Following the leader

Source: http://www.marthabeck.com/

I took Miss L for a demo gym class in the West Village last week and it became very apparent that Miss L is just too independent of a girl to follow the leader.

An elaborate obstacle course was set up for the kids with tunnels and stairs. After some open play time, the class instructor asked all of the kids to follow her through the obstacle course in a specific sequence. All of the kiddies lined right up and started climbing through the course. Miss L took one look and then ran over to the middle of the obstacle course to climb up the stairs in the opposite direction of everyone else.

Then Miss L noticed everything that was not part of the obstacle course. She tried to climb over the barriers to an empty theater stage. She noticed stairs, not the multiple stairs set up for the obstacle course, but the stairs leading outside, which were obviously not part of the obstacle course.

After chasing Miss L around I breathed a sigh of relief when the class instructor called everyone to the middle of the room to sing songs. As everyone sat down in a circle for the butterfly song (think of the butterfly pose in yoga and then shake your legs like the wings of a butterfly while singing) I watched as some of our little friends from playgroup kissed their toes at the end of the song as prompted by the class instructor. Meanwhile Miss L decided she wanted to stand up and dance around the circle.

Miss L definitely dances to the beat of her own drum. I think the Montessori school system is calling her name. It also looks like she inherited the independent spirit that seems to run in Mister T's family.