I recently met a friend who talked about his son, who had just started elementary school, who was sitting in the last row of the classroom. Once in an open class, the principal came to listen to the class and sat next to his son. During one lesson, his son left his seat four times and walked around the classroom. When he got home and asked his son why he was walking around, the child said that the first time he went to close the door because he saw the back door open; the second time because the eraser fell down and rolled away, went to pick it up...
The Little Beanie in "Little Beanie by the Window" is a similar child. Why is it called "the little beanie by the window", because the little beanie likes to stand by the window during class, and sometimes the window will walk past the publicity artists, and the little beanie likes to wave at them. Such a small beanie gave the teacher a headache, and he was persuaded to withdraw from school less than a year ago.
It was this child who ended up becoming a famous Japanese writer, TV presenter, and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, ms. Tetsuko Kuroyanagi, the author of "Little Beanie by the Window.".
From an underopportune child to a person who contributes to society, in this book, Ms. Tetsuko Kuroyanagi tells the real reason.
After being expelled from school, she came to Ba Gakuen, and under the love and guidance of Principal Kobayashi Zongsaku, the little beanie who was "weird" in the eyes of ordinary people gradually became a child that everyone could accept, and laid the foundation for her life. This book is about what happened in Ba Gakuen.
01 Tram classroom in Ba Gakuen
The gate of Ba Gakuen is two low trees, the school name sign hangs on the tree, the campus is not large, and various trees are planted around it as a fence.
The six trams parked on campus are classrooms. The car has a luggage mesh rack, the ceiling and floor are the original appearance of the tram, the driver's seat has been replaced by a blackboard, and the tram chair has been replaced by a table and chair for elementary school students, which are placed in the direction of the front of the car.
When children go to class in the classroom, it is as if they are studying and traveling at the same time. Xiao Doudou sat in a chair, full of flowers, and secretly decided: such a good school, I will not miss class, I will come every day.
She looked out the window, and although the tram wouldn't move, the trees and flowers on campus swayed in the wind, feeling like a tram running.
"Ah, so happy!" Xiao Doudou finally couldn't help but make a sound. Then she pressed her face tightly against the glass window, singing unsymborded songs, as she did every time she was happy in her heart.
02 "Taste of the Sea" and "Taste of the Mountains"
There are a total of more than 50 elementary school students in Ba Gakuen, and when they eat lunch, they all go to the auditorium, arrange the tables and chairs in a large circle, and take out the box lunch they brought.
Generally speaking, the school will ask parents to prepare a box lunch "please pay attention to the nutrition and balance", and Mr. Kobayashi, the principal of Ba Gakuen, just asks the parents: "Please let them bring the taste of the sea and the taste of the mountain".
The taste of the sea is like fish, the taste of the mountain is vegetables and meat, Mr. Kobayashi hopes that parents will not be too extravagant, mountain flavor with fried eggs, seafood with sea vegetables can be.
Every time he ate, Mr. Kobayashi looked around the circle at the children's box lunches, and if there was only seafood or only mountain flavor in the box lunch, the principal's wife who was behind him would scoop out the prepared fish balls or sweet potatoes and put them into the children's box lunches.
In this way, no child says "hate to eat fish balls" or the like, and no child will have the idea of "whose dishes are very advanced, whose dishes are always very shabby", as long as the box lunch has the taste of the sea and the taste of the mountains, the children are very happy. At the same time, children themselves can learn what is in the sea and what is in the mountains.
03 The green frog falls into the ancient well, and the silence smells the sound of water
In Ba Gakuen, you will sometimes see such a scene, Mr. Kobayashi playing the piano, each of the children with their own unique expressions, stretching their hands and feet, very intoxicated jumping around, each movement just in line with the beat of music.
This is in a prosody class. Mr. Kobayashi has gone to Europe to investigate and come into contact with this kind of course, the rhythm makes the body and mind feel the rhythm, not only the ears hear music, but let the body and mind can hear and feel the music, help the spirit and the body to achieve harmony, thereby awakening people's imagination and promoting creativity.
Because Mr. Kobayashi is worried that modern education that relies too much on words and language will make children's ability to feel nature and touch inspiration with their hearts gradually weaken.
For example, in the Japanese haiku "Green frog falls into an ancient well, lonely and smells the sound of water", people who see frogs jumping into the pool water are definitely not only Matsuo basho, but there are very few people who can feel it with their hearts.
"The most terrible thing in the world is that you have eyes but you can't find beauty, you have ears but you can't appreciate music, and you have a heart but can't understand what is true." It won't be touching, it won't be passionate..." Mr. Kobayashi sighed.
