Bring on the cookies!

Well, we made it to Christmas break!  My kids were super crazy today.  But we survived.  Our morning routine was thrown off because we had to move the bells over to church before school.  My 6th graders who ride the early bus headed over there with their bell teacher while I watched her 1st and 2nd graders. 

I kind of forgot about the two girls who ride the late bus.  When they got to school, they unpacked their stuff and then studied their memory work (probably thinking I was running an errand and would be back to the room soon).  A few minutes before the bell rang, they came down the main hallway, looking into all the rooms, "Have you seen Miss Heintz?"  It's nice to know I would be missed if I disappeared.

All of them did their homework!  Yesterday, a few had some late assignments and I told them they wouldn't get to open presents if they had unfinished work.  I pulled the same deal with the 7th and 8th graders (except they wouldn't get to watch the movie in the afternoon).  Man, the late work practically dove into my mailbox!

After memory work was said, we did a skit of the Christmas story for religion.  Next year I'm definitely finding a script.  First, we had to list the characters.  Then, we had to assign parts.  One of the boys wanted to be Mary.   I said no.  We ended up drawing sticks and people got to pick their parts.  None of the girls wanted to be Mary if a boy was going to be Joseph, but eventually we all had our parts.  And chaos broke loose.  Everyone was running all over the place, pretending to be barn animals or a baby or I don't even know.  They were diving into beanbags, running to different corners... it was a mess.  So I told them that if they couldn't handle doing a skit, we were going to work out of our religion books. 

Ugh. I should have just made them sit down and work out of the books.  But we were short on time and I wanted to let them do a skit, so we ended up doing it anyway.  And it was crazy.  After that, we decorated bags to put our little snowman tins in.  I kind of forgot about making an art project that could be a present for parents, but we decorated some tin cans with tissue paper to look like snowmen, and I figured we could stick them in a bag as a parent present. 

The only actual school stuff we did today was take a spelling test.  Some of the girls hadn't finished their stories yet, so I gave them time after the test to finish up.  Then we played Telephone Pictionary.  I had a stack of blank paper for each student.  For some reason, they had a hard time understanding how to play.  You just write a phrase about Christmas, and pass your papers to the person next to you.  Then they draw a picture on the next sheet that matches the phrase.  Then you pass it all over again going through the cycle of writing then drawing, writing then drawing, until your original stack of papers comes back to you.

I had students flipping their papers over, writing on the backs of the papers, drawing on the same page... two of them had to ask for help because they were so confused.  I wanted to do a second round (that probably would've gone better), but it was time to open presents so we could get to church on time for lunch.

They all loved their presents.  We did a different type of gift exchange (they wrote down something they wanted and their gift exchange partner only got the name of the person the initials of that gift).  A few of them got it right!  I gave them each a candy bar and a pack of paper with a cute design on it.  The only not so good part was that one boy doesn't like chocolate, so he didn't want a candy bar.  I felt kind of bad about that.  I got some cool presents too: a clip-on desk lamp, scarf, kitchen timer, lotion, an ornament... two of my students didn't give me a present, but that's okay. 

We walked over to church with the 1st and 2nd graders (their teacher was at church practicing bells with the 8th graders).  Wow.  It is pretty challenging to get 20 students ready to go out into the cold.  But we made it!  The board of education and their wives served our noon meal.  It was very tasty.  Then we had our last practice (which only had a few mistakes).  I think we're ready for Sunday night!

When we got back to school, we separated into the older kid group and the younger kid group.  The older kids watched "Tom and Huck" in Mr. E's room.  The younger group came into my room and borrowed the projector to watch a Kung Fu Panda Christmas movie.  I corrected the 7th and 8th graders' geography tests while they watched the movie.  Mr. E wanted to have them watch "Tom and Huck" because they'd never heard of Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn.  I had seen the movie before, but it had been a while.  There was actually a bunch of swearing!  Every time someone in the movie let a word slip that maybe they shouldn't have, my kids all turned around to look at Mr. E and me.  Overall, they liked the movie. 

Afterwards, I passed back their tests and gave each of the 7-8th graders a candy bar.  When the dust had settled and all the kids were sent home, I shot some hoops in the gym to get rid of some energy (or maybe stress???).  One family of students were waiting for their mom to pick them up, so we played a few rounds of Lightning.  I lost most of the time, but I won once!!!  The oldest girl is in 7th grade and she is under the impression that I am an amazing basketball player because I swished two threes in a row once after a basketball game.  I've never been able to do it again, but she still thinks I'm the bomb.  I guess I won't complain about that! 

Our Christmas programs are Sunday night and Monday night, so I won't be able to head for home until after the program Christmas Eve (if the weather is good) or Christmas morning (if the weather is not so good).  Pray for good weather!!!

Oh the weather outside is frightful!

Holy Smokes! It sure is windy today!  This morning we were going to bring the bells over to church to practice for the Christmas program, but it was way too windy, so we're moving them tomorrow.  Half of us ended up driving over to church instead of walking.  For some reason, a few of my kids wanted to walk/run to church.  They almost blew away!

Because of all the blowing, the snow kept drifting onto the sidewalks.  Thankfully, pretty much every boy at our school loves to shovel.  They were outside for about an hour shoveling!  Then after school, one of my 6th graders stayed to get picked up by his mom.  When she didn't show up for a while, he sauntered into my room and said, "I'm going to go outside to shovel for a while.  It's way too hot in here."  Hopefully it will calm down so we can have school tomorrow!  Otherwise we'll have to wait to open presents until after Christmas break!

Ah, young love...

So there was major drama going on in chapel today.  Remember that 1st grader and 4th grader that were "dating"?  Well, yesterday, the first grader bit one of his classmates and got in major trouble.  Today during chapel, his "girlfriend" wrote him a note telling him what his punishment was.  What did the note say?  "I am breaking up with you." 

Yep.  She broke up with him via note right before chapel.  When this little lady saw me watching her, she whispered, "Miss Heintz, did you see my note?  I broke up with him.  I need to date someone older plus it's been two days already."  Wow, talk about kicking 'em to the curb!

The drama increased even more after chapel when we practiced for our Christmas program.  All was going well until it was time to practice the procession and recession.  Somehow, these two star-crossed lovers ended up walking next to each other in the procession out.  The 4th grade girl was NOT happy.  She stomped out of church in a huff.  And then she refused to walk back in. 

Instead, she sat at a table in the back of the fellowship hall, pouting.  Trying not to roll my eyes, I asked her what the problem was. 

In our program, we have more students on one side of the church than are on the other.  If she had been paying attention, she would've learned that who you walk in with is not the same person that you walk out with.  Plus there were some people missing, so her aisle partner was not set in stone.  However, since she was lost in her own little world, she was absolutely positive she was going to be stuck with her ex-boyfriend.  Eventually I convinced her that she wouldn't have to walk by him and she reluctantly made her way back into church.  Lovely.  Now let's hope tomorrow doesn't put the two of them together again. 

Put your hands in the air!

This morning, my kids were being especially crazy before school started.  One of the 7th grade girls gave out presents (consisting mostly of candy) to her friends and they were certainly enjoying it!  I decided to give them something to do. 

I told them about this "magic" trick.  If you stand in a doorway with your arms at your sides and push them as hard as you can against the door posts for 30 seconds, then when you leave your hands at your sides, they'll magically float up.  That kept them entertained up until the bell rang. 

We spent most of the morning watching the movie Where the Red Fern Grows.  I previewed it last night (and cried at the end).  Before we watched the movie, I had my students describe how they pictured the characters in the book.  After the movie, they reviewed those descriptions and wrote how the movie was similar and how it differed from their idea. 

As an extra treat, I let them eat popcorn and drink pop during the movie.  We moved desks around, grabbed beanbags, and hunkered down to watch.  During the movie, I had them fill out Venn diagrams to compare the book and the movie.  I was pleasantly surprised at how many of the little details they remembered about the book!  Every two seconds it seemed like someone was saying, "But Miss Heintz! Didn't it happen this way in the book?"  Oh it warmed my heart!

At noon recess, I watched my two boys play basketball on the same team.  They were whipping the ball around, back and forth, passing it over and under and all around the eighth graders on the other team.  Wow! It was crazy!  It reminded me of the way Old Dan and Little Ann work together in Where the Red Fern Grows.  Cool stuff.  I told one of the boys and he just looked at me and laughed.  Hopefully he took it as a complement.

One Down, Four to Go

Our first Christmas program practice at church was today.  We got through everything (minus the bells) and there were no major mess-ups. 

I don't know, lately I've been feeling like a lazy teacher because I don't seem to be teaching anything!  The whole afternoon was basically shot because of program practice.  We squeezed all the other subjects into the morning to leave our afternoon open, but it still felt like I wasn't doing anything.  Grr... frustrating.

Last Friday, one of the 4th grade girls started "dating" a 1st grade boy.  It set the playground all abuzz with the news.  About five of them came running up to tell me.  They were planning a date for Monday (today).  She was going to wear her high heels and skirt.  I have no idea how they were planning to make school into a date but...  Anyway, the other teachers wanted to wait until Monday to see what happened; they thought it might blow over (this girl has been "in love" with a bunch of other boys already this year and it's changed on a daily/weekly basis).  But today rolled around and the two of them wanted to walk over to church together for Christmas practice.  Hmm.  It doesn't appear to be blowing over.  We'll have to see what happens tomorrow...

Surprise after-school visitors

I had some more surprise after-school visitors today.  The snowmobilers were back.  This time, they shut off their bikes, and knocked on my door.  The two boys were waiting for their friend and thought they'd stop in and say hello while they waited.  That was about a half an hour ago.  I think they're playing basketball in the gym right now, still waiting.

