Agriculture ABCs take two...

I taught the Ag ABC lesson to the other class of 4th graders today.  I thought aliens had come and sucked their brains out... they were so quiet! I kept waiting for them to bust in with comments or questions, but most of them raised their hands or just didn't have many questions.  It was so strange.  Another strange thing I saw today was two girls wearing mismatching books.  It looked as if each one gave the other girl one of her boots.  My first thought was, "Oh, it must be like friendship necklaces, but for feet!"  Anyway, back to science.

Only two 4th graders chose "I" as their favorite letter.  One chose it "cause it was gross and funny. and cool."  but the other student said "it is cool to learn about cow-pies and how they used to burn it."  Two liked R for Round Bales, two liked L for Lambs, two liked D for Dog, four liked K for Kittens, one liked Q for Quack, and two liked O for Oink (pigs).  One student commented, "because I liked learning where the bacon comes from."

Other interesting remarks are as follows:

H for Harvest- "Because I like the combines."
S for Silo- "Because it's cool how much corn can go in a silo."
V for Vaccine- "Because no one wants a sick animal."
Y for Yell! (call everyone for dinner)- "I liked it because I like to yell at my brothers and sisters."
Z is for Zzz (farmers taking naps)- "I like Ethan trying not to laugh." [I told my 4th graders that I staged the picture and my brother and dad were trying not to laugh at the animals climbing all over them while they tried to "sleep."]

Nap time for 4th graders!

I remember when I was little I hated taking naps.  They seemed like such a waste of time and I could never fall asleep.  Come to think of it, I still hate naps.  Imagine my surprise this morning when my 4th graders announced they would rather take a nap than do our morning sharing (aka show and tell).  Someone suggested it, they voted on it, and I decided it was better to just go along with it.

First I had to lay some ground rules so they wouldn't go crazy.  They had to sit in their desks and put their heads down.  If they didn't want to take a nap, they could read a book at their desks.  We have some pillows in the back of the classroom, and to avoid arguments over their use, I drew Popsicle sticks until all were taken.  Then I set the timer for 15 minutes and they had nap time.  It actually worked pretty well for me because I could correct papers in peace and quiet.  Still... nap time.  I never would've thought it an activity 4th graders would get excited about.  Afterwards they all congratulated the student who originally proposed the idea and said they hope to do it again!

In other news, last week's word of the week (rotund) was used multiple times this week, and it's only Tuesday!  The word got off to a rather rough start last week.  I was giving the spelling test and came up with a sentence using the word from the top of my head.  Looking back on it, I probably could've come up with a better sentence for the word rotund, but it's hard to think on the fly!  I'm pretty sure my sentence went something like this, "The kindergartener could be described as being rotund."  Yeah.  That didn't go over too well.  Some started giggling and one 4th grader pointed a finger at me and gasped, "You're a bully! Calling a little kid fat!"  The other kids chimed in and it got a little out of hand.  But I admitted I made a mistake and said it was not kind of me to use the word in that sense, and we moved on with our spelling test.

This week, I showed a picture of Miggery Sow from The Tale of Despereaux and one of my 4th graders shouted, "She is rotund!" which is true.  I'm glad to see they are adding the word to their vocabularies.  It's such a good word, it's a shame it's not used very often.

The votes are in... pigs are cool!

Earlier this semester, I decided I would teach my 4th graders some lessons on agriculture.  To better accommodate their interests, I had them take a two question survey.  One question was about how I am doing as a teacher (according to them, I'm perfect and I don't need to work on anything... I wish they were the ones giving me a grade!) and the other question was "What do you want to learn about farming?"  These responses were a bit more interesting:

How much profit do they get for an average year?
How do farmers get the stuff they need for farming?
How do you get hay in hay lofs?
How do you take care of an animal if it HATES you?
What do farmers do to pass the time away?
I want to learn how do animals get pregnant?

And the best question of all...  "how do you get the meat and stuff out of the pig without killing them, or do they have to be dead?"

Yeah, that should be a fun conversation.

I taught the first "ag" lesson to my class today.  I had made a Farmyard ABC book for a class last semester and decided it would be a good place to start with my 4th graders.  I added a few more pictures and braced myself for the onslaught of questions and comments that would be generated by the epic-ness of farming.

