The Discovery Channel Presents... Recess

Bowl games started early this year, with the Montana State University vs. SUNY-Albany lunchtime football special. Yes, the two seventh grade classes decided to face off on the playground. We could barely contain their excitement in the lunch line. Sit down! Stop screaming from one table to another! It sounds like fun, but if it ends in a fight.... Just don't get so excited that you end up angry. The game itself went well, even on pavement, with no clear yard lines and sixth graders racing through, immersed in their own play. I suspect it will continue tomorrow.

Nature videos say play is practice for adulthood. Young lions practice stalking each other through the tall grass. Young birds try out the tricks of flight. Young humans practice... chasing the girls and hitting them with a foam ball? chasing the boys while dodging double-dutch games? hopping on one foot on numbered squares? tossing objects through hoops?

Some children prefer the company of adults to that of other children. These are the kids who bring books to lunch, then stand against the wall reading, or stand next to me and chat. Or the ones who come up to me again and again with interesting or random questions: Is it true that lightning never strikes the same spot twice? How much do you weigh? Did they play hopscotch when you were a kid?

Other kids are the athletes, and take football or basketball very seriously. Still others hang out near the fence, as far from the teachers as possible, huddled in cliques, hashing out the latest she-likes-him-but-he-likes-that-other-girl dramatics. This year, we have several groups of committed rope-jumpers; I promised them I will jump one day when I'm not in a skirt.