der Musikgarten
For the past few weeks Leo and I have been going to a Mutter und Kinder (Mother and Child) music class in a small yoga studio in a close-by neighborhood. The first Wednesday, we arrived 37 minutes into the 40 minute class, since the directions Claudia Kuhn gave me, in English, were not all that good. Well, actually, they were terrible, but today, before Leo’s 3rd class, I found out why. Claudia, the teacher, is from the GDR (former East Germany), and English just was not a priority during her school days. She assured me that her Russian was better. In truth, her English isn’t that bad—she was able to tell me this story in the past tense and I understood it fine.
My German, on the other hand, is still horrible. I am learning a lot of it in these classes, however. There are lots of songs and games that use basic vocabulary (body parts, actions, sounds, etc.), designed for little language learners… That these songs also help me has been an unexpected benefit. Today, though, I had a moment of embarrassment during a song about parts of the face that involved the touching and naming of the nose, eyes, etc. I was dutifully following along, touching my own face parts, when I looked around to see that all the other mothers were actually touching their babies’ faces. But never mind the face, a lot of those words are really similar to English, anyway. Here are some helpful words I have picked up in these music classes.
Stompen
Stompen means to “stomp”, like stomp your feet on the floor. The teacher starts each class with a welcome song that also functions to teach us all the babies’ names. The basic idea is “We’re [bodily action] for [baby’s name]”. So, while we’re patting for Dominic, rubbing for Enja, hugging for Emma and nodding for Simon, for some reason, we’re stomping for Leo. It is not a surprise, since so far he has been the highest energy kid in the group, racing around from corner to corner and squealing with enthusiasm at the mere presence of the other ones. So, let’s stomp for him I guess.
Schlag
This words means heavy. It was Leo’s turn to… how to describe it… gong the um… big metal thing that you see in a drum set? A cymbal? So he grabbed the stick (mallet) and began to gong away, amazed at how he could make that studio fill up with sound. As a few of us winced involuntarily, Claudia looked at me and said kindly, “Schlag!” It was then that I also realized just why my morning coffee had been tasting so good—I had been using heavy cream (schlagsahne) in it.
Kopf
This word means head, and I heard it in the context of “Nicht in der kopf”, “Not on the head”, which is what I heard another mother saying in response to Leo’s love pats to another, somewhat younger boy. It is new for me and for Leo to have him be the big kid in a group, since at daycare in Atlanta he was the youngest. He clearly knows that he is the oldest and biggest, which is why he gets so physical. I tried to control this behavior by using Fernando’s trick of reminding Leo to touch softly. It worked pretty well, but I stood close by in case there was more heavy head patting.
Kurz
Means short. This word I heard several times as a few mothers searched around to find a smaller drumstick for Leo to play with. The teacher had surprised me when she handed Leo one of the biggest drumsticks in her basket, and sure enough, Leo waved it up and down frantically in close range to other heads. He used the stick mostly to tap it on the floor, as was the designated way to handle it for this activity, but occasionally would move it from side to side, which is when it was confiscated and exchanged for a less dangerous, shorter stick.
Er ist in sein element
Well, in context, this can only mean one thing. Claudia looked at me and said “He is in his element”. And he definitely was… he was sitting with his drumsticks, surrounded by about four other kids, all of them stomping there sticks on the floor to the music. He really was having fun, and hadn’t actually hurt anyone for the entire class.
After the class, I went up to Claudia to ask for information about other classes, either at her place or elsewhere. It was then that she suggested Leo would also enjoy a class for slightly older kids. This other class meets on Thursdays, at 11:00. We will try to make it, and it might be back to the old days, with Leo as the little one again. We’ll see how it goes.
My German, on the other hand, is still horrible. I am learning a lot of it in these classes, however. There are lots of songs and games that use basic vocabulary (body parts, actions, sounds, etc.), designed for little language learners… That these songs also help me has been an unexpected benefit. Today, though, I had a moment of embarrassment during a song about parts of the face that involved the touching and naming of the nose, eyes, etc. I was dutifully following along, touching my own face parts, when I looked around to see that all the other mothers were actually touching their babies’ faces. But never mind the face, a lot of those words are really similar to English, anyway. Here are some helpful words I have picked up in these music classes.
Stompen
Stompen means to “stomp”, like stomp your feet on the floor. The teacher starts each class with a welcome song that also functions to teach us all the babies’ names. The basic idea is “We’re [bodily action] for [baby’s name]”. So, while we’re patting for Dominic, rubbing for Enja, hugging for Emma and nodding for Simon, for some reason, we’re stomping for Leo. It is not a surprise, since so far he has been the highest energy kid in the group, racing around from corner to corner and squealing with enthusiasm at the mere presence of the other ones. So, let’s stomp for him I guess.
Schlag
This words means heavy. It was Leo’s turn to… how to describe it… gong the um… big metal thing that you see in a drum set? A cymbal? So he grabbed the stick (mallet) and began to gong away, amazed at how he could make that studio fill up with sound. As a few of us winced involuntarily, Claudia looked at me and said kindly, “Schlag!” It was then that I also realized just why my morning coffee had been tasting so good—I had been using heavy cream (schlagsahne) in it.
Kopf
This word means head, and I heard it in the context of “Nicht in der kopf”, “Not on the head”, which is what I heard another mother saying in response to Leo’s love pats to another, somewhat younger boy. It is new for me and for Leo to have him be the big kid in a group, since at daycare in Atlanta he was the youngest. He clearly knows that he is the oldest and biggest, which is why he gets so physical. I tried to control this behavior by using Fernando’s trick of reminding Leo to touch softly. It worked pretty well, but I stood close by in case there was more heavy head patting.
Kurz
Means short. This word I heard several times as a few mothers searched around to find a smaller drumstick for Leo to play with. The teacher had surprised me when she handed Leo one of the biggest drumsticks in her basket, and sure enough, Leo waved it up and down frantically in close range to other heads. He used the stick mostly to tap it on the floor, as was the designated way to handle it for this activity, but occasionally would move it from side to side, which is when it was confiscated and exchanged for a less dangerous, shorter stick.
Er ist in sein element
Well, in context, this can only mean one thing. Claudia looked at me and said “He is in his element”. And he definitely was… he was sitting with his drumsticks, surrounded by about four other kids, all of them stomping there sticks on the floor to the music. He really was having fun, and hadn’t actually hurt anyone for the entire class.
After the class, I went up to Claudia to ask for information about other classes, either at her place or elsewhere. It was then that she suggested Leo would also enjoy a class for slightly older kids. This other class meets on Thursdays, at 11:00. We will try to make it, and it might be back to the old days, with Leo as the little one again. We’ll see how it goes.
posted by J&F at 1:18 AM
3 Comments:
I was rolling at the image of the other mothers watching Jules pointing out parts of her own face. So funny.
Leo, the most active kid there? I wonder what they would think of Gabriel...
I''m sure there would be less choice words you would be sharing ;-)
GB
God, how funny to find yourself pointing to your own face!!! That made me laugh, too. Julia, you are so so so brave to be trying to absorb this new language at our ripe ages, when starting from scratch really does make you a kid all over again... I love your posts, keep them coming!!! And say hi to Fernando--hope he's all done convalescing?? xxxx Dierdra
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