I was not disappointed.  In the last two minutes of class, I squeezed in a quick assessment to see if they were listening; my 4th graders' task was to write a sentence on a post-it note describing which alphabet letter was their favorite and why.  Here are some of the responses I received:

 The letter M- Moo- "Moo- because my grampa has cow and they licked me all the time."
The letter U- Uh-oh- "When the sheep jumped the fence."
The letter Q- Quack- "Q- I like aquatic birds."

The letter "I" got many responses, but I assumed that would be the case since "I" is for Icky Cow Pies.  Most of them chose this letter because "it was funny." But a few of my 4th graders actually put some thought into it...
"Ikey because they throw it in guardens."
"Ikey because they throw it in there feilds." 

The second most common letter was O- Oink!
"About the pigs because they have so many and that they give us backen [bacon]."
"The pigs how they are smart like us."
"I liked the pigs because I know a lot about them and I still found out more about them."

I wonder what the other class will think... tune in on Wednesday to find out!

Coincident at its finest...

Yesterday, after school, Kristy and I were driving back to Mankato when we passed an interesting entourage on the side of the road.  There was an ambulance with lights flashing, a hearse, and two regular cars.  We were confused as to why that combination would be on the side of the road together, but didn't overly dwell on it.  The next day, I had a brilliant idea; my students have been drawing conclusions all week in reading class, so I would tell them what I saw and have them draw a conclusion based on my information. 

So I told my class the story and right before I asked them to discuss possible conclusions they could come to, a student raised her hand and said, "Miss Heintz? I know what happened for real."  I was surprised and super curious of how she knew about this.  As the rest of the class discussed, she revealed, "My great-grandma was in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, but she died on the way there."  Apparently the hearse was there to take her to the funeral home right away.  What are the odds?  Really?  I had no clue what to do with this, so I asked the student if it was okay if we kept going or if she wanted us to stop.  She said it was okay if we kept going, but I kept an eye on her.  Some of her classmates already knew what happened because she had told them before school, so my grand activity was a bust. 

"You are such a diphthong!"

These words trickled to my ears yesterday as I prepared for the school day.  My eyes shot to the two boys using this term and I stood there watching them for a while.  I couldn't figure out if they actually knew what they were calling each other.  (A diphthong is the name of a sound, specifically when you have two vowels that both make a sound as in "toy" or "boy" or "out".)  I have a feeling they didn't.  I was going to step in, but then I figured diphthong is not the worst word to call someone, so I let it go.

We also had drama in the girl world of 4th grade today.  One student wrote a couple notes to other girls saying she didn't want to be friends on Motion Monster, or whatever the online game is called.  The other girls wanted to know why, but the first girl kept running away and wouldn't talk to anyone.  So they were all talking about her and she was upset because they were talking about her behind her back.  Then after recess, two girls came in and told me that they had had a fight during recess and they wanted to talk to the first girl, but she kept running away.  We ended up keeping the three girls in from PE so we could get to the bottom of this. 

They talked through their problem like adults, but the problem itself wasn't very adult-like.  The first student said the other student was breaking up her friendship with another girl and she didn't like it.  The accused girl said she wasn't trying to do that, and the friend in question said she wanted to be friends with both girls.  Mrs. J pointed out that a friend couldn't be stolen away if she didn't want to be, so the first student had nothing to worry about.  Sigh.  So much drama.

Last night before we went home after school, Mrs. J said there was supposed to be a big storm coming through and we would get 5 inches of snow, or so.  This morning I woke up and.... no snow.  I think this is the first time in my life I've been disappointed that we didn't get snow.  I was really hoping for a snow day.  Oh well.  What can you do?

Writing Books with Despereaux

Before I began student teaching, my parents asked me how I would handle those times during class when I would really want to laugh, but I should keep a straight face instead.  I don't think I had an answer for them at that time, and I don't really have an answer at this time, but I do have more experience with it!

In English, I called some students up to my desk to conference with them about the adventure stories they are writing.  I had been encouraging them to use descriptions to help the reader visualize what was going on in their books.  One boy has a very vivid imagination and took my suggestions to heart.  This is a sample of what he wrote, "He grabbed the brown hat and in the blink of an eye the TV turned on with a man in black clothes with shades on.  Ralph was so stunned his eyes popped out like he got stung in the butt with a needle 6 inches deep in his skin... the first thing that ran through Ralph's head was to get the stuff and go. Ralph ran to the pack of stuff like a dart cutting through the air." 

