Walking the "OSHCIES" - Part one

Part of my role as the coordinator of After School Hours Care; and with 2 or 3 other educators is to walk between 20 and 30 children from one school to the other school where the OSHC building is located. The walk is only about 500 metres up the road but we walk to the west, in full sun and this is done at between 2:15 to 2:45PM; essentially the hottest part of the day ranging between 35 - 45 degrees with varying levels of humidity depending on the season. There IS NO option to close school early when it gets higher than 35 degrees; that is life in the Kimberley. The Kimberley Kids are tough; born tough and live tough but these kids are also like any other kid in Australia and this is a narrative that occurs nearly every day when I pick up the children and walk them to OSHC.

To look at us from the air, we look like a higgledy piggledy blue snake winding and weaving its way from point A to point B with several stops along the way

I have changed the names for privacy reasons but Im sure you will get the drift.

 

I collect the youngest children from their pre-primary classroom. These children have just started school; average age of 4 -5 years old; 8 AM till 2 PM five days per week and they are exhausted.

One child is sitting in the doorway of his class room retrieving his OSHC hat and loading his backpack with his reader, library book, drink bottle, lunchbox, school hat and notices.

Other children are scrambling to get past him to their parents who are waiting outside the classroom under a corrugated iron verandah - temperature is easily 40 degrees but there are no heatgry outbursts. Heatgry is like hangry.......heat induced anger.

Dry heat and humid heat are part of life in the Kimberley and people seem to be immune to it.

 

Another pre primary child doesn't want to go to OSHC. She has just started and doesn't cope with the walk just yet. A year 4 girl nicknamed Charlie offers to hold her hand while walking. Charlie is a great kid who loves dance, singing and is always available to assist with the younger kids. I will write another whole blog on Charlie and her brother George.

I have finally gathered up all of the pre primary children (its like herding kittens) and walk to the meeting area where they are putting on sunscreen, hats and getting ready to ship out. It sounds like a military precision operation but it is not. It is the exact opposite.

In my loudest voice I call "Ok Oshcies....time to go".

We ship out........we get past the first obstacle - the kindy gate. George holds the gate open for us all to walk through and then runs quickly to the front of the group to resume the role of Looker 1.

By this point Looker 2 (Brad) and I have reached the first checkpoint where we all stop under the shade of a gumtree and wait for the stragglers to catch up.

"Camilla; You need to do your shoe laces up" and "Andrew, where is your hat? No you cant go back to your class room to get it; you will have to wear a spare one. Here is one that has the Freo Dockers on it. Its not a girls hat". Right everybody are we ready to go? and we start walking to the next stop; the first cross road.

As we approach the first cross road which is also the teachers car park, we see Mr Marley.

"Hello Mr Marley" call out all the children as he rides his bike past....."Hi kids" he replies with a friendly wave.

We cross the first road without incident and there is a callout from one of my team that Phillip has lost one of his shoes. We keep walking to the next shady spot while Phillip and my team member and 3 other children retrieve the lost shoe and tighten the shoe laces yet again.

We keep walking and Charlie starts singing "you've got a friend in me" from Toy Story. Its a song she is learning in choir and Charlies little hesitant friend is singing too. "YES" I think to myself; I think we have made a connection.

Then we cross the next road which is the TAFE. It is usually quite busy but most of the time, the traffic stops for us.

We must be a sight to see. Past the TAFE is the creek and overgrown grassy snake home.

The usual conversation goes something like this.........

"Andrew and Edward; stay on the footpath. There are snakes in there."

Sophie and Catherine; keep walking. The water monitor is gone today"

Beatrice and Edward; put down to sticks, we have sticks to paint at OSHC.

Eugenie and Harry; keep walking, we are nearly there.

 

At last we are at our final cross road which is right outside the greenery of the school where our OSHC building is. We group together and as quietly as 30, tired and thirsty school kids can be, we walk across the shady grass area to our OSHC building where we take off our shoes, have a big drink and sit down to cool down, rest and crunch on some apple or carrot while practicing some grounding and mindfulness activities or share any news that children have.