Speaking of basketball... I think next week, I might throw a little physics at the 7th and 8th graders, tying it in to basketball.  That might get them excited about science.  We'll have to see. 

Science supply update: we might be getting an aquarium!  Stay tuned.

Happier than a 6th grader riding a sled behind a snowmobile...

Today was super nice outside.  It was my turn to watch the 1-2nd graders during their afternoon recess and we went outside.  The weather was so gorgeous, it made me want to put on some snow pants and boots and run around making snowmen and snow forts.  Unfortunately, I was wearing shoes not appropriate for playing in the snow, so I was stuck on the playground (still covered in snow).  A few kids wanted me to give them underdogs, but I had to beg off because I didn't want my socks to get all wet from snow falling into my shoes.  I did give them pushes on the swings. 

During noon recess, one of the 8th graders said, "Hey Miss H, can you tell me when it's about eleven after twelve?"  I said sure, figuring he wanted to switch games at that time.  At the appointed hour, I let him know and he yelled out, "Sweet! It's almost 12/12/12 12:12."  Oh.  Right.  I forgot about that.

At lunch, one of the 6th graders said, "Hey Miss H, guess what I'm going to do after practice? ... [two of the 8th graders] are going to bring their snowmobiles to school and they're going to pull me around on a sled behind them."  I just stared at him, finally saying, "I don't think that's a good idea."  Immediately, the rest of the class tried to convince me that it was fine, mostly by arguing that they do it at home all the time, or they've done it before with their dads.  I ended the argument (at least in my mind) by saying something along the lines of it not being safe and they shouldn't do it at school and if they wanted to, they should talk to Mr. E about it first.  Like they would actually do that.  The worst part is, I think their parents were going to drop off the snowmobiles at school. 

Anyway, during Christmas program practice, one of the 8th graders talked about the snowmobiling plan for after practice (I had forgotten about it), so I went to talk to the principal.  I felt like such a little snitch!  But really, if any of them got hurt on school property, we would be held responsible.  I think Mr. E talked to them after school, but shortly after boys' basketball practice was over, I heard the gunning of a snowmobile engine.  Grr.  Those boys.  Well, I know my 6th grader is alive; he came back into the classroom for his book bag. 

I spent most of my time after school trying to scrounge up some science equipment for our school.  One of my professors had suggested calling some of the nearby colleges to see if they had any surplus or old equipment being replaced.  I did and it turns out they have a whole department for that kind of stuff.  I'm still waiting to hear back what things they can give us, but hopefully it will be something good!

2 hour late start!

Yay! We had a two-hour late start today.  I ended up cleaning my apartment and wrapping Christmas presents.

Our whole day was super crazy because of the mix-up.  My kids were okay in the morning, but they got a little spunky after lunch.  But we didn't have all that much time together because of switching class for math and then for Christmas program practice.

The 7th and 8th graders were actually excited to come to class today!  Of course, that was because they were going to get their tests back and I promised if no one failed, I would bring them gingersnaps.  No one failed, so they got cookies.  One boy asked if I would give them cookies for Christmas.  Another asked if they could have a third cookie.  I guess if my job as a teacher falls through, I can always bake gingersnaps! 

The 6th graders spent some time this afternoon making a card for the 3rd and 4th grade teacher.  His birthday was on Saturday.  The cards are a secret and are currently hidden under a poster on the lab table, waiting for students to sign.  It's a good thing I hid it because Mr. D came into my room at the end of the day to chat for a bit and he ended up standing right by the lab table. 

My Own Personal Weather Forcasters

Holy Buckets!  Today was definitely an indication snow was coming.  My normally calm 6th graders were off the wall!  It's so interesting how students' moods/actions correspond to changes in the weather.  They're almost better weather predictors than actual weathermen!

It didn't help that our schedule was messed around.  The 7th and 8th graders won a pizza party a few weeks ago and they finally cashed it in this afternoon.  Of course that meant they couldn't show up for my class.  We ended up switching for a half an hour in the morning so the 6th graders could have math and they could have their geography test.  (I promised to bring them cookies next week if none of them failed the test.  Hopefully I have to bake something this weekend). 

In the afternoon, we had program practice.  Some of them weren't singing, so I kept them in from recess for a while to practice the songs they hadn't sung with the whole group (a consequence we had discussed prior to practice).  Then we ended up going outside.

Half the class (the girls) wanted to come in early because they were freezing.  We stayed outside (there was only five minutes left).  Then we had art.  It involved balloons.  Never a good idea for hyper 6th graders to do a project with balloons.  They were grabbing them out of the bag, not listening, blowing them up way too big for our project... it was pretty much a disaster.  The girls finally settled down, but one boy just kept going.  So I sent him to his desk.  I don't think it was the best choice; he sat there and didn't care that he was at his desk.  But it was helping calm the other students down. 

We still had a half an hour left after art.  I didn't want to teach science because we're starting a new unit next week and they were so off the wall, I didn't think they'd pay any attention to me at all.  We ended up exchanging names for our Christmas gift exchange.  Then we cleaned the room and went home.  Yikes. 

About 45 minutes after school cleared out, it started snowing.  Yep, the kids were right, yet again.

You want the good news? Or the bad news?

I've got some good news, and I've got some bad news.  The good news is that Christmas is going to be here in less than three weeks!  But the bad news is that Christmas is going to be here in three weeks... Our faculty met after school today for our December meeting.  We had a surprise baby shower for the kindergarten teacher who is expecting a baby any day now.  She had no idea we were planning a surprise party!  There was cake, juice, a fancy table cloth and napkins... there was even some candlelight!  But after the cake and devotions we got down to business. 

Sigh.  The frustrations are back.  The majority of our time was spent talking about the Christmas program, which normally sounds like a good thing.  But there's some good news and there's some bad news. 

Bad news: the students don't know the Christmas music for hand bells, so they're going to need extra time to practice during the week.  This drastically cuts into my geography/science time.  The good news: During the extra time they're practicing, I get to read aloud to the 1st and 2nd graders.  And we're switching geography and science days so we don't always cut science short. 

Good news: we're actually staying on schedule with my lesson plans for geography and science.  We're barely squeezing in all the countries in the world in geography, so it's really important to stay on track.  And now the bad news: it turns out that during the entire last week of classes before Christmas break we are not going to departmentalize.  That means we're not going to switch classes.  So I will not be having science or geography with the 7th and 8th graders.  The good news= not as much to correct.  The bad news= having to completely change up my lesson plans so we can have a test before Christmas (so they don't forget everything over their break).

But let's end on a positive note:  Bad news- Adam and Eve sinned so now we are all dead in sin.  Good news- God sent his Son to take our place and wash away our sins, so now we will be with Him in heaven!

Vomitrocious

Well, I had my first encounter with cleaning up vomit at school today, after school actually.  One of the 8th grade girls had been feeling sick all day, and during practice she just couldn't hold it in anymore.  I was in my room at my desk correcting papers when some of the other players came dashing in to borrow my paper towels. 

Thankfully, I had some of that absorbent stuff you sprinkle over the mess, so I brought it out to the gym.  The 1st and 2nd grade teacher came and helped sweep it up.  I held the garbage bag. 

This poor girl!  When she started to throw up, instead of letting it fall where it may, she stuck her head inside her shirt so it got all over her clothes.  She had some extra clothes in her gym bag and ended up changing right there in the gym while her teammates kept guard at the doors.  Our first basketball game is tomorrow; hopefully no one else gets sick. 

Cootie Insurance

I got the strangest request this morning.  Before the bell rang, one of the 6th grade boys came up to my desk and said, "Quick, I need some Cootie Insurance.  Can you give me some?"  It took me a while before I figured out what he was getting at (he was hugged by one of the 7th grade girls and decided that he needed a safety measure against cooties).  Deciding to play along, I replied, "I'd love to give you some insurance, but I don't think I'm licensed to give it out."  He just kind of looked at me for a while. 

The other 6th grade boy (who was waiting to say his memory work) clued him in, "Uh, Miss H is a girl, so she would probably give you cooties anyway." 

This didn't faze him at all, "Oh well, I'll just go ask Mr. D.  He'll give me some.  Can I borrow a post-it note?"  A few minutes later he came waltzing into the room and dramatically attached the post-it to his desk.  "There.  Now if some girl touches me, I just have to touch this post-it note, and I'm safe from cooties!" 

In other news, I finally got my laptop back from the IT guys!  And it works!  They said the battery went bad; not a rare problem, but my computer wouldn't turn on because of it, something very rare.  Regardless of the fact, I'm very happy to have a computer I can take home with me.  Now I won't have to stay at school so late! 

Good Day, Not-so-Good Day, Good Day...

If yesterday was a bad day, then today was a good day to make up for it.  Beautiful weather, lots of learning, doing cool projects...

This morning, we hung our chain of the church year.  The 7th and 8th graders who visited our room kept asking what each of the colors meant.  I was very pleased to hear my 6th graders telling them the correct answers.  Now hopefully no one will pull it down.  We'll start tearing chain links off starting on Monday.

One of the boys was absent today, so the classroom was much quieter.  It was very strange how just one person being gone could make our classroom that much quieter.  When he's here, it doesn't seem like he's very loud.  But the boys probably feed off each other.  The boy who was left behind was extra quiet today.  That was also very strange.

At lunch, he decided to start a game of "Little Red Schoolhouse."  The result was a super quiet lunchtime.  Most of the girls didn't care, so they talked right away.  It was down to him and me.  The game was going to be a stalemate for a long time, so I gave in and said something so the game would be over.  And then he started another round!  This time, it was death by laughing.  And by death, I mean most of the players were kicked out of the game for laughing.  Again, I was one of the last people left silent against the initial instigator.  He won a second time and decided to stop playing because "I was the champion twice, so I don't need to play anymore."