I don't know about you, but I was really struggling to keep a straight face after reading that, especially the first part.  He also asked me if we could vote on the best story; I assume he thinks he's in the running, and he probably is.  Some other students were at the desk when I told the student he could go back to his desk.  Seeing the emotions playing across my face, a few asked, "Miss Heintz, was [that student's] story funny? What did it say?" 

The other incident of the day was during spelling.  On Tuesday afternoons, right before the end of the school day, I read my 4th graders' spelling sentences.  One of our words this week is "duty."  Yeah.  You can imagine how that went over.  The sentence I read began, "Who's duty is it to clean the..."  To give them adequate time to write the sentence, I broke it down into smaller parts.  I didn't perceive this word as a problem until it was too late, "Who's duty is it..."  Every single student cracked up and couldn't stop laughing.  I looked at Mrs. J to see what she was thinking; all she said as she shook her head was, "Every year."  We had to get through these sentences, so I gave them a lecture on how they were 4th graders, soon to be 5th graders; they could be mature about this and handle it in an appropriate manner.  After that, they sobered up and I didn't hear any more giggles about that word.  But I sure was paranoid about reading that sentence! 

"Take Chances! Make Mistakes! Get Messy!"

Thursday was Superstar Book Character Day for I Love to Read Month and I came up with the perfect costume idea... Ms. Frizzle.

 
My 4th graders guessed who I was right away, but guessing which character my supervising teacher was took much longer, mostly because she didn't dress up.  When pressed by our students, she said she was somebody's mom.  Of course they wanted to know which specific mom she was.  She thought for a while, but before she could answer, one student said, "Oh! I know! You're Ms. Frizzle's mom!"  So Mrs. J was Ms. Frizzle's mom.  The student who had made the comment hadn't dressed up either, so he decided he would be one of the students from The Magic School Bus.  He couldn't remember any of their names, so I started to suggest some,
"How about Arnold?"
"Is he the guy with glasses?"
"Yep."
(he made a face)
"Why don't you be Ralphie?"
"Who's Ralphie?"
"The guy whose body was explored in that episode we watched..."

"Oh, yeah, that's a good idea.  I'll be Ralphie."

Other costume ideas from the day included: Pippi Longstocking, Harry Potter, Junie B. Jones, Cowgirl Kate, Charlie Bone, and Despereaux.  Kristy, the other 4th grade student teacher, dressed up as Amelia Bedelia.  Her supervising teacher dressed up as the boy in the striped pajamas (they were working on a unit about the holocaust).

Secret Agent Math!

My 4th graders were standing in line at the tail end of their bathroom break when a student made the comment that math was boring.  I of course, being a teacher, had to stand up for the unpopular subject.  I told them that math wasn't boring all the time.  Another student, remembering our M&M math from the day before, said, "Yeah, M&Ms make math better.  You should give us M&Ms every day!"  I told him no, but sometimes having a teacher who was excited about math could make math exciting, or at least less boring.  Unfortunately, sometimes it's a struggle for me to get excited about math.  And because of my big mouth, my 4th graders were expecting great things from me and my first math lesson.

About two seconds before I started teaching, a vision came to me; we could pretend we were secret agents, trying to find the product of two numbers! Our mission required that we knew how to multiply two digit numbers.  Woohoo!  How exciting!  It actually worked pretty well, considering I was flying by the seat of my pants with this whole idea.  I heard one boy whispering to himself, "I'm a secret agent of math," as he did his assignment for the day. Overall the lesson was okay; I know I could've done better, but given that I haven't had a whole lot of experience teaching math, I did pretty well. 

Today was kind of sad for me; it was the last day of our body systems unit in science class.  But today was a good one to end on; my students were very enthusiastic.  They have a review day and a test next week, and then we'll move on to electricity.  Sigh.  It just won't be the same as learning about our bodies.  On a more positive note, tomorrow's dress up day for Snow Week is "Favorite Book Character" Day, so I'm going to be Ms. Frizzle.  But I'm afraid I have to leave you on a less positive note: I forgot my phone at school.  I took it out to look at the calendar on it and left it on the teacher desk right by the computer.  Hopefully no one desperately needs to get a hold of me tonight!

Valentine's Day

It was snowy, sugar was heavily involved, the schedule is off, and a party was planned; would the students be completely crazy?  In my class, they weren't too bad.  I was in charge of the activities for the day, and I tried to keep it structured.  We were sitting in our morning meeting circle when a slow trickle of students from the other class came and dumped valentines on my and my chair.  The other class of 4th graders exchanged their treats right away in the morning and wanted to give me a treat since I teach them science.  It was sweet of them to think of me, but I got a little annoyed because they were very disruptive.  One of my students commented, "Miss Heintz, you hit the jackpot!"

