look out world

There are 26 French children who know the English alphabet that didn't know it this morning. Please hold your applause.



26 genius children, 26 letters.
I wish I could say 26 was also the number of times some punk yelled "ZIZI!!!" after we said the letter Z.
But unfortunately that was more like 260.

I made an alphabet poster where each letter is colored with the color that shares a vowel sound.
A sounds like gray, Q sounds like blue, Z-- ("ZIZI!!!") ...thank you, sounds like green.

For a few minutes, R was a mess, because they didn't know any color that sounded like it (not the first time I've regretted omitting chartreuse from the color lesson.) But then one of my favorite weapon-obsessed seven-year-olds saved the day, by pointing out that R sounds like the French word for "firearm". Soon everyone was waving imaginary pistols in the air and yelling "AAARRRR!" I doubt any of them will ever forget that letter. Or be convinced that Americans aren't cowboys.

The gun-brandishing, the "I as in iPod!" and "K as in OK!" and the "ZIZI!!!" chorus - it was a pretty outrageous day. And at the end of it, there were 26 kids who knew the alphabet.

And now you can clap.