greeting--during which we all sing/say hello to each child--continually makes eye contact with her students throughout the class and concludes with a song of farewell--during which we all sing/say goodbye to each child. Parker has a hard time with the attention he receives when the class is singing hello or goodbye to him; he usually fails to make eye contact, and never returns the greeting. He's still learning about social niceties. One of these days, he'll look up and say, "Hi!" I'm sure of it.

Postscript: In case you're curious, the St. John School of the Arts does offer private music lessons, so Parker can someday learn to play an instrument like his 9-year-old uncle. OK, everyone breathe a big sigh of relief now.