My Client is a Pint-Sized Hurricane
The terrible twos. Every parent’s favorite urban legend until it becomes their daily reality. In early childhood education (ECE), two-year-olds often top the list of the “Most Trying” (read: Worst) Students. Even the professionals get outwitted, out-cried, and totally worn down by these pint-sized hurricanes in diapers. Developmentally, two-year-olds live in the strange space between babyhood and preschooler. On one hand, they still need diaper changes every couple of hours, scatter food like it’s performance art, and possess a supernatural ability to scream at pitches so shrill they could shatter glass. On the other hand, they’re chatting, dancing, running, solving puzzles, playing pretend, and even pulling off the occasional prank. (Pulling off is rather generous. Maybe more like dropping a lego down your shirt and laughing maniacally).
The adult responsible for a two-year-old is dealing with a manipulative, brilliant baby who just underwent a cognitive explosion. One who now has access to language, colors, shapes, animals, people, stories, and emotions, and yet still poops their pants and demands full-time attention. In simpler terms, a constantly understimulated, highly verbal bomb with sticky hands and zero self-regulation.
It should come as no surprise that preschools struggle to hire educators for their 2 year old classrooms. Any sane ECE professional knows that 3’s, 4’s, and 5’s are far better regulated, routined, and are able to handle a level of complexity that makes lesson planning and execution more productive and enjoyable. On the flip side of the age range, infants have the benefit that their cries are an indication of a fairly limited set of needs - cuddles, food, sleep, burp, diaper change. Toddlerhood is essentially the human’s first puberty: the physical and cognitive changes endow such a huge amount of power that the prior baby-mode operating system is overloaded. It will take time and tantrums for the body, mind, and soul to adjust into this new level of growth.
So what’s in it for me as a brand new Lead Teacher for a Two Year Old classroom? It’s definitely not the money, and from my year long teaching internship and trial days I promise it’s not because I think it will be at all easy, good for my nervous system, or because the cuteness is gonna make up for the inevitable shit everywhere. (In fact, I’m actually partially writing this so when I’m bashing my head into the wall I’ll have documentation of how I justified my own insanity).
Here are five reasons why I chose Two. I’ll check back in in a few months, perhaps when I’m a little less green, and let you know which ones stick. (Or maybe I will have already sprinted for the hills, long over my sparking eyes).
Two is when we start to introduce the most basic, daily-use cognitive concepts like letters and numbers! I am thrilled to be one of the people revealing the magic of 26 simple characters, our alphabet, and offering names to some of the intuitive patterns our kiddos are already clocking like numbers, shapes, and colors. It is a true honor to be the one who figures out how to best introduce the tiny human to two of their greatest tools: language and mathematics.
Two means that my job does not start and end in the art of academic teaching. I am also a teacher of life: how do you wash your hands, or go to the bathroom, how do you get the food off the plate and into your mouth? How do you take turns or use words instead of aggression or a tantrum, or appropriately show your affection to the people you love? How do you put yourself to sleep, dance joyfully while being mindful of your body, keep your hands out of your mouth and your pants, and not rub your boogers all over someone else? How do you find ways to feel okay away from your caretakers, and play with new friends, talk to friends who are different from you? How do you give a gift or a compliment or say “I love you”? Yes, it means the job gets pretty fucking gross sometimes. But if I do my job, if I serve you well, you will use these skills every single day for the rest of your life. And that, that my friends is such a special role to play in a human life. I can’t quite believe that it’s me that gets to do it.
Two is a lifestyle of cuddles and hugs. I get so many sweet hugs from little chubby arms, most of the time for absolutely no reason at all. Twos are so in touch (pun intended) with an aspect of humanity that the adult world has long divorced from: gentle, affectionate, safe physical touch. It is so regulating for them, and, frankly, it regulating for me. These small things burrow into my chest, and all of a sudden the world seems to be weightless.
Two is when you start to see the person emerge from what has so far been, an alien of an infant. I get to be there as the cocoon flakes apart and the first solid semblance of a personality, now empowered by words, begins to make itself known. The first experimentations of “what kind of human am I going to be?” happen within the walls of our classroom.
Two is when we learn that we can do hard things, and we can make it through a hard time. Being two is really hard. Like I said, it really is like a puberty of young childhood. You are learning to make sense of this unbelievably powerful body, brain, and heart for the first time. You’re going to drive a lot of people batshit crazy as you figure it out, and a lot of people who don’t absolutely have to are probably not going to put up with it. But you are going to figure it out, and you don’t have to do it alone. I’m here to help you and hug you along the way, along with your parents, families, friends, other educators, and pets. The beauty of making it through Two is that we knit inside you the knowledge that you are resilient, you are adaptive, and you are loved. If we adults do our jobs, and those gems are safely tucked in your heart, it won’t matter if the entire world forgets someday. You won’t. You’ll know forever. You are a warrior.
I’m excited to meet you, little ones!
X
Meena
