Vn73.1 Not Being Ready; Logo vs. School 8/26/77
For the past week Miriam has been mentioning that she doesn’t ‘feel
ready for school.’ I’ve tried to find out what Miriam means by her
feeling ‘not-ready.’ In one case, she explained to me that she didn’t
know what they do there. In another incident, at the dinner table,
when Miriam mentioned not being ready for school, I pointed out to her
that she was surely ‘ready’ for Logo and asked both children if they
thought of Logo and school as being the same or different. Robby
answered first, that Logo and school are different.
| Bob | How are they different? |
| Robby | You don’t learn anything at Logo. |
| Bob | Oh? And you do at school? |
| Robby | Yes. |
| Bob | What do you learn? I know you have art, but you knew how to draw before you went to school. |
| Robby | You learn. . . ah. . . mathetating. |
| Bob | Mathetating? |
| Robby | Mathetating; what you do with numbers. |
| Bob | Don’t you ever do adding at Logo? |
| Robby | Yeah, but all you learn at Logo is how to use computers. |
| Miriam | I learned how to write. |
A third incident showed a different perspective.
| Miriam | (To Robby) I wonder what school will be like? Was it very fun in second grade? |
| Robby | Pretty much fun if you have a teacher like Mrs. Johnson and Mrs. – – – [a student teacher] |
| Bob | Miriam, are you more concerned with school’s being fun or your being ready? |
| Miriam | Fun. . . but I’m not sure I’m ready. |
| Bob | In what way? |
| Miriam | They may be different people. I hope not. I want the same people again. |
This last comment recalls the difficulty Miriam had in making friends
at the beginning of the last year. That September was the first major
upsurge of her hayfever allergy (previously only dust and mold had
been diagnosed); her reaction was so severe that she was physically
depressed for the first 8 weeks of school. I surmise she remembers
that time as a very bad time and has vague fears associated with the
returning to school.
Relevance
These three notes touch on Miriam’s sense of being ‘not ready’ for
first grade and some contrast of what they do at school and at Logo.