The 7th and 8th graders had a review game for their test on Friday.  It actually went really well.  They remembered more of the material than I thought they did!  There was very little screwing around except as they left the classroom.  One student was mad at his teammate because he wasn't listening to anyone else in the group.  The ignored boy decided to slam the door in the first guy's face and he walked right into it.  Of course he started bawling.  The other boy thought he was justified in his actions.  Everyone else wanted to know what happened.  Crazy, crazy, crazy.  But we got it straightened out.

After school, the new uniforms for basketball got passed out.  I didn't see much of it, but I could certainly hear it!  The boys were trying to remember which number they wanted and which shorts would fit them.  A few of them were trying on these basketball shorts right over their pants.  What a fashion statement! 

Ufda!

Blech.  This day was gross.  Overall, the day wasn't very bad, but it wasn't very good either.  It was just kind of "blah."

It was probably my fault; last night I didn't sleep very well (I had a dream that I went home for a weekend and my parents informed me that I was getting married.  The church was decorated, guests were invited, and my mom even got me a dress!  Apparently everyone knew about it but me.  It was an arranged marriage with my friend's ex-boyfriend.  I obviously couldn't marry him, or my friend would hate me for life, but my parents and his parents didn't seem to understand that...) Anyway, I was very glad to wake up this morning.

Then at school, half my kids were falling asleep and then a few minutes later, they were going crazy!  It seemed like I did a lot of yelling/chewing out/reprimanding students today.  We have a new student in 4th grade, a girl, so some people were teasing the 4th grade boys about having a crush on her.  I had to have a little talk with my 6th graders.  Then, in the gym at noon recess, one of my students was throwing balls away from the people who were playing with them, some boys were shooting baskets from the top rows of the bleachers, and there was tackling/biting going on in the football game.  Like I said, lots of chats with students. 

We went a little bit over in MN history today, so we went a little bit over in art, which meant we didn't get started with 7th and 8th grade geography right away.  Today we were choosing new countries to do reports on, so that took way more time than it should have.  There were two groups presenting and we ended up going over about 10-15 minutes so the second group could present.  I kicked out two boys from class (I probably wouldn't have had to, but they were the straws that broke the camel's back, so I did anyway).  Then I felt bad afterwards, but I didn't want to back down and lose face with them.  Ugh.  You just can't win. 

We had ten minutes left at the end of the day, not enough time for a good recess, so I decided we should finish our art project (a chain the colors of the church year).  We finished the chain and were about to hang it up when I realized I had miscounted the white chain links and we were short about 30.  It was time to pack up and I decided we could finish hanging/fixing it tomorrow morning.  One student decided she wanted to play with the chain instead of getting ready to go home.  I stopped her and asked her to get ready for the end of the day.  She kept playing with the chain.  I repeated myself.  She started moving it to the lab table.  We went back and forth, "What did I ask you to do?"  "Get ready to go home."  "Why aren't you doing it?"  "I'm putting the chain on the table!"  "But what did I ask you to do?"  "Get ready to go home."  "So why aren't you doing that?"  Sigh.

But we got everyone sent off to the bus on time and we weren't even the last class out the door.  Tomorrow is a new day.  Now if I could just get my desk cleaned off...

We Want More Math!

Yesterday was another day of basketball practice and it was the boys' turn for late practice.  It was my turn to supervise "study hall", or the boys who were waiting to go to practice.  One of the students' parents came to supervise, but I was the teacher back-up supervisor.  My 6th grade boys were trying to do their math homework, but the 3rd and 4th graders didn't have any homework to do (or they had finished it all) so they were being kind of noisy.  Finally one of my boys said, "If you don't be quiet, we're going to give you some math problems!"  One 3rd grader piped up, "YES! Give us some problems!"  I thought he was kidding, but he was serious!

My 6th grader quickly scrawled some easy multiplication problems on a paper and handed it to the 3rd grader.  He yelled for a pencil.  Seeing that there were none available and he was still being noisy, I volunteered to write some on the board and he could work them out up there. 

I have never seen a student so excited to do math.  Pretty soon all the other 3rd and 4th grade boys were asking for their own problems to do on the board.  They they wanted some extra hard multiplication (749 x 4)... then really hard addition problems (one boy said, "give me something in the millions!")... some of the 7th graders decided to see how smart these 3rd and 4th graders really were and tried to throw in some tricky division with decimals.  They didn't get it.  So with the 7th graders' and my help, we figured it out together.  It was so neat to see these grades getting along, working together, and doing math!

Thanksgiving Turkeys

The last day of school this week went pretty well.  Two groups of 7th and 8th graders presented today.  One group had a lot of great information, but read straight off the slides (they copied and pasted words right off websites, and it showed).  The other group was done by one 8th grader.  He didn't actually do a whole lot of research about his country.  I would ask a question about it, and he'd say, "uh, I don't know."  Then I'd ask about a picture he had on a slide... the same answer. 

For the most part, the 7th and 8th graders were okay respectful-wise.  One boy kept blurting out answers to questions, even though he was an audience member, not one of the presenters.  So I kicked him out.  He tried to argue a little, but I just repeated myself and he left.  Mr. E made him write an apology note and have his mom sign it. 

At the end of class, I had everyone give some feedback on the presentations.  Most of the people who weren't goofing off made some really good points.  Things to try for next time: No irrelevant questions.  No gross humor.  Know the information on your slides. 

There were some other ones too, but these were the most important ones they came up with. 

The last few minutes of the day the 6th graders spent making thankful turkeys.  I drew shapes on the board, they cut them out of scraps of construction paper, and we made them into turkeys.  The boys wanted to make theirs Chinese and give them sunglasses, but I axed that idea.  We cleaned up, prayed, and booked it out the door.

Now it's my turn to head home!

Faster than a speeding bullet...

Woo, this day flew by!  There was lots of good learning going on at school today. 

Our computers stopped working, which threw a wrench into my plans for English.  We were going to work on typing our chapter stories.  But no matter what we tried to do, the student computers just wouldn't turn on!  We tried unplugging and replugging and refreshing... nothing helped.  So I scrounged the Internet on my computer for some ideas.  My 6th graders have trouble with adjectives, so I melded a few activities together to create... the Adjective Game!

The class split into two groups.  One person was the secretary, the other two were Thesaurus checkers.  I put an object between the two groups, set the timer, and let them go!  They had to find as many words as they could to describe the object (and they could look up words in the Thesaurus).  First we described a big plant that's growing in our room, then a multicolored ball of yarn, and a whiteboard eraser.  At the end of all this, the groups were tied.  To break the tie, we did a super-extra bonus round describing... a slightly worn book.

To decide how many points the groups got, we used a scoring system like Scattergories.  One group would read their adjectives, the other group would say whether they had the same thing written down.  I was the moderator and decided if an adjective didn't fit the object.  It was really fun!  They loved it!  We just might have to play it again sometime...

The 7th and 8th graders had a great time in science.  I think they were all paying attention (they were certainly asking enough questions).  Most of them remembered to raise their hands and no one got kicked out.  We had to cut our time short because of Christmas program practice.  We were kind of late... oops.  But everything turned out all right in the end. 

After school was basketball practice.  It was the first day one of the parents was going to watch them instead of a teacher.  I went to go pick up copies from the office and right away I knew the boys had just gotten ready.  There was literally a wall of male cologne in the hallway and I walked straight through it.  Whew!  I can't imagine what it actually smells like in the bathroom.  The girls' bathroom was pretty aromatic too, so I guess we can't just be picking on the boys.

Lots of Late Nights...

I don't know, something about this week made the days seem longer than most.  Tuesday night I was still at school making worksheets at 7:30pm when my friend Diana called me (she made me go home).  Wednesday night we had about a two hour long PTL meeting.  Last night I was making a PowerPoint of the life cycle of stars and lost track of time.  Tonight I was going to leave at 5:30, but then this lawyer called me about going in to see a chiropractor about possible injuries I sustained from a car accident that I had been in last weekend with my friend Alex on her wedding day (We were in the Cities on our way to get Alex's nails fixed. One of her other friends was driving and some guy pulled out in front of us on the highway and smashed into our car. No one was hurt, but Alex's mom wanted us to get checked out anyway so she called one of her lawyer friends).  He just wouldn't stop talking!  So now I'm going to the chiropractor tomorrow to see what's up.

Today was a great day... we finished our read aloud book, are getting to the exciting part in Holes during reading, got our spelling test finished on time, had a great time during science learning about stars... and then we had practice for Bells.  The 6-8th graders are playing handbells on Sunday, so they went over to church to practice with the 1-2nd grade teacher.  I watched her students outside.  Half of them were supposed to stay at school with me, but for some reason they all ended up over at church.  Then they all came back and we were going to have science/math.  Well, all the boys ran off to the playground to play football.  The 1-2nd graders were lined up to go in.  My 6th grade boys started to come in, but they got distracted by the 7-8th grade boys rushing out to play.  I had to call them three times before they came in.  The 1-2nd graders were up at arms, "Miss Heintz! They're not coming in!"  Finally we had everybody situated and then half the 7-8th graders realized they hadn't brought their notebooks or a writing utensil to class!  I was so frustrated!

