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Trigger Warnings For Those About to Enter Kindergarten

Trigger Warnings For Those About to Enter Kindergarten
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Warning: the contents of this article might be offensive to some. In that, it might make you conjure up images of snot, mucous, throw-up, broken arms and the like. Consider yourself trigger warned.

Last weekend's Globe and Mail had an article in its Focus section about trigger alerts. Essentially, trigger alerts are advance warnings that might alert one to potentially harmful, anxiety-inducing, adverse information found in course material, books, public and private settings and environments, writing and other venues of transmitting influential stuff that might need censoring.

In other words, someone could be bothered at the very least and offended at the most by what they encounter.

According to the article, university professors are being asked to provide trigger warnings in advance of their course readings so that any sort of ill-effect, including panic attacks and anxiety disorders that might be provoked by the influence of the potential literature could be avoided. That is, through using a trigger warning so as to alert.

Essentially, trigger warnings are kind of like car horns: they jar you so that you pay close attention. Or kind of like the jarring bellow of a teacher just before her student runs in front of the swing-set. You get the idea.

The thought of which gave me pause to consider the various trigger warnings that I should offer to all those incoming students of mine who are going to be attending my upcoming K classes in the fall. The four year-olds, that is. If I was to provide a trigger warning for them, here's what it would look like:

Be aware, Prospective Clients of the Public School System. Entering the educational system and thus attending kindergarten classes might bring on the following adverse, unpleasant affects:

1. Sickness, after you come into contact with every cold and flu virus known to humankind, which incidentally must FIRST cross the threshold of the school doorways before filtering out into the world at large.

2. Dirty, filthy clothing, as you wear said 'virus' proudly like a badge (because I can guarantee: you will be wiping your nose all over those super-adorable little shirts and dresses that looked spick and span when you left home in the morning but look like a compost dispenser by the end of the day).

3. All manner of cuts and bruises, as you manage to find every dangerous corner, table, wall and other sharp object or the like inside every classroom, hallway, music room, gym and secretary's office within the school. And yes, quite possibly even the bus.

4. All manner of broken body parts, (yes again, I said that right), as you experiment with gravity on the outdoor playground equipment. Or school banister railings.

5. Writer's cramp, as you are reminded for the bazillionth time to hold your pencil with proper, standardized pencil grip.

6. Discriminating taste buds, as you realize halfway through the month of September that you still have twelve years ahead of you eating Flakes of Ham sandwiches.

7. Joy at discovering that mom has no idea what happens to said 'sandwich' when Teacher turns her head to read out the lunch menu. For that matter, neither does Teacher.

8. Cold, wet feet, upon discovering that playing soccer in mud puddles a foot deep causes one's clothing from the hip down to become completely soaked. And then some.

9. A propensity to needing bandages, as you discover that sticky, adhesive substances are quite fun to apply to the body. And then rip off two seconds later.

10. A paranoid sense of personal space as your teacher patiently explains to you why standing one cm from a person's mouth is not far enough away.

These are merely the top ten. I could write more. So much, much more.

The author of the Globe article goes on to cite a recent Atlantic Monthly critiqueon the topic of micromanaged kids and their helicopter parents: "Kids are no longer left alone to find their way, invent spontaneous and sometimes risky forms of play, to confront and overcome unknowns, to do things themselves, and to fall, fail and then get back up again."

To which I say, au contraire. Where there is a will, there is always a way.

I was on outdoor duty Friday, and I can assure this good man that children are still testing the waters of safety, running towards the road, hiding beneath trees, escaping the confines of their boundaries, sitting on the top of the monkey bars, sliding down the slide backwards, hitting one another over the head with pinecones, branches and possibly rocks (oh my nerves) and banging into each other when playing and running.

Falling down. And then getting back up again. And interestingly, some of these kids do have helicopter parents.

And while I see that there is still a propensity towards anxiety in children of helicopter parents, by and large, most kids are running around full-tilt, as if their life depended on it. And loving every, single minute of it.

'Cause that's their job. It's what they have to do.

At least, it is for the healthy, happy P.E. Island kids I know and teach.

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