To those of you familiar with the story of 'The Gingerbread Man,' I hope you will find this post to be a fun one! I must ask a favor of you before you begin reading...if you have a preschooler or kindergartener looking over your shoulder, please hide their eyes from this post...kindergarten surprises await them! That's all I ask :)
Every year, since I started teaching kindergarten, my team of teachers and I always read our students 'The Gingerbread Man,' Pictures by: Karen Schmidt (and other Gingerbread Man stories). If you have never read this story or any version of this story, I highly recommend it! This one is about an old woman and a little boy who make a gingerbread man. Ignoring the warning from the little old woman about not opening the oven door before the time is up, the tempted little boy smells that yummy gingerbread smell and opens that oven door prematurely just to peek. Out jumps the gingerbread man who has just come to life (because naturally, that's what happens when you open the oven too soon with gingerbread cookies)! The front door of the house opens, the gingerbread man makes a run for it, and a chase ensues. I won't spoil the ending, but it's a good one!
These last three years of teaching, I have been in charge of this gingerbread man experience. We bring all of the kindergarteners into my classroom (about 88 five-year olds), and during the next forty-five minutes, it's gingerbread man heaven! I read the story.
After reading, and getting the students all excited about the story, we ask them if they would like to try to make a gingerbread man. Of course the response from them is always one of cheering, shouts of "yes," and eyes wide with excitement! We teachers, always anticipating this to be the case, casually pull out a mixing bowl, spoon, gingerbread box, butter, flour, and baking pan (or we just happen to have them on hand in case there's a need for gingerbread). Volunteers come up to help mix him all together, and then I assemble the pieces.
This year, I asked them if they wanted me to put legs on the little guy. Our conversation went something like this:
"Yes, he has to have legs!"
"But what if he runs?" I ask.
"He won't run, that's just in the story!"
"Are you sure you want me to put legs on him?"
"Yes!"
"Okay, I'll put legs if you really want me to. What about feet? Should I add feet then?"
"Yes, he has to have feet too!"
"Alrighty then! You're taking your chances!"
Here's what he ended up looking like:
When the gingerbread man is complete (legs and feet and all), we march him down to the oven in the faculty room, pop him in. Of course we warn the office ladies, "Please do not open the oven door, even if he smells really, really good!" It's fun to hear them explain what happens if you open the door too soon!
Back to our classes we head until it's time to retrieve him.
While we are away, someone smells that gingerbread man, opens that oven door, and away he goes. When we come back to get him, he's already gone. The office staff tells them the story of what happened, and off we go in search of our gingerbread man!!
These last couple of years the kids have handled his disappearance very well...I've had two criers (oops) in the past who "just really wanted to eat him!" We look and look for him, but he never shows up that day.
The next day I read the story "The Gingerbread Baby" by Jan Brett. From this story, it's obvious that we need to make a gingerbread house (or four, one for each kindergarten class) to catch our gingerbread man. He comes, takes some bites of the house (sometimes demolishes the house), and leaves us a note. The gingerbread man is nice. He thanks us for the delicious house and says he'll write back soon.
We still haven't found our gingerbread man from this year, but we know he's been to Montana...someone (a friend of mine) spotted him and tried to catch him and sent us a postcard explaining. Our gingerbread man just said, "Run, run, as fast as you can, you can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man!"
My kindergarteners would be happy if I asked all our readers out there to please keep your eyes open for our gingerbread man and if you find him, they would tell you, "Please don't eat him, just bring him back and we'll share!" (at least that's what they told our principal!)
