You Want Me To WHAT?

The end of the school year. Parties, laughter, two weeks of standardized testing for the different grade levels. Wait a minute there. Two weeks of standardized testing?!?! They waited until the last few weeks of school for this? And then they asked me to try to keep 11 preschoolers, 11 three and four year olds who can apparently smell summer on the wind and taste it in the sunshine, 11 children who have rediscovered every old behavior I thought we had permanently destroyed, absolutely quiet on testing days. Apparently laughter was not the response they were looking for because it did not receive a warm welcome. Once I swallowed my mirth at the idea of somehow keeping that number of children anywhere near quiet at this time of year, we began to problem solve. Since I am in no way able to predict when several of my children will burst forth into loud noise (either in joy or anger) the final decision was made that perhaps on testing days for the grades in our hallway it would be best if we spent as much time as possible outside. Compared to trying to keep the mob quiet, I can handle playing outside. We can play games, read under a tree, play on the playground, do sidewalk chalk, ride bikes, play with bubbles, go for a walk, take the water table outside, play ball, paint with water on the sidewalk and the building, pick wildflowers (weeds..shh, don't tell the kids), etc. What we can not do is control the weather and the fact that it is supposed to rain on some of the testing days. Um, we don't have a plan B here. Plan B is to keep them absolutely quiet and Plan B is about as likely to occur as me winning the Utah lottery. I have a feeling that I am going to receive a lot of intra-building calls telling me to keep my kids quiet and I will ask for volunteers to come on down and try to keep a preschooler quiet. The Prize? Your very own preschooler on testing days. Because short of feeding them candy until they explode, or letting them quietly destroy the building, there is no way to keep them silent. I wonder if the principal would let us come play in her office for a while? :) I am sure there are plenty of neat things there that would help us stay quiet. We have already worn out our welcome in the library, the computer lab is just a bad idea altogether, and the gym is taken all day for the older kids. I may resort to popcorn and videos for at least a few minutes of guaranteed quiet - that is if no one steals anyone else's popcorn, if no one touches or looks at anyone else, if everyone agrees on the same video, if everyone can see, and if the air currents remain absolutely stable. It is like herding cats through a waterfall, and trying to keep them quiet while doing so. But the kids? They are so much fun right now as we ride bikes, make kites, play in water, play dress up (I wore butterfly wings all day last week because they asked me to and I am totally willing to look like an idiot if it encourages language and social skills), make rapid new understandings (community helpers connected for everyone in so many ways), explore the world around them, discover things outside for the first time or all over again (bugs! caterpillars! dirt! leaves! flowers! birds! blades of grass! puddles! rocks!), and show off a year's worth of learning and personality. Even with the behaviors coming back (they are ready for a break), this is the best time of year because they have come so far and made such progress. And like today, their behavior was awesome! Still, I have to ask, when it comes to keeping them silent, you want me to WHAT?!?