Introducing prosody to children's education, Mr. Kobayashi believes that it will receive good results. For Doudou, it is very happy to be able to walk around lightly and barefoot like Duncan, bouncing around, and going to class like this.
04 Good friends and big adventures
Tai Ming is a good friend of Xiao DouDou in Ba Gakuen. Tai Ming suffered from polio and walked with one leg dragged.
Almost every child in Ba Gakuen has a "dedicated" tree, and children climb up the forks during recess or after school to look at the sky or look at the pedestrians on the road. Tai Ming does not have his own tree because of his physical relationship, so Xiao Doudou invites Tai Ming to come to his tree to play on the weekend, hoping that Tai Ming can see the beautiful scenery he sees in the tree.
Xiao Doudou dragged a ladder from the tool room, set the ladder on the place where the tree split into two strands, and then whizzed up on his own, holding down the ladder in the tree, and shouting to Tai Ming to climb up. This is the method that Xiao Doudou thought of last night.
But Tai Ming's hands and feet did not have the strength to climb the first step of the ladder. Xiao Doudou quickly turned around and got off the ladder, holding Tai Ming's hips from behind and pushing him up. But the ladder kept sliding, and after trying for a long time, it still didn't work. Tai Ming took his feet off the ladder and silently lowered his head.
Xiao Doudou ran to the tool room and dragged the scaffolding that would not slide, before she had never found herself with such great strength. Tai Ming's body was soaked with sweat, and with the encouragement of Doudou, who was also sweating profusely, he plucked up the courage to raise his legs and walk towards the first level.
From the first step to get the highest level of scaffolding, how much time it took in total, Tai Ming and Xiao Doudou are not clear. In the summer sun, the two men thought nothing. Xiao Doudou followed Tai Ming, lifted Tai Ming's feet with his hands, and put his head on Tai Ming's hips, and the two of them used all their strength, little by little, to finally climb to the top of the scaffolding.
However, the next step is desperately difficult. Xiao Doudou jumped on the branch of the big tree, but no matter how hard she pulled, there was no way to pull Tai Ming to the big tree.
Xiao Doudou was so sad that he wanted to cry. But she didn't cry, and she thought that if she cried herself, Tai Ming would cry too. She reached out and took Tai Ming's hand, which was bent due to polio, and her hand was much larger than Xiao Doudou's. Xiao Doudou told Tai Ming to lie down like sleeping, and she pulled and pulled again.
At this time, if an adult saw Tai Ming lying on the scaffolding, and a little bean standing in a tree pulling him, he would scream, because both children looked shaky.
But Tai Ming already trusted Xiao Doudou very much, and at this moment, Xiao Doudou was also desperately trying, and his small hand tightly held Tai Ming's hand and pulled Tai Ming towards the tree with all his strength.
Finally, the two men stood face to face in the tree. Xiao Doudou bowed while brushing the hair on his face with his hand and said, "Welcome." Tai Ming leaned on the tree and smiled a little shyly, "Disturbed!"
For Tai Ming, this was the first time to see the scenery in the tree, and he said happily: What I saw in the tree was like this.
The two men stayed in the tree for a long time and talked a lot. There was a sound of cicadas around them, and they felt very comfortable.
05 Write at the end
Xiao Doudou is lucky, she has a patient and gentle mother, and also met the excellent educators Mr. Kobayashi and Ba Gakuen.
Xiao Doudou's mother heard that the teacher had asked xiao doudou to withdraw from school in the first grade, and she felt sorry for xiao doudou for disturbing others, and accepted the school's advice to take Xiao doudou away. She didn't get angry, she knew that Doudou was standing by the window or repeatedly opening and closing the desk lid, which was actually the curiosity of the child, and she just told Doudou to go to the new school.
When she first went to Ba Gakuen and saw Xiao Doudou say, "I like this new school too much," she secretly worried that "what matters more than whether you like the new school is whether the principal of the new school likes you or not."
In Ba Gakuen, there will never be children who have done anything wrong, there is no distinction between good students and bad students, and no one will look at children's strange thoughts and exaggerated behaviors with strange eyes.
All this stems from the educational philosophy of the principal, Mr. Kobayashi, who often says: You are all the same, no matter what you do, everyone is the same. For the different little beans, Mr. Kobayashi will always say: You are such a good child!
This sentence affected Xiao Doudou's life. Xiao Doudou remembers that on the first day of arriving at Ba Gakuen, Mr. Kobayashi listened intently to Xiao Doudou's speech for 4 hours, and for the first time in his life, Xiao Doudou felt that he had met someone who really liked him.
I wish all ordinary and extraordinary children could live in a place full of love and patience and be treated gently.