Preschool/ages 3 and 4, and Kindergarten/age 5/6 memories

I am going to make a few posts about memories from being in school and being little. Instead of one long post, I will break it into smaller post.(By the way, I still remember my birthday cake was a blue Spongebob-themed cake when I turned 2!)

(I don't remember much about being 3 anymore. I used to have several memories of being 3, but 4 is when my memory really starts now. Also, I can't tell you my first days of these years in school anymore. I had been asked to write about it as a book question about my very first day of school when I was in the fifth grade, but I had long forgotten by then, so I just described the classroom and a few things we did.)

Age 3/FYP: I remember that every day we would have circle time and sing. I remember singing "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see?", "Happy and you know it", and "The more we get together."

Age 4/SYP: Our preschool was a really small school that had two preschool classes, two teachers, and two assistant teachers. Our classrooms were connected by a really small bathroom that had stalls but no doors, which I always thought was weird. Our preschool would only occasionally, as far as I remember, go outside to the playground. I wondered why we didn't go more. I remember our teacher, in gym one day, asked us to walk fast, which I thought was running. I was really confused by how it wasn't running, so I kind of just ran.
I also remember that we had an activity to use small blocks to make a colored pattern of our choice, but I just could not figure out what that was.
Finally, I remember that a girl named Brianna was like a parent to a lot of us. I never fell asleep for naps (which my teacher told my mom, and my teacher said she would tell me it was okay as long as I was quiet and wasn't cranky afterwards, which I always complied to.) Brianna would always wake up and whisper to me to go to sleep. I don't think I was distracting, but I don't know if my being awake distracted her or if she just wanted me to sleep. (I think the latter is the case because I was always quiet for nap time.)

Age 5/Kindergarten: When I was in kindergarten, our classroom was connected by a door to a kindergarten classroom, however, there was no bathroom or hall between our classrooms. One day a kid named Juan was yelling, kicking, and crying and he got switched to our classroom. (Today I wonder if he was abused because he would get restrained and carried to the office. Once I saw two teachers carrying him by his arms and he yelled, "Stop! You're hurting me!" The teachers said, "No we're not!" "Yes you are!")
We had a behavior chart on our side of the door that I just described. At the end of the day, an assistant teacher would ask us what our color was and color in a box that was our monthly behavior chart that we would take home for our parents would see. You would start the day with a green card. If you did one thing wrong, you got a yellow card. Two things wrong got you an orange card. Three things wrong got you a red card. You would also, twice a day, get skittles. Each time you were on green, you got two skittles during that time if you were on green, one if on yellow, none if on orange or red. I was worried I would forget my reason for changing color, but I was ALWAYS on green and I ate four skittles a day in kindergarten. The kid I described was always on red. One time I went back there just to see if I had all the card colors because I never changed it.
Finally, we also had "Star Student of the day". A student would be the star of the day and get to take a stuffed animal (a jaguar, which was our school mascot) home for the day. I forgot mine the next morning!

Those are my memories for now. I will start a series until I get through all the ages and grades.

Why girl scouts should have vests rather than sashes

A decision girl scout leaders make is what kind of uniform the girls should have. I am not going to talk about a tunic, as I did not have one, but I had a vest as a brownie and a sash for every other level.  (I was not a daisy because there were no girl scouts in my area in kindergarten, and when I was in first grade, only kindergarteners were daisies.) There are good things about wearing a sash. Since sashes only go on one shoulder, they are easier to get into and out of. If you wear cute clothes, they will be more easily seen with a sash as the sash takes up less room. Taking up less room may also mean that you will not grow out of the sash as quickly as you would a vest.  Also, while I don't know if I agree with this, some people think sashes make girls look more mature than a vest. However, there are reasons I still suggest a vest.

1. More room for badges. Being a brownie was very different from the rest of my girl scout experience. We had vests as a brownie and sashes as a junior. When I went to my new troop, I became a cadette and we had sashes then as well. A sash may be less bulky and take up less room than a vest, but a vest has more room to be able to hold badges. (I think we earned so many badges when we were brownies that we couldn't fit them all on our vests! A sash would have never held as many badges!)
2. Cheaper long-term. If your girl does not grow enough to need a new size, then, as said, there are more room for badges, so you will not need to get a bigger uniform as your girl earns more badges. The vest is more expensive at first, but you may not need as many vests as you would sashes. 
3. Vests hold the trefoil pin. If you wear a sash, the uniform code is to wear the sash and put the trefoil pin on your shirt rather than your sash. This will poke holes in any shirt you wear with the sash. However, if you wear a vest, a vest will hold the pin and you will not have to either wear the same shirt or have multiple shirts with holes.
4. No sliding around. A vest might be bulky and harder than a sash to get into and out of, but a sash will slide around your body and you will have to adjust it all the time. Vests stay in place for a longer amount of time than sashes because they wrap around both of your shoulders, but sashes go on top of one shoulder and they do not have much retention. 
5. Less confusion. If you wear a sash, you might forget whether the uniform is left shoulder to right hip or vice versa. If you wear a vest, you might forget what patches go on which side, but at least you are unable to make the mistake of putting it on backwards.

I hope this helps. Happy Scouting!