What's fair anyway?

What a privilege it was to spend a day at the at the Evergreen Community School. What struck me most was the teacher's skillful ability to deepen children's thinking, resulting in incredibly competent and articulate children. Here is a short excerpt from a reflective meeting with a group of twenty 4 - 5 year old's in a discussion about fairness. From an almost five year old boy:

" well, it's not always fair for everybody to just get the same. For example, if everyone gets a cupcake, but there are chocolate and vanilla cupcakes, and some people like chocolate and some people like vanilla, then it doesn't feel like it's fair to me if I don't get the one I like. So, just dividing everything up so everyone gets the same doesn't make it fair. You have to ask everyone what makes it feel fair for them. It takes communication to work it out."

This is a word for word transcript, excepting a couple of umm's and thinking time. The vocabulary and the use of language is incredible, but the depth of thinking in relation to the concept was astounding. Thank you so much to Alise Shafer Ivey and the team at Evergreen for welcoming me. I look forward to some exciting collaborative projects in the future!!