Class today was the worst I've seen all year.  Every ounce of respect I had earned this year went out the window.  People were talking all over the place.  Just when it would be almost quiet, someone would start in with a random comment that was pretty much wasting air!  I had no idea what to do.  I just stood there in shock.  I was this close to kicking one of them back to Mr. E's room... I should have just done it, but he said, "Oh no, I'll behave now."  So I let it slide.  We got through the PowerPoint, but I don't know how much learning was going on.  I just don't know what the consequences should be!  But I'm at the breaking point; from now on, if they mess around, they're getting sent back.  No ifs, ands, or buts.

After the kids had left for the day, one of the other teachers asked how my day went.  I told her that if I were a crying teacher, I'd be crying right now, but I'm not, so I'm just overwhelmed.  After a class like that, you just feel like you are a horrible teacher and you're not doing your job.  And then when you realize how much is left of the school year... and that every day could be like that... it's enough to make you want to quit!  Ugh!  But I'm not going to.

Monday is a new day and a new week.  Thanksgiving break is coming up.  Lots of brainstorming will be happening to make science more interesting. 

Monday, Monday

Well, this has been a long day.  I think this is the first day all year that the 6th graders have had more energy than I've had.  They were off the walls!  Pastor came to teach our class about stewardship this morning, so that might have set them off.  It snowed this morning too; not a whole lot, but enough to get them excited.  And I'm still recuperating from the wedding I went to this weekend. 

This morning, all the 7th and 8th graders kept asking me questions about their upcoming PowerPoint presentation.  A few came up to me and said they were almost finished with it.  They first heard about this assignment on Friday.  Talk about excited to learn!

Since our books are so old, we divided up the countries in South America and each student is going to do a report/presentation about each country.  They can work in pairs or by themselves; they just have to present the information to the class in some way.  They are also going to write worksheets for the class to fill out during the presentation.  The presenters will pick five of these questions to use on the test.  They'll get their worksheets back to study for the test.  Tomorrow we're going to go over the difference between a good PowerPoint and a bad one. 

At recess today, I had way too much junk food.  And by junk food, I mean pretend, imaginary food "made" for me by some 1st and 2nd graders.  They were sitting behind the bleachers by the scoreboard keyboard, waiting for customers.  One of them asked what kind of smoothie I'd like.  Then he asked if I wanted a meal with that... but they were a candy shop, so they only had cupcakes and candy.  It seemed that there was tension in the ranks because one of his "coworkers" said they had some hot dogs.  Then they changed it so they had pizza.  So I ended up going back for three meals.

One girl asked if I would jump rope with her.  I was kind of confused, thinking "how are the two of us going to jump together."  But she had a long rope and wanted me to twirl the other end.  Pretty soon there was a long line of kids waiting for their turn to run in.  I started singing "Cinderella, dressed in yellow, went upstairs to kiss her fellow..."  One student got up to nine doctors!  Everyone (including me) was sad when recess was over.  Maybe we'll do it again on Wednesday!

13 hours

Whew! Yesterday was quite the day.  It was Parent-Teacher Conferences, so I spent about 13 hours at school yesterday.  What's really interesting was that only family came on time to their appointment; the rest were early and because I wasn't meeting with anyone we could get started right away.  Of course, the people who actually came at their appointed time were my last conference, so I didn't get get to sneak out early.

Everything went fine.  The parents were cordial and didn't have a whole lot of questions for me.  The principal checked on me a few times, to make sure I wasn't having any trouble.  Then afterwards, one by one the rest of the teachers came in: some to check on me, some to congratulate me on finishing my first Parent Teacher Conferences.  When the last teacher to come in saw all the other teachers standing around my desk, she said, "Oh, is this the after party?"

One funny story from 7th and 8th grade geography...  I had asked to see everyone's eyes up front so I would know they were ready to go.  One boy (who hadn't done his notes for the day) was scrambling to open his book to the right page.  Being a smartaleck, he had his head turned to me and had his eyes flipping back and forth between me and the pages of his book, trying to follow my directions and figure out where we were.  I couldn't help smiling because he looked so goofy!  All the other students (who were looking at me like they were supposed to) saw me smiling and wanted to know why.  Some figured out who I was looking at, so they tried to see what was so funny.  And then the people in the front turned around to see.  And then no one was ready to start class.  But then they calmed down (somewhat) and we started class.  They had some really good questions too!

It's "Miss" Heintz

For some reason, yesterday there was more talk than usual about my relationship status.  In 7th and 8th grade geography, one girl kept calling me Mrs. Heintz.  One of the boys who sits in front turned around and yelled at her, "It's MISS Heintz.  Stop calling her Mrs.; she's not married!"  Apparently, Mr. E has to go over this small grammatical error over and over and over.

Then, when my 6th graders were doing art, one of the boys asked, "Miss Heintz? Are you going to do what our old teacher did?"  I was kind of confused (and so were the rest of my students).  He kept going, "Well, he got a girlfriend and then he moved away.  So are you going to do that? ...I mean, are you going to get a boyfriend and get married and move away?"  I think I said something like, "Probably not."  One of the girls piped up, "Oh, I think you're going to get a boyfriend.  But you can just stay here; you don't have to move away."  Thinking it was time for a subject change, I said, "Well, I don't have any plans to move away right now."  The boy who brought the subject up said, "Good.  Cause I don't want you to leave." 

Vote, Vote, Vote!

The results are in! At least, the ones from the 6-8th graders' mock election.  The 6th graders spent a half an hour setting up our classroom as a polling place.  We had three booths (desks surrounded by gym mats), two registration tables (one for last names A-H, and one for I-Z), and a tally table (our lab table).  Each of the 7th and 8th graders had a job to do, and most of them were very professional about it.

Two people went to tell the classrooms it was their turn to vote.  The voters would come in and sit in the waiting area.  They would go up to the registration table, have their name crossed off by an 8th grader, and be handed a ballot and a pencil by a 7th grader.  Then, a 7th or 8th grader would let them know which polling booth was open (the people manning the polls would raise their hand).  The student "guarding" the poll would remind the voter not to write his/her name on the ballot. 

Some of the 1st graders had trouble reading the words on the ballot, so the poll assistants would help them read the names.  After voting, the voter would fold his/her ballot, stick it in the official ice cream pail, and return to the waiting area.  When the bucket got full, I would carry it to the tally table (partially hidden by a tri-fold board) where three 7th and 8th graders were waiting to count the votes.  One girl pulled out the ballot, recorded the vote for cats vs. dogs, and passed it down to the next girl (who recorded chocolate vs. vanilla), who passed it down to the final tallier who recorded Obama vs. Romney.  This last individual put an X on the ballot and put it in a different ice cream pail.

When all the votes were in, we put my classroom back together, and the 6th graders made bar graphs of the results.  They also calculated percentages of the votes cast for each choice.  We presented the results to each classroom that participated right before the end of the day.  52 people voted and the results are as follows:

Cats vs. Dogs
Cats= 10 [19%]
Dogs= 42 [81%]

Chocolate vs. Vanilla
Chocolate= 24 [46%]
Vanilla= 28 [54%]

Obama vs. Romney
Obama= 10 [19%]
Romney= 41 [79%]
Other (write in)= 1 [2%]

Halloween... Best or Worst Holiday?

Growing up, Halloween seemed like a pretty great holiday.  You dress up in costume, get some free candy, have a party at school... how is this a bad holiday?  But once you get to the teacher side of things, it's a whole new ball game.

First of all, everyone is talking about their costumes for weeks in advance.  Then they ask you what you are going to be.  When you answer that you aren't going to dress up, they try to convince you!  They even brainstorm some possible ideas.  Nowadays pretty much 80% of costumes are gross, so they wouldn't even work at school. 

Next reason: kids are jacked up on sugar.  It's bad enough they are fed sugar during the class party.  Later that night, they'll probably eat their weight in candy! (okay, maybe not that much).  Add together the late night and a belly full of sweets... not a recipe for success the next day in school.

We didn't have a party in our classroom; Friday our class is hosting an all school carnival in the gym, so we're going to have a Reformation/Fall party for a brief while after lunch.  Even though my students knew we weren't celebrating anything until Friday, they still brought in cupcakes and cookies to share!  Urgh! I didn't want them crazy all day, so we doled out the sweets at the end of the day.  Make the bus drivers and the parents deal with them, eh? 

Most of my students were fairly awake this morning (with the exception of the boys; they looked like they partied hard.)  Part of that could be they're getting sick.  All morning our room was full of the sounds of coughs.  Not little "clearing the throat" coughs.  I'm talking those big "almost hack up a lung" cough.  Hopefully they get a good night's sleep tonight. 

Meetings, Splinters, and Crazy Campaigns

Sunday was the 3rd quarterly voter's meeting at church.  It was the first voter's meeting I've ever attended, and it was about what I expected.  One thing that is different here (as opposed to my home church congregation) is that the women can vote.  Since I haven't switched my church membership, I still couldn't vote because I'm not a church member.

At the meeting, I sat in the back (partly so no one would notice me and partly so I could see everything that was going on).  It went along pretty much like you would expect a voter's meeting to go.  And then came the school report.  The principal reported that the new 5th and 6th grade teacher was doing a great job, fitting in well, and he threw out a couple of other interesting points about the school.  Then asked, "Any questions?" 

Some one's hand went up.  "Am I correct that this year there are no 5th graders?" 
"Yes."
"Well, it seems to me that if we're being good stewards, no offense to the current teacher, we shouldn't even have anyone teaching that age group.  The students can go with another teacher."
There was a pause.  Then he kept going, "How many students are in the upcoming class?"

I started feeling panicked; there are only four fourth graders who will be in fifth grade next year, even fewer students than my current six.  If this guy was pitching a fit over paying me to teach six students, how was he going to react when he found out next year I'll only have four?

