Will you help build it back?

Susannah is watching Wesley make a bridge out of felt. Livia and Ellie notice, and jump along the length of it. Wesley expresses concern that they will break it, and indeed, as Livia jumps across it, the felt moves out of place. Livia responds by purposely destroying the bridge. Susannah asks Livia, Do you see Wesley’s face? How do you think he’s feeling? Livia replies, He’s sad. Why do you think he’s sad? His bridge is broken. How do you think we can fix it? Now, as Wesley patiently reconstructs the bridge, Livia hands felt squares to him; she watches closely and takes care to arrange squares that aren’t quite in line. When it’s finished, she jumps over it, not along the top of it; taking care not to disturb the felt. In fact, Livia leaps over the felt lines, not the squares, allowing less chance of her disturbing it. Wesley likes this idea and he jumps over it again and again. When a felt piece gets out of line, Livia fixes it. Other children notice and jump over it: Johann, Josie, Lila. When Jack and Jamie come in from the playground, Jack notices the bridge and works on straightening it out, then carefully walks across it, and Jamie joins him. Then Jamie jumps along it and it becomes partially undone. Like Livia, Jamie destroys it after jumping across it. Jack and Wesley work to fix it, but Jamie takes it apart again.

Susannah asks Wesley how he’s feeling, and Wesley slopes his shoulders and gives a pouted lip in response. But Jamie is not able to acknowledge Wesley’s sadness in the moment, and he leaves the area. Susannah stays by Wesley, acknowledging his feelings, then asks, Should we see if Jamie wants to help us build it back? and Wesley says Yes. They approach Jamie in the bird area. Wesley, do you have a question for Jamie? Wesley does: Will you help build it back? Now Jamie says Yes and they cheerfully return to work on the bridge.

Reflection:

Although children here are interested in drawing with felt by arranging and lining it up, as well as seeing what their bodies can do and perhaps showing off their abilities, there’s much more at play.

As bridges do, this one serves to make connections – physically, cognitively, emotionally.

Perhaps the moment Livia and Jamie realize that the bridge is becoming undone under their feet, they become embarrassed. They appear to understand that they have damaged something. Perhaps they quickly connect the damage with Wesley’s feelings, and, in empathy, understand his sadness. But what comes next, after causing sadness? Perhaps we eliminate the source of the embarrassment – literally breaking the bridge. We might then retreat, finding a place away from there. But, again, what comes next? In a previous post we describe how Jamie stepped on Ellie’s hand by accident, and she told him exactly what to do: say you’re sorry and kiss it. Interestingly, in the case of the bridge, the onus is again up to the child who is hurt: Wesley needs to do the equivalent of “Say you’re sorry” – he has to repair their relationship by asking Will you help build it back?

Perhaps there’s a lesson to be learned here about the role of the victim.