Three Pillars of the Super Primes (4 year-olds)
With school beginning only a week and a half ago and the weather finally showing signs of the season’s end, it's been nice to watch things begin to “fall into place”. Here in Super Primes we have begun to fill our 3 “ships'' for the year. These ships are our three main pillars of what it means to be a Super Prime: Friendship, Stewardship, Allyship.
Friendship
“This is not RuPaul’s best friend race” - Lashawn Beyond, RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 4
A Super Prime is a Super Friend. There are no best friends in Super Primes. We are all friends. In our class the rule is: if we can't play with everyone, we can't play with anyone. Therefore the answer to the question “Can I play with you?” is always “Yes!”. As a pack, it is our job to make sure that each one of us has a space in our group. One of the biggest ways we show up for each other is friendship. Inclusion is important in Super Primes. We have mealtime conversations about our lives outside of school. Through observing and listening to each other, we learn who each one of us is. We learn our likes, our loves, our dislikes, we learn who our people are. We learn how to communicate with each other. We learn how to support each other. We learn to work through problems. We get consent. We remember that some friends communicate differently. They may not always use words. They may feel nervous saying no. How do we know if we have consent? There are more ways to know other than NO! — We learn to watch the many different signals for consent. While reading Yes! No!: A First Conversation About Consent by Jessica Ralli and Megan Madison, we learned different ways to identify when you don't have consent. Friends may use phrases like: stop!, maybe later, not really, I don't like that!, not today, I don't know. Friends may use their bodies to tell us they do not give consent. This can look like: hands up, arms crossed, body turned away, one hand up, a sad expression on the face, shaking the head from side to side, using the sign for no, and NOT answering. A super friend has to accept when they don't have consent. Super Friends have to respect their friend’s decision even if it's hard to take.
Stewardship
“Stewardship is not a spectator sport” -Unknown
A Super Prime is a steward of the community including the space they inhabit. Our school is like our home away from home. We take action and show care for our second home. We all maintain our community by taking care of our spaces. We care for our grounds, trails, playgrounds, and woods. We respect the land, we make paths, maintain our forts, and replenish areas of our woods spot by giving them back to nature, allowing healing from the heavy traffic of our play. We remove our shoes upon entry to our classrooms. We do helper jobs delivering meals and nap mats to each other. We clean up after ourselves, When we are done with something we “leave it nice for the next friend”. We help each other. The answer to finding a mess is never “I didn't do it!” but rather “I can help”.
Allyship
“Allyship is not an identity, it’s a verb—it requires constant action” -Desiree Adaway
A Super Prime is always working to become an ally. Since the beginning of our time together we have been exploring the many ways we are creating community. First we examined what it means to be in a community. We talked about what it means to be together. As we begin to learn our commonalities, we begin to learn and celebrate our differences. This is a big part of the path to becoming an ally. Through observing and listening to each other, we learn who we are. Then we start to identify each of our needs so we can work toward building allyship in our pack.
During one of our first meal discussions we asked a big question: What are our needs?
These were some of our answers:
Some friends need to move a lot.
Some friends need to use a quiet voice.
Some people need more time to think.
Some people need quiet and get uncomfortable when there are loud sounds.
Some people need extra cuddles and lovies.
Some people need to use a loud voice.
Some people need to not be touched.
Some people need time alone.
Some people need something to do with their hands.
Some people don't hear.
Some people don't see.
Some people need extra space.
All people have different bodies that need different things.
The book We Move Together by Kelly Fritsch, Anne McGuire and Eduardo Trejos acts as a guide to building our understanding of allyship, including the idea that different people need different things. By moving together, we accommodate everyone! Everyone goes at the same time and no one can be left behind or left out. This is of course unless a friend chooses to be left out by virtue of taking space. Even in those instances we always check on our friends and see how we can bring them back into our group work.
Learning our needs help us make love and safety for everyone possible.
We are all so different but we all want to feel safe and loved. For some that is more attainable than others. For Super Primes, we will actively commit to making safety and love attainable for everyone.