Thank the Lord, Mr. E figured out a way to sort of smooth things over, "I believe there are eleven students in third and fourth grade."  Not a lie! But not really answering the question.

Then another voter raised his hand and said something along the lines of, "Isn't that a question for the Board of Education?  And I think they're doing a fine job.  Let's move on."

They did move on, and so did I.  But then the principal's wife and the pastor's wife came and talked to me about it and that got me all worked up again.  I tell you, it is the worst feeling in the world to realize that someone wants to take away your job.  Later that afternoon, Mr. E called me to explain that this guy has been saying the same thing for the past five years and he's pretty much the only one.  So I can rest assured I'll be okay for now.  We'll cross next year's bridge when we come to it.  But in the meantime, if you'd pray for a family with some 4th and 5th graders to move into the area...


In other news, one of my students got a splinter today during school.  You'd never guess a little splinter could cause so much disruption, but man, we got derailed.  First she tried to push it out.  Didn't work.  Then we dug around my first aid kit for a tweezers.  Nothing.  But we did find a splinter remover.  She didn't know how to use it, so I had to dig around her hand.  I felt so bad!  I could tell the probing hurt.  In the end, she ended up running to one of the other teacher's rooms to get a tweezers and I unearthed the splinter after a few minutes.  Meanwhile, the other students had been calmly working on their spelling workbooks, waiting to begin their pretest.

All in all, the day was pretty calm.  Calm that is, until we were supposed to switch for math.  The 7th and 8th graders were on a field trip, so I was going to keep the 6th graders all afternoon.  With our extra time, we were going to learn how to use features in Open Office.  The best place to do this was the 7th and 8th grader's classroom.  Unfortunately, about half of them forgot to log out of their accounts, so my sixth graders couldn't access their accounts.  The passwords for the 7th and 8th graders weren't written down, so we were kind of stuck.  Actually, we were really stuck.  Finally, I ended up calling it a dud and we went back to our room. 

There, we made posters for our upcoming election: Cats vs. Dogs.  Which are the better pet?  The 6th graders were pretty creative, trying to come up with a slogan and a bunch of pictures to put on their posters.  On the dog side, the poster has a crazy/evil-looking cat and a cute, cuddly dog.  "Which would you rather have? Vote for dogs!" was their slogan.  On the cat side, the 6th graders wrote, "Are kittens cute? Vote for cats!"  Then they drew some pictures of cats in the shape of a heart.  I was hoping to get them finished sooner so we could work on our ice cream war: chocolate vs. vanilla, but it didn't happen.

Nothing like the smell of manure in the classroom...

Last night, some farmers took loads of manure and spread them all over the fields around our school.  Today was very foggy and moist, so the smell just sat there and permeated the building.  Since today is Wednesday, our school had chapel over at church.  Not everyone enjoyed walking through the wall of smell.  Thankfully, the wind started blowing a bit and moved the smell around. 

My classroom got pretty toasty once again, but instead of cracking the door (like I did yesterday), I opened one of the windows.  At first I didn't think the smell was coming in, but when the 7th and 8th graders came for science, they said it smelled gross.  It's probably just as well that I left the door closed. 

There are still flies buzzing around my head!  My two 6th grade boys immediately grabbed the flyswatters this morning and started hunting.  They kept finding more and more.  And then one of them had a sudden inspiration, "Hey Miss Heintz! Guess what? We're going to save all the dead flies and make them into a Christmas present for you."  Wow, what do you say to that?  I ended up replying, "If you do, I will keep it and love it because you made it."  The other boy said, "Yeah, we'll gather them all up and spread them all over her desk." 

Speaking of presents... the first and second graders gave me a whole bunch of new drawings they had just finished (probably because I was late to art again; those 7th and 8th graders just suck up all the time!).  The lovely drawings are currently hanging on the wall by my computer.

Picture Day!

Today was picture day.  You would think that a little thing like getting your picture taken wouldn't disrupt your entire day, but trust me.  It does.  Don't get me wrong, it was nice to see all the students gussied up for school.  Girls wore skirts instead of sweatpants, and a handful of the 8th grade boys wore polo shirts to school! 

BUT.  There was no specific time for each class to go.  It was kind of, "we'll come knock on your door when it's your turn."  This, of course, completely threw some students off.  I guessed our turn would come at 9:30am.  9:30 on the dot, one girl raises her hand in the middle of a lesson, "Miss Heintz, you said we were going to have pictures at 9:30."  The rest of the class reminded her that I had only guessed what time pictures were, and they'd come knock on our door when it was time. 

Two minutes later.  "Miss Heintz, shouldn't we go for pictures?  I thought we were going at 9:30."
The same thing happened five minutes later. 

Finally it was our turn!  We lined up in alphabetical order and filed into the gym.  Our photographer was a super nice guy, really funny.  He even let us look at our pictures before he called the next person forward.  I was called a few times to help arrange the girls' hair.  He made a joke that I'd have to go on the road with him to fix all the girls' hair so he wouldn't have to do it.  I don't think my 6th graders got the joke. 

After their turn was over, my 6th graders didn't really know what to do with themselves.  I gave them a choice, "You can go back to the classroom and read a book, or you can sit on the bleachers until we're done."  I was pleasantly surprised how many wanted to go back to the room and work.  Since I am the teacher, I had my picture taken last.  When I walked in the room, I was overjoyed to see everyone sitting quietly working on reading.  The small group of students I had been working with was waiting patiently for me to sit in my seat and continue where we left off.

That was pretty much the only calm part of the day.  It was pretty foggy, so we stayed in the gym for recess.  That riled them up even more.  We had a review day in MN history, and the boys started yelling out answers.  It was very toasty in our room, so I propped our outside classroom door open.  Unfortunately, that let in a ton of flies.  I spent about ten minutes at the end of the day swatting flies.  And they are still buzzing around my head!  I'm sure the boys will have a blast catching flies tomorrow morning.  Their teacher last year taught them how to be "fly whisperers."  This explains why they always try to sneak up on the flies instead of just swatting them. 

The 7th and 8th graders had a review day too.  They also had a sub for the day so Mr. E could observe classrooms.  Wow, they were super amped up.  My 6th graders came back a little early from math, and they ended up sitting in the hallway/back of the classroom doing their math while I finished up with the 7th and 8th graders.  After they left, one of the 6th graders commented, "wow, they sure are loud."  That is a bit of an understatement.

We did line puzzles in art.  The idea came from an old art book my mom found at a garage sale (thanks Mom!).  It actually has tons of good ideas.  This one involves drawing lines on a piece of paper, cutting out pieces on the lines, and gluing them down with a little space in between.  For some reason, the 6th graders were having so much trouble figuring out what to do.  I did this same thing with the 1st and 2nd graders yesterday, and they had just as much difficulties.  We're going to do this project another day, so we'll see what happens then.

Technology Troubles...

This week has certainly been challenging.  My computer decided not to turn on this weekend, forcing me back into the "dark ages" before I had a computer I could take home with me.  I've been staying extra late at school to get everything accomplished, but so far I'm surviving.  The school's IT guys actually have my laptop right now, but they're still figuring out what's wrong with it. 

Today, I wanted the 6th graders to type their personal narrative stories.  We have six students and four computers (five if you count my desktop computer).  Thankfully, one girl had typed hers over the weekend, so she didn't need a computer.  I let one of them use my desk computer, so we had just enough for everyone.  Unfortunately, the computers decided to take forever to turn on.  Sometimes they go into a weird sleep mode, and then you have to hold the power button until it goes off, and then hold it so it turns on... but of course today it took 15 minutes for the log in screen to appear.  That pretty much used up our time. 

During the time their computer screens were blank, my students decided it might make the computers turn on faster if they pressed buttons on the keyboards.  They discovered that pressing buttons equals a lovely pinging sound.  So they kept pressing buttons. 

Did I tell them to stop? Yes.  Did they keep doing it?  Just one boy decided to keep pressing buttons.  Finally, I gave up and told them to come back to their desks; we would just do Spanish vocabulary until lunch.  So we did.

Another technology development for my classroom...

We talked to a teacher at our neighboring school about using an iPad as a "SMART board" tool.  All you need is an iPad, a desktop computer, and a free app that lets the user control the desktop from the iPad.  After school yesterday, Mr. E told me to check out Craigslist for used iPads.  I found one for $300.  At Mr. E's request, I sent the guy an email seeing if he would go down to $200.  A few minutes later, they guy replied saying he'd go down to $250.  Mr. E and I discussed, made a decision, got a check from the treasurer (money from a family memorial donation), and I emailed the guy to set up a meeting time.

8:15pm.  Met at Kwik Trip.  I went by myself, sat in my car for about 20 minutes, and got a call from this guy's girlfriend.  Her boyfriend was still in class, so she was going to meet me.  To cut a long story short (or at least, shorter), our school is now the owner of a slightly used iPad. 

I wanted to play around with it when I got it home, but I don't have wireless internet, so I had to wait until I was at school.  Then when I got to school, I remembered that my classroom doesn't have a strong wi-fi signal.  I ended up standing in the school office, messing around with it by the copier.  Our IT guys said that it would be an easy fix to get a stronger signal to my room, so I could in theory have an interactive whiteboard by the end of the week...

Getting Down and Dirty in Art

Last week we started an art project involving modeling/sculpting with clay.  The sixth graders had to choose two animals and combine them, making a mutated animal.  Since we have a limited budget, we used a bucket of clay that has been sitting in the community art closet for who knows how long.  And being that the clay was for everyone, they were going to have to mush up their creations afterwards (I did say I'd take a picture of their sculptures so we could put them on the website).  Well, you can probably guess how that went over.  Everyone wanted to keep their clay (even though they hadn't made anything yet) and wanted to know why they couldn't.  One of my students said she had some clay at home that she would bring in; then we could all keep our projects.  In the meantime, we practiced with the old clay.  It was super tough and rather hard to work with, but it just gave our fingers a workout.

