I’m not sure how it is at other schools in our area, but at our school, 1st grade is the time for studying the rainforest. Each 1st grade class transforms from a regular classroom into a rainforest jungle. It’s actually pretty amazing. In one part of the classroom is a large tree with “leaves” of crepe paper draping down, paper mache snakes “slithering” around, large frogs and spiders, birds, monkeys…… Even though it’s obviously a man-made rainforest, you actually expect to hear sounds of the jungle to be heard at any time. These rainforests are kept up until the end of the school year, making it neat to walk through the classrooms at Open House. The 1st grade classrooms get the most traffic at that time.

Along with transforming the classroom, the classes learn about the rainforest through several projects. My son’s class performed a musical play for us parents. My son was the Boa. His part was to try and talk a curious frog into climbing on his back for a trip up to the top of the rainforest to get a better view. In other words, it was to give the frog a “friendly” hug, as only a Boa Constrictor can do. For weeks, my son sang his part in the car, in the shower, at the dinner table, trying out the song with different accents and emotions. Of course, once in front of the crowd, he sang it as regular as possible. But with hand motions. And with nervousness on his sleeve.

The final project is for each student to choose an animal and write a report on it, and include an art project that showcases their chosen animal. My son chose the Toucan. And for two weeks I scoured the bookstore and went through every single wildlife magazine they had and came to this conclusion: animal magazines don’t consider the Toucan to be an animal. That had to be the case, because there was not one article or glossy photo of a Toucan anywhere. But luckily, my parent’s are the proud owners of a color printer that printed out some pretty great pictures I found on the internet.

We, of course, saved this project till the last minute. It’s due on Monday, I gathered material on Friday night, we wrote the report on Saturday, and we created the project today, Sunday.

That’s the short story. Here’s the real story……

My son, as many of you know, is a video game addict. If he doesn’t get his video games as usual on the weekends, it is like weening him off crack. He is a mess. And the rule this weekend was that he was not allowed to play video games until his project was completed, and his room was clean. On Saturday morning we went to the art store. I scoured the aisles as he whined about how long we were taking, and how we were always doing what I wanted to do despite my constant reminder that we were there for his project. I picked up paints, a glue gun, poster board, fake plants, clear glass jewels, and green felt. Back home, I went through the papers that I had printed out with information about the Toucan. I read him the questions the teacher wanted him to cover, and then read the Toucan information to him, prompting him to come up with the answers himself. This went kind of like this:

Me: “Alright son, what does the Toucan look like?”

Son: “Are we almost done?”

Me: “No, we need to write the report still.”

Son: “When can I play video games?”

Me: “I already told you, when your report is done. Now, what does the Toucan look like?”

Son: “It’s black. How many more minutes do we have?”

Me: “We’ve just started. Now, what else can you say to describe the Toucan?”

Son: “I already told you! It’s black!”

Me: “So you’re saying it’s black with a yellow face and a big, colorful bill?”

Son: “Yes. How much more do we have?”

Me: “Not much more. (reading) ‘The toucan lives in southern Mexico and South America.’ Now, where does the toucan live?”

Son: “In the rainforest.”

Me: “Yes, but where?”

Son: “In a tree.”

Me: “But where is the tree?”

Son: “In the rainforest.”

Me: “In southern Mexico and South America.”

Son: “Yes. Now am I done?”

Me: “No. Let me just write this down. The toucan also eats papayas, cantaloupes, bananas……”

Son: “Why are you writing all that?! That’s too many words! This is going to take forever!” (starts crying)

Me: “It’s not a lot of words. But we have to answer the questions your teacher asked in this report. And I’m helping you. All you have to do is copy all the words I’m writing down. Now where were we?”

Son: “Can I play video games now?”

This went on for awhile. When it finally came time for him to write his own words, new tears would come as each sentence ended. You would have thought I was torturing him. Constant questions of “how much more?” and “are we done?” and “am I halfway through?” and “can I stop now?” were asked. Also included was, “can I play video games now?” Finally we were done.

Me: “Now we just need to paint the poster board.”

Son: “Waaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”

I finally gave in and painted the board myself, figuring he would be doing enough the next day when we cut out felt leaves and paper toucans, and pasted them on the board with the fake plants and the gem raindrops. And I gave in and let him play video games for a short while since he had already done “so much”.

The next day after breakfast I pulled out the dried poster board and took out the felt. On each felt piece I traced a bunch of leaves for him to start cutting out. Me, my daughter, and my son all sat down to start cutting. And my son burst into tears when he saw how many leaves we had to cut. And then he cried when I said we had to cut out the toucans. And then he cried when we had to paste them down.

“Now are we done?” my son asked as we glued down the last leaf.

“No, now we have to glue down the raindrops and the plants,” I replied as my daughter plugged in the glue gun.

And he cried.

We did eventually finish the project. And it came out pretty well.

Next year the big project is a report on a country. I can’t wait.

Email me at winecountry.singlemom@yahoo.com.