Rolling the Mats

My children have done something at school since they were first starting to walk.   They think everyone does this and it’s just a part of daily life—they roll their mats.    Mats in their school world mean multiple things.   It represents your work area on the floor, your place at snack or a meal or a space within which to do work.  

If a child wants to do a particular activity (“work”) at school they select a mat from a bin (they’re all the same) and then they roll it out onto an open area of the floor.   These mats are place mats in cream or other base colors and aren’t meant to do more than mark off an area of space.  The size of the place mat is reasonable for the work the child will be doing.    The space marked by the mat lets other children know the boundaries of the work so they can respect others work area around them.

When the children eat a meal they get a rolled up place mat and place it on their table area.   When they’re done doing any work or eating, they roll up the mat and place it back in the bin of rolled mats.    For larger work or work for multiple children, there are larger mats that can be used.  

So my daughter, in her fourth year of school now, has a lot of experience rolling mats.   Tonight when we were drying her hair she looked at my small container of white cloths on the bathroom counter and told me, “mom, these need to be rolled.”  She rolled them all for me, stood them up into the container and let me know that her way was better now.

The Big Boy Update:  My son likes swords and anything he can swing around.   Is it a boy thing or influence from media?  I swear, he was able to turn a stick into a weapon three years ago before he had any idea about ninjas or power rangers.    His neighbor friends that are boys seem to feel the same way about “weapons”.    I am monitoring the situation as a parent though…

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  We went to a movie today and my daughter watched some of it but wasn’t interested in watching a lot of the movie.   I had to take her out when we got close to the end.  She did know there were birds and seemed to pay attention for a while.   Was it an inability to see or is it attention span and interest level?  It’s too easy to say it’s visual issues, we’re not completely sure what’s all in play though.