When the clay finally appeared at school, it turned out to be Plaster of Paris, not actual clay.  We decided to try it anyway.  This was the kind you have to mix with water; we didn't have any measuring cups, so I eyeballed it and mixed with my hands.  Some of the sixth graders didn't want to have anything to do with it because it was so messy.  Others wanted to dive right in.  (The boys were actually the ones who didn't want to touch it).  Eventually they all grabbed some of the goopy mix and tried to mold it.  It didn't work so well.  First it was way too slimy and wouldn't hold a form.  Then it got too dry and started crumbling.  When we tried to rehydrate the dry stuff, it ended up turning even harder.  Finally we gave up and everyone went to go wash their hands.

Our classroom survived the invasion of Plaster of Paris; only the floor is spattered with white flecks.  Thankfully the janitors are cleaning tomorrow night, so we won't have to deal with the mess for long.

After school, the parent of the sixth grader who had brought the plaster came up to me and asked if I wanted her to buy some modeling clay for our class.  Wow! That would be great!  She said she'd pick some up and drop it off at school probably on Wednesday.  Sweet! Now we can work with some new clay, and get to keep the finished results.  The Lord definitely provides.

It's not an adventure until you get lost...

Well, I survived my first field trip.  Our class of six went to the Pipestone National Monument and the Jeffers Petroglyphs today.  Since there were only six students, all of us fit into my vehicle (I asked for a parent chaperone, but no one stepped forward).  We headed out bright and early at 7:30 in the morning.

I thought they'd fall asleep on the way there, but no, they were super pumped up and loud for about the first hour and a half.  It took two and a half hours to get to Pipestone, so I figured the energy couldn't last too long.  The boys ended up falling asleep after they used up their energy.  Of course the girls thought this was wildly funny and wanted to prank them while they slept.

Once we got there, we watched the video they have visitors watch and then we looked at a few displays in the Visitor's Center.  My students kept trying to catch my eye when they spotted the "millions of years old" wording on the displays.  We had talked about that before we left (something along the lines of God creating the earth about 6,000 years ago, but it looks way older, but most scientists don't believe in the Bible, so they say millions of years).

After getting the chance to cut some pipestone, we headed out to the trail.  It was only about 45 degrees and windy, so we kind of hustled through the Circle Trail.  That didn't stop my kids from wanting to climb on every rock that stuck out of the ground or peer into every pit that looked like a quarry.  I had to keep reminding them that this area was sacred to the Native Americans, kind of like our church, so we needed to stay on the path. 

I cannot believe how often I heard "Miss Heintz!" today.  Wow.  Every two seconds one of my kids would spot something or have a question and would just talk over each other so I would answer them.  Whew!  I'm glad they had so many questions and were so observant, but I barely had the chance to catch my breath! 

Of course we had some technology troubles.  One of the girls brought extra batteries, but all the batteries she brought were dead.  I let her use my camera while we were at Pipestone until we got to a place where she could buy batteries.  We ended up stopping at a gas station to buy her some, but they went dead after about 20 minutes at the Petroglyphs (they were the cheap-o brand, so what do you expect?). 

Another girl didn't have any batteries for her camera and had asked one of the other 6th graders to bring some.  Of course he forgot to bring them and she didn't have any money along to buy more.  So she was moping around for about half the field trip.  Not once did she think to ask someone to lend her money or to borrow someones camera.  I didn't know what to do.  I kind of wanted to step in, but my camera was already loaned out and I'm a firm believer in having students do their own problem solving.  If she would've asked, I would've helped her, but since she didn't, she was kind of stuck.  Eventually, she shook it off and ended up having a good time anyway.

We left Pipestone with just enough time to cruise over to the petroglyphs.  I had intended us to eat our lunch outside, but since we were running a teensy bit late, we ate in my car on the way over.  Since I had never been to the petroglyphs, I borrowed my family's GPS so we wouldn't get lost. 

From leaving school, we ran into at least three detours due to road construction.  I was kind of surprised that I was able to follow the detours, but follow them we did.  When going from Pipestone to Jeffers, we had to cross the road that runs between Slayton and Marshall.  Right now it is completely closed down because they're redoing the whole road.  Somehow, by following the GPS, we ended up on a gravel road that wasn't on the GPS map.  I remember this road had been closed for construction earlier this summer, but I didn't see any signs saying that people couldn't drive on it.  Of course this road led to the completely closed road (which was being repaved), but again, there were no signs saying that I couldn't drive on it!  I only had to go a little ways on the new road, so I thought maybe I should chance it and just drive on it.  But then, there were those roller machines smoothing the pavement, and I had a vehicle full of 6th graders full of energy from their lunch. 

I stopped in the middle of the road, trying to decide what to do.  My kids were completely oblivious.  I ended up chancing it.  Crossed the road, no problem.  Then, after passing through Currie, the GPS told me to take this gravel road off the main highway.  Hmm, well, the GPS must know best.  We ended up following this gravel road for about 20 miles.  Every once in a while a sixth grader would pipe up, "Miss Heintz, where are we?"  I wasn't too worried because the petroglyphs are kind of in the middle of nowhere; I was more worried that I had typed the wrong address into the GPS because the location "Jeffers Petroglyphs" was not a preset location.  It was a pretty crazy drive.  The GPS took us down minimum maintenance roads, up hills, around curves, all on gravel roads.  It did shave some time off, so we got to the petroglyphs right on time (even after stopping for batteries).

The petroglyphs were so cool!  We did some things in the visitors center first, mostly looking at artifacts.  As soon as we got in the center, they started looking at the artifacts that were on display.  Once again, my ears were filled with "Miss Heintz! Come look!"  This time it was because they recognized a lot of the artifacts from the topics we've been studying in Minnesota History.  I was quite proud of my 6th graders; they knew 90% of the questions our guide asked.  She was very impressed with them.  They asked great questions about science and social studies.

They all got the chance to throw an atlatl (a large spear) at a fake bison.  Everyone missed (including me).  But it was super windy, so the wind took or arrows.  After everyone got a turn, we headed out to the petroglyphs.  About halfway there, one of the boys asks, "Miss Heintz, can I go to the bathroom?"  Are you kidding me?  I asked everyone to go before we left!  Of course he didn't have to go then, so he didn't.  I told him he could go back to the visitors center and just come find us afterwards, but then the other 6th grade boy realized he had to go too.  I thought it was kind of suspicious that both of them had to go, so I came along too. 

As soon as they were finished, they wanted to run back out.  I wanted to catch up to our group, so I told them they could and with that, they were off like rockets!  Not wanting to be left behind, I sprinted right along with them.  Man, it was hard to keep up!  But I did!  They kept turning around to look at me.  I think they were kind of surprised that their teacher was holding her own with two speedy soccer players. Eventually their energy petered out and we walked the rest of the way. 

Out on the petroglyphs, the wind was even worse.  But it was a nice, sunny day, so we could see the carvings really well.  Our guide still brought a board and a mirror along.  This was to create a shadow and then direct the sun so the petroglyphs would stand out more.  About halfway out to the through, one of the boys asked if we were almost done because he was cold.  We wrapped it up and headed back to school. 

Then came the lovely time for contacting parents to come pick them up.  One girl needed to be dropped off in New Ulm, since we were passing through.  One boy didn't have a cell phone, so he borrowed mine to call his mom.  Another girl didn't have her cell phone along, but couldn't figure out how she was going to call her dad.  Eventually I helped her come to the conclusion that she needed to ask to borrow someones phone.  After she got done calling, she told me, "Miss Heintz, you have to drop me off at my house."  Excuse me?  I have to?  It sounded like she was ordering me around.  I said, "What?"  and then she amended her statement, "I mean, could you drop me off?"  "Well, since you asked so nicely, we could probably drop you off." 

We got her dropped off and left one of the boys at a gas station (don't worry, his mom wanted him left there!).  Everyone else came back to school, grabbed their pumpkins and spider plants, and headed home.  I cleaned out my car.  It's amazing how much garbage can accumulate from one day.  Whew! All in a day's work.

Surprise Visitor

Today during reading, we had a surprise visitor.  Well, I knew he was coming, so it wasn't really a surprise.  There was a church counsel meeting earlier this week, and I'm guessing the people at the meeting were asking Mr. E, the principal, how much time he's taking off to do administration duties (he's supposed to take off a half day each week, but that never happens).  So finally today, he took the morning off so he could observe the teachers teaching in their classrooms.  Yes, that included me. 

In reading today, we were doing an activity with books by David Wiesner (an author/illustrator who likes to leave out the words in his stories).  The 6th graders were practicing their summarizing skills by reading a book with only a few words, and then retelling the story to the rest of the class.  Of course we did an example together in class before I set them loose.  We read June 29th, 1999 by David Wiesner.  I had warned my students ahead of time that Mr. E would be visiting, but he sneaked in so quietly, half the kids didn't notice he was there!  Well, we were tucked away in the reading corner, and he just sat at one of the back tables, so that might be why they didn't notice him. 

I was kind of worried that he wouldn't like what we were doing.  In my class, our whole group instruction is usually spent working on a reading comprehension skill by reading a picture book together as a class with me modeling what to do.  We got new reading textbooks this year, but they are used during small group instruction.  I guess I'm just worried someone is going to have a problem with my using these "kids books" with 6th graders when they're capable of doing more complicated stuff. 

