I was reading Walt Whitman's "A Passage to India" from Leaves of Grass yesterday evening when I decided to take a break and watch supposedly random Youtube videos. One of the advertisements was for this new learning program involving CGI trains.
One of the videos showed a train pulling letters in each car, so that young kids could learn them slowly. I thought back to kindergarten in Japan, and how I began almost every class yelling, "A-A-ah-ah!" and waiting for the children's thunderous response, and then all the way through the alphabet with call and response. Sometimes I would speed up to see how fast we could go, then slow down out of nowhere to get some laughs, and then speed up crazily, and then go at a normal pace, and then talk in a whisper, and then yell as loud as I could (they loved responding in kind to that one), and so on and so forth until we had gone through the alphabet.
Another video showed a Brio train set in CGI. Brio trains were my favorite toys when I was seven. You could create entire towns around train tracks.
After the second video I saw a link to a "Little Engine That Could" cartoon, which I hadn't seen in I don't know how long. I know the story by heart, but I probably hadn't heard it since elementary school. It turned out that this version was European and needed to be translated. "The Little Steam Engine from Daisyland." It's for tiny kids, of course, but sometimes those messages are the most profound. I definitely learned that in kindergarten.
Basically, the kids and the business man were on a journey, hoping to arrive at the next station safely. But the train engine liked to stop and notice all of the beauty along the way. He pulls over when he sees some flowers and starts sniffing lilies and rolling around with a look of contented ecstasy on his face.
Businessman: "What a disgrace! We surely will be late at the station!"
Train: "Yes, but so what. If we don't see the first lilies of the valley, we'll be late for the whole of spring!"
Then they continue, but during the night he stops for the nightingales chirping for the first time (or they'll be late for the whole of summer).
Then they stop for the sunrise.
"Sunrise! Each sunrise comes once in a lifetime."
Eventually, when he's won everyone over to his way of train travel, he says to hurry up or they will be late.
"It's time to go! We'll be late," says the train.
"Yes, but if we miss this sunrise, we will be late for the rest of life!" says the businessman.
"But we have to be there on time..." says the train with a smile.
They arrive on time.
When the conductor hears him pulling up, he says, "He's singing again. It means that he's met something VERY interesting..."
One of the videos showed a train pulling letters in each car, so that young kids could learn them slowly. I thought back to kindergarten in Japan, and how I began almost every class yelling, "A-A-ah-ah!" and waiting for the children's thunderous response, and then all the way through the alphabet with call and response. Sometimes I would speed up to see how fast we could go, then slow down out of nowhere to get some laughs, and then speed up crazily, and then go at a normal pace, and then talk in a whisper, and then yell as loud as I could (they loved responding in kind to that one), and so on and so forth until we had gone through the alphabet.
Another video showed a Brio train set in CGI. Brio trains were my favorite toys when I was seven. You could create entire towns around train tracks.
After the second video I saw a link to a "Little Engine That Could" cartoon, which I hadn't seen in I don't know how long. I know the story by heart, but I probably hadn't heard it since elementary school. It turned out that this version was European and needed to be translated. "The Little Steam Engine from Daisyland." It's for tiny kids, of course, but sometimes those messages are the most profound. I definitely learned that in kindergarten.
Basically, the kids and the business man were on a journey, hoping to arrive at the next station safely. But the train engine liked to stop and notice all of the beauty along the way. He pulls over when he sees some flowers and starts sniffing lilies and rolling around with a look of contented ecstasy on his face.
Businessman: "What a disgrace! We surely will be late at the station!"
Train: "Yes, but so what. If we don't see the first lilies of the valley, we'll be late for the whole of spring!"
Then they continue, but during the night he stops for the nightingales chirping for the first time (or they'll be late for the whole of summer).
Then they stop for the sunrise.
"Sunrise! Each sunrise comes once in a lifetime."
Eventually, when he's won everyone over to his way of train travel, he says to hurry up or they will be late.
"It's time to go! We'll be late," says the train.
"Yes, but if we miss this sunrise, we will be late for the rest of life!" says the businessman.
"But we have to be there on time..." says the train with a smile.
They arrive on time.
When the conductor hears him pulling up, he says, "He's singing again. It means that he's met something VERY interesting..."
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