Stickers

In a public school we have to be very conscientious of parents belief systems and it can get challenging when the beliefs of different cultures impact what we are used to doing. For instance, there are several students that do not celebrate birthdays or holidays. My student teacher asked if she could give one of these students a shamrock sticker at the end of the session. (Stickers are a hot commodity in kindergarten and first grade)

I explained that she could give the child a shamrock sticker but not on St. Patrick’s Day. The parents had told me at a previous meeting that they saw every day as equal… so they did not want any more importance placed on any one day, but they did not have a problem with the individual items. (An example this parent gave was that they can have cake… just not as a celebration of their birthday) Pepper walked into the room as I was giving another example of what the parents had told me.

Me: “They said they always dress up in their nicest clothes because they never know when they will meet their maker.”

Pepper: “My maker can see me and can wait until I’m wearing something he thinks is nice before he decides to take me.” :)