Well, Mr. E had only good things to say about the lesson he observed.  He was really interested in the book we were reading and the whole setup of my reading instruction.  (He took notes, but he didn't show them to me). 

Tomorrow is our first class field trip!  All the 6th graders were super excited today and kept asking me questions about our trip.  At the volleyball game after school, one of the girls said, "Miss Heintz, it's almost tomorrow!"  I also overheard a conversation between one of my 6th grade boys and an 8th grader,
"I'm so pumped for tomorrow!"
"Why?"
"We're going on a field trip!"
"Yeah? So? We get to watch a movie and have pizza." (since I'm not around, the 7th and 8th graders don't have geography or science tomorrow and Mr. E is letting them watch a movie and have pizza)
"Well I'd rather go on a field trip over watching a movie."  I was so proud!  Of course, he's probably just excited because we're not going to have any homework tomorrow and he'll get to run around outside with his best friend all day.

Recess = Blast from the Past

Recess is such a roller coaster ride; every day is different and you have no idea what to expect.  One day, the older kids will be kicking a soccer ball around in a serious game, the next they'll be chasing leaves around, trying to keep them from touching the ground.  Today we were in the gym.  Some girls decided to build a fort out of some mats and the boys decided to play "bombard the castle."  At first the girls were okay with it, but the boys got a little too gung-ho.  Of course after recess everyone was like, "Wow! That was the best recess ever! Let's do the exact same thing tomorrow!"  (Seriously, I heard at least two people say this.)

I've decided I hate being recess monitor.  You are in charge of the welfare of at least 20 kids, if not more, and you have to decide if you're going to let them do the things they want to do.  They try to convince you that it's not dangerous, and when you tell them to pick something else to do, they stalk off grumbling about how all the other teachers let them do it.  Ergh! I feel like such a bad-guy-stick-in-the-mud. 

With the younger grades' recess, you go through the same thing.  They start messing around and you have to remind them to go down the slide feet first, or they can't play anymore.  They're always asking for underdogs (or underfish, as they like to call them) until you're run ragged.  One of the other teachers told me that you can set a maximum limit on how many underdogs you give in a recess.  Lately I've been setting the limit at two per person.

On the other hand, the little ones are extremely creative.  Watching them play reminds me of the things I would play with my sisters when we were little.  Some girls like to play campfire or cooking class or beauty parlor.  I remember cooking up lots of tasty things with my two partners in crime.  We'd usually make something with cabbage or rice (dandelions and grass seeds).  Some girls only swing at recess.  They like to sing "Red Solo Cup" by Toby Keith.  I'm not sure if they know what they're singing about, but they sing it at the tops of their lungs. 

Today there was a group of four little girls and one first grade boy playing some sort of make-believe game.  They all went down the slide together and the boy pretended to be dead once they got to the bottom.  All the girls huddled around him calling him Lightning, trying to get him to "wake up."  My guess is that he was supposed to be a dog or a horse.  Somehow the girls found some way to get their lovely pet back to life.  This was after a couple of second grade boys stopped their game of football to investigate whether their first grade classmate was alright.  Once they saw he was just pretending, they rolled their eyes and went back to their game.

I got a nice surprise at the end of the day today.  I had stayed a little longer to help the 1st and 2nd graders get cleaned up from their art projects (we made underwater portholes out of paper plates).  By the time I got back to my classroom, I was a little late.  But my 6th graders had cleaned up the room, checked their mailboxes, and packed up for the end of the day.  It was amazing!  They were all ready to go in record time.  We even had enough time left to sing a hymn before the buses came.  AND we were the first class out to the bus.  Wow.  I was super impressed.  Hopefully this behavior will continue into Friday when we go on our first field trip.

VIP Day

Yesterday was VIP day at our school.  (Basically the same as Grandparent's Day, but since some of the students don't have grandparents to bring, we call it VIP day so they can bring someone else important). 

We started the day by showing our VIPs the classroom.  My 6th graders were quite proud of their spider plants and painted pumpkins!  Afterwards, we played Pictionary on the whiteboards until it was time to eat donuts.  I thought it was kind of strange, but the VIPs sat at the tables behind the desks and watched while the 6th graders sat at their desks and shouted out the answers.  It got quite loud in our room.  Eventually I made a rule that they had to wait five seconds before shouting out a guess.  That worked pretty well, but then I would forget to count to five (because they were being quiet) and then they'd start yelling again. 

I had some other visitors that day before donuts.  Almost all the 7th and 8th grade boys showed up in my room to watch the Pictionary game.  They didn't want to play; they just wanted to sit.  I'm still not sure why they came to my room.  One of the 1st grade girls brought her grandparents into my room to meet me.  I thought it was so cute!  Her grandma was quite impressed with our variety of plants.

Finally it was time for donuts and everyone poured out of my room to the gym (which was decorated with tables and chairs that I had helped set up the day before).  After that came the entertainment for the morning.  Since October is Fire Prevention Month, we had the Courtland Fire Department come out to give everyone a talk.  They also brought some trucks for the kids to climb on, hoses for them to spray water from, and a fire safety house that they could walk through.  The VIPs got to come along for all of this.  The 3rd-8th graders were outside first.  My class got to spray the fire hose.  They LOVED it.  They all got to hang onto the hose, while each person took turns running the nozzle.  Not many of the VIPs wanted to try, but I thought I should while I had the chance. 

At this point, my two 6th grade boys decided to stand on the edge of the spray and try not to get wet.  There's a place on the nozzle that you can twist to adjust the wideness of the water spray.  Of course I experimented with that, but as soon as I made the water go wider, the boys decided to run underneath the spray.  Unfortunately, that was right about the time I turned the nozzle back to full spray.  Yeah, they got wet.  I was more worried about the pressure hurting them than I was about them getting wet.  But they were fine.  The VIPs were laughing, so I took that to be a good sign.

We went to the safety house next.  We found out that our class would probably die if we were in the upstairs room of a house on fire.  One of the boys volunteered to throw the metal escape ladder out the window, but he threw the wrong end out!  His VIP ended up tossing the end back up to the top so he could lower the right end of the ladder.  But by that time, we probably would've been toast if it were a real fire.

After touring the fire trucks, we headed inside to listen to the fire fighters talk about safety and making sure you have two ways out of your house in every room.  The VIPs left, and we started our day.  Man, my kids were crazy after their VIPs left! 

After school, we had a volleyball game in Mankato.  Normally I don't go to the away games, but since this one was close and it's the girls' second to last game, I decided to go anyway.  The girls played 8 games!  Our B squad played two against their 5th graders, two against the 6th grade, and the A squad played two games against the 7th graders, and two against the 8th graders.  All total, both the A and B squad lost one game apiece. 

It's the Little Things...

There was another soccer game after school, so all but one of my students stayed afterwards.  I got more accomplished than I had expected, especially after they left to go warm up.  My outside door was propped open to let some cool air in our sweltering classroom, so I could hear/see people coming and going.  One third grader and his first grade sister came walking up the steps to my room.  I could hear them before they got close, "Of course she's in there.  Let's go say hi to Miss Heintz."  They come running in, say hi, and then scamper off to do something else.  A few minutes later the boy comes back in carrying a paper plate and a small Tupperware container. 

"Miss Heintz, I got a surprise for you."

His brother (one of my 6th graders) had been squishing box elder bugs against the side of the school today, so I was a little leery of this third grader's surprise.

"Is it a good surprise or something that might be kind of gross?"
"A good one.  You can eat it."  He opened up the container to reveal an apple dessert, fresh from the oven (his mom baked it before they came over to the game).  He told me he was going to give some to his teacher, but Mr. D left for the day, so he'd have to find someone else to give it to.  This third grader was so prepared!  He had brought plastic forks and plates.

So he scooped out a piece for me and plopped it on the plate.  It wouldn't slide off the fork, so he used one grubby finger to put some pressure on his surprise for me.  Internally wincing, I noticed all the layers of dirt he had on his hands as he pulled the fork out.  But... I ate it anyway.  It was delicious.  There were of course apples, with a crusty bread-like top sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar.  Did I mention it was warm from the oven?  Yum. 

After delivering the other piece to our principal, he and his sister came back swinging Lunchables, their supper for tonight.  I made them sit at one of our back tables so they wouldn't get food all over the place.  They kept talking the entire time they were eating.  And they kept trying to give me their food too (I made them eat it all). 

The sister kept calling me "Mrs. Heintz" until her brother finally yelled at her, "Her name is Miss Heintz! She's not married!"

Of course his sister had to ask, "Why not?"

Hmm.  How to answer that question.  "I don't have a boyfriend, so I can't get married."
"Well how come you don't have a boyfriend?"
"I don't know any cute boys."
"Really?"
"All the cute boys I know are about this tall." (I held my hand about waist height).

The third grader piped up, "I'm cute!"  I just smiled at him. 
Then they noticed the flowers on my desk one of my 6th graders had picked from a bush on the way to school.  Of course they wanted to know who they were from.  Then the third grader announced he was going to bring me a rose tomorrow.  And his sister chimed in, "Me too!"  Then they both ran out to go play.

I don't know if they're going to bring me a rose or not, but either way, it was a pretty good end to my day.

Doozy of a Day

Well this has been an interesting day. 

This morning I woke up from a dream where one of the 7th grade girls (the most pushy of them all) was screaming at me in class and I was screaming back at her.  I don't remember if there were other students around, but either way it was stressful.

