民話の紙芝居『たのきゅう』
長い間お休みだった小学校の朝の読み聞かせが今日から再開しました。家で検温を済ませてマスク姿で教室へ行くと教室は窓が開放され、子供達はマスク着用、先生はフェイスシールド姿（となりの教室の先生はマスク姿）。今までは前の方に集まって話を聞いてくれたのが今回からは机についたまま。（横の広がりと後ろまでの距離は読み聞かせとしてはちょっと厳しい。）状況は事前のミーティングで聞いていたので本選びは苦労するところでした。
小さな絵本では遠くの子供達に見えないだろうと今回の小３のクラスで私は民話の紙芝居「たのきゅう」を選びました。マスク姿で声を出しているとだんだんマスクが下がってくるので何度も引き上げながら我ながらの奮闘ぶり。聞こえなかったら黙って手を上げてねと頼んでおいたけど誰も手が上がらず一安心。お母さんの手作りなのかな、男の子も女の子もそれぞれのマスクが可愛らしい！ 大人より一回り小さいマスクの顔、顔、顔。しっかり聞いてくれました。
Storytelling at elementary school which had been stopped to avoid infection of coronavirus for several months restarted from today. After taking my temperature at home, I went to the classroom with a mask on. I found that all windows were open, every child was wearing a mask and the teachers had face shields on (but the teacher in the next classroom had a mask instead). Before the coronavirus, kids got together in front of me, but they stayed at their own desks to listen to the story. (This setup is a little hard for us as storytellers because the space among everyone is too wide.) It was hard to select an appropriate book since I heard of the condition beforehand. I chose “Kamishibai (storytelling using picture cards)” titled “Tanokyu” so every kid is able to see even if he or she is a little far from me. When I was telling the story, my mask was coming down, so I had to pull it up several times. Before I started the story, I said to the kids that if they couldn’t hear well, to let me know by raising their hand silently, but in the end I didn’t see anybody raise their hand. The children’s masks were so cute and were probably hand-made by their moms. I saw the faces of children who were wearing smaller size masks than adults’ . I appreciated that they listened to my storytelling with attention.
2020/0610