The 7th and 8th graders had a test in Science today (and one in geography tomorrow).  Since they haven't been trying very hard on their homework, I thought I'd print off their grades so they know how they're doing.  In summary, not so hot.  I left a note on the whiteboard saying if they didn't like their grades, they should come talk to me about them before or after school.  Only a few people came to talk to me.  Most of them wanted some extra credit worksheets or assignments to do.  They kept bugging me about them all day and I didn't get the chance to print some off, so I'm going to have to do that tomorrow before school.

I was run ragged by the 1st and 2nd graders at afternoon recess.  They kept asking me to give them an "under-fish" (another name for underdog).  Since I'm taller than the 3rd and 4th grade teacher, I can push them higher.  We have four swings and I was in demand for pushes on all of them.  Whew!  I escaped only to be caught by two sisters who were digging in a sand hole by the playground.  They started screaming because they saw a little spider.  I convinced them that it was just a baby one and it couldn't hurt them.  They ended up naming the little guy, and while they were deciding on a name, I sat back, congratulating myself on changing the world, one spider-lover at a time.... and then the girls screamed again.  They saw a daddy long-legs.  I said, "Girls, that's just a daddy long-legs.  I thought you liked spiders now."  "We do, but we only like little baby ones, not big ones like that creepy daddy long-legs."  Then they started screaming some more as it crept toward them.  Thanks Lord for showing me humility.  I herded it to the grass away from the girls.  "Miss Heintz, is it gone?"  "Yep, it's in the grass."  "Good.  What are we doing for art today?" 

That was the question of the recess.  I'm pretty sure I got asked that question by at least four 1st and 2nd graders.  The answer was watercolor masking tape trees.  It's a super easy project that looks awesome.  First you put masking tape in a shape on your paper (we did tree shapes).  The hardest part of the project was getting the tape torn just right and stuck on the page.  After they had their tape situated, they could paint over the page with their watercolors.  A bunch of them were mixing colors to make some darker shades.  All of them were super careful with how they were painting.  That kind of surprised me; I modeled how to put the paint over the tape tree and was kind of painting sloppily.  One little boy said, "Miss Heintz, why are you scribbling?"  I didn't really know what to say to that, "Because I can" isn't the best response for any student.  I think I ended up saying something about wanting to get all the white around the tape covered with paint. 

They all wanted to take their tape off right away, but I told them they had to wait until it was dry.  One boy (who wanted his tree to look EXACTLY like mine) kept touching his paint, "Miss Heintz! I think mine's almost dry!  Can I take the tape off?"  "I think it needs more time to dry.  Why don't you finish painting the page before you think about peeling your tape off?"  I can't wait to see what their trees look like!  My 6th graders saw my example and got really excited, "Do we get to do that?  I think we should do that next.  It looks really cool."

Our test during 7th and 8th grade science went well behavior-wise.  I haven't corrected them yet; I'm kind of dreading it.  I think a lot of them just gave up on answering the questions and wrote down random stuff.  Since this test was a unit test, covering two chapters, I mishmashed a bunch of questions from both chapter tests together and the numbers didn't match up.   This really confused one of the eight grade boys; he kept flipping from one page to the next looking very perplexed.  Finally he raised his hand and I walked over to hear him, "Didn't you say there were two extra credit questions?  Well, where is the second one?"  I flipped to the second page and pointed to the number.  "What! There's another page?!"  Apparently he hadn't realized there was a second page.  Or a back to the second page. I don't think he was very excited about that. 

Volleyball practice was interesting too.  I did a drill with the older girls where I would throw the ball to them and they'd bump, set, or spike the ball.  It went fine until it came time to spike.  Then I had to dodge the balls!  The whole time I kept thinking, "Wow, Emily, what a great idea.  Give your students the perfect chance to hit you with balls as hard as they can.  Perfect payback for giving out bad grades and difficult tests."  I thought about making a joke with them about it, but decided I didn't want to give them any ideas, just in case.

After practice, I tried to catch up one of my students with her science vocabulary words.  She's over 20 words behind! I have no idea how this slipped under the radar.  Of course, her dad is sitting in a chair waiting for us to finish so they can go home.  He's hearing me load on the homework (that she should've been doing over the past two weeks), so he probably thinks I'm an evil teacher giving out tons of homework to make my students suffer.

Finally everyone left and I just wanted to go home.  But first I had to pack up and decide what I needed to correct.  My car has been having some transmission issues and I've been calling around trying to figure out what's wrong with it.  My dad gave me the number for the Ford dealer near my hometown, so I gave them a call to see what they would say.  I won't bore you with the details, but I ended up needing to check my transmission fluid.  So I head out to the parking lot with some paper towels, still in my volleyball clothes, ready to check this puppy out.  And then I couldn't find the transmission dipstick.  After calling Dad, asking him if he knew where it was, and reading the owner's manual, I learned that my vehicle doesn't have a place to check the transmission.  Wonderful.  Finally I called the guy I bought the vehicle from to ask his opinion about what I should do. 

He said I should just get the filter replaced and change the transmission fluid (with an additive in it).  He could do it and he could do it this weekend when I go home.  Perfect.  I drove home, finally ready for a break. 

I walk into my apartment and dump my stuff in my room.  And then I notice my alarm clock.  No lights are on.  "Nooo! My alarm clock died!  Now I'll have to buy a new one! But I love this one!  I don't want to change!"  Grasping at straws, I tried it in a new outlet.  And another one.  And another one.  None worked.  Then I thought I should try turning on my lamp to see if maybe the outlet was the thing that was bad.

My lamp didn't turn on.  Neither did any of the lights in my apartment.  Then I noticed my fridge wasn't running and there was no time showing on my microwave.  What did I do?  Checked the fuse box, flipped some switches.  Nothing happened.  Called Mom.  She told me to call the emergency maintenance number for my apartment building.  They said they'd be out soon.  Soon turned out to be forty minutes.  I tried to find something to eat, going in and out of my fridge quickly so the cold wouldn't escape.  It's quite a challenge to put a meal together without using electricity.  I ended up with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  Except it was frozen because my bread was in the freezer.  Not the peaceful evening I had envisioned.

The maintenance guy finally came and said the electric company had a power outage and they would hopefully have it fixed soon.  Sigh.  They joys of technology.  Now my power is back on.  I've eaten supper.  Some of my papers are corrected (not as many as I hoped).  Lessons are planned for tomorrow.  I think I'm going to call it a night.

Summary of the Week

To back up a few days, our class fundraiser on Sunday was a success!  Our class served treats after church for free will donation.  Each 6th grader was in charge of bringing treats or juice and stayed after to help pour coffee/look pretty/serve bars/smile at the people who walked past.  A few of the older congregation members commented that it was nice to see such young faces helping out.  All together we raised $40 to go into our field trip fund.  (Next Friday we're going on a trip to the Pipestone National Monument and the Jeffers Petroglyphs.)  This coming Sunday is our school's Pork Chop dinner and Silent Auction and the following Sunday we'll do the same fundraiser again.

Yesterday was our school's first home soccer and volleyball games.  We played against Trinity Lutheran from Janesville.  All day, students were asking me if I was going to go to the game.  Yes, I was.  Since I had to coach volleyball after the soccer game, I decided to change out of my teacher clothes and in to jeans.  When I walked out to the field, I heard the goalie say to another player, "Is that Miss Heintz?"  I guess they don't recognize me out of dress clothes.

It was great to see the students putting all their moves together; I've seen them practice every day during lunch recess.  One very cool coincidence at the game was that I saw some of my old students from Janesville.  The semester before I did student teaching, I taught 3rd grade reading, math, and religion at Trinity.  The 3rd graders are now 4th graders and a bunch of them are playing soccer and volleyball!  Two of my former students sat behind me during the volleyball game and said, "Hi Miss Heintz!"  It's nice to know I'm not forgotten. :)  They've changed so much in one year! 

The Worst Goalie In the World

Everyone at this school LOVES soccer (except me; I'm not the biggest fan).  But I've been putting my opinions aside since it is soccer season, and all my kids love playing it.  At recess we've been playing variations of the game- this week it's been mini-soccer.  The past few days I've been able to avoid playing, but today we were short one and it's already hard to play soccer with only six people.  So they put me as goalie.  Yeah.  Dress clothes + teacher shoes + no skill= a very interesting soccer game.  I actually did much better than I thought I would have, given the circumstances.  After a while, one of the boys on my team made me start kicking the ball after it went out of bounds by our goal.  I wasn't expecting too much, but the ball actually took off!  As this sixth grader chased the ball he yelled, "Nice kick, Miss H!"  It totally made my day.  Maybe I'm not the worst goalie in the world.

In reading, we're reading a story about the discovery of Machu Picchu, which is located in Peru.  I remembered that one of my friends from college lived in Peru for a summer and is currently teaching English in Chile.  I facebooked her to see if we could Skype during school.  Her schedule was open and today we Skyped with her for about a half an hour!  My sixth graders came up with a list of questions and took turns asking.  We found out about the food, clothes, climate, animals, and landscape of both Peru and Chile.  We had so much fun!  Our internet connection wasn't very strong, so we had to keep trying to call her back.  The video didn't work so well either, but we made the best of it and still learned a lot.

One of my students brought in some Native American artifacts borrowed from a family friend.  There were a few old buffalo bones along with some authentic glass trading beads.  Some of the beads were green (they looked like watermelons) and red.  Those ones were pretty rare and are the most valuable.  The other ones were blue or a grayish color.  There was even a beaded belt.  We didn't have very long to look at them, but the time we had was well spent.

After school I spent some time helping the preschool teacher figure out how to put pictures on the school website for her class.  I was also snagged to take pictures of the basketball uniforms so we could send them to the uniform company to make extras.  I guess I'm the go-to tech person at our school.  But I don't mind.