After our morning meeting, I read a few chapters from The Tale of Despereaux and they decorated bags to put their valentines in.  Then we made valentines for the nursing home residents.  Following that, we went into our Daily Five rotation.  I met with a few students about their plot and character worksheets for the adventure stories we're writing.  A male student was explaining some of his characters to me and I was a bit confused when I read the box titled, "Character's Problems."  In that box, he'd written, "has good emotions and shares his feelings."  I asked him, "Are those really problems?"  When I was reading aloud what he'd written the student was turning more and more red.  His character's name used to be his own name because he wanted to be in his own story, but then I saw he changed his first name to be The Hulk.  But it was still him.  Apparently he must think he's good at sharing his feelings, but it's a weakness? 

This same student went a little crazy when we passed out our candy.  After lunch and PE, I had the students come into the room, open their decorated bags on their desks, grab their treat from the back, and sit quietly until everyone was ready.  We only had a half an hour before going to a short play put on by some local college students.  When everyone was ready, I shouted "go" and they took off!  It was absolute chaos, but I was okay with that; I figured it was bound to happen at some point in the day.  Mrs. J said they could eat whatever candy they wanted (if it were up to me, I would've said they could eat only two or three pieces).  Fun dip was the candy choice of the day; I think I got about seven of them out of a class of nineteen.  The student I mentioned earlier decided he was going to pour the sugar from six packages into his mouth.  Then he came up to me, "Miss Heintz, look at my tongue!"  It was bright green, like the color of a leaf.  Since we had been studying the body, I told him it looked like a gall bladder and told him to get a drink; maybe it would water down some of the sugar.  Yuck!  Mrs. J made the comment they should use moderation and make sure they don't eat themselves sick.  When we went to the play, she told them, "I know you haven't eaten enough candy to have a sugar rush, so that idea can go right out the window.  You need to be listening quietly and be a good audience for them."  We had no behavior problems at all.  It was amazing!

After the play, I gave them my valentine treat: M&Ms for doing some geometry.  I met with individual pods to show them how to make crystal hearts with pipe cleaners, water, and sugar (or salt).  They're currently sitting on shelves all over the classroom, waiting for evaporation to do its job.  I finished with the last pod at 3:00 right on the dot and we calmly got ready to go home.  One of my students stopped packing up her locker to give me a Valentine's Day hug (Mrs. J got one too).  What a great day!

When I got back to school, I found two cards in my mailbox, one from Grandma and Grandpa, and the other from my parents.  The best part was that my dad had sent the card (I recognized his handwriting).  That one card made my whole day!  I couldn't stop smiling.  Later on, I went back to my room and found a rose in front of my room with a fancy homemade card saying, "you and me are soul mates, happy Valentine's Day! Love, Your Secret Admirer."  My sister wrote on my whiteboard, "Congratulations on your elopement.  When you get back, you should tell me who you married. PS- the kiss is from me."  She'd left a chocolate kiss in front of my door.  Someone else left another fun dip taped to my door.  Mysterious.  So my Valentine's Day was a pretty good day after all.

Week (or so) in Review...

First graders are funny.  I was walking to lunch one day and a little 1st grader looks over at me, says matter of factly, "You're pretty," and turns back around.  Then, I was on my way to make copies when I heard a little 1st grade girl say to her friend, "Well I like spiders.  I'm not going to marry a boy unless he likes spiders."

In our small reading group, we were talking about why opinions can be bad.  One student used this as an example of a bad opinion, "Abraham Lincoln was a bad president because he had a machine gun in his closet."  I'm not sure what his logic is coming from.  Then another student chimed in, "Besides, he wouldn't have a machine gun 'cause they weren't invented then, just a Gatling gun."

Yesterday, the principal came to our class to make an announcement.  Apparently, he got a call from a parent complaining about a game the 4th and 5th graders were playing at recess.  It's called "Murder Tag."  He told the students they weren't allowed to play it anymore and if they knew anything about it, they should tell an adult.  After lunch, one of my students asked to speak with me in the hall.  She admitted to starting the game but told me it was supposed to be called "Marauder" tag, after the characters in Harry Potter.  People just misheard her, but she assured me they don't play it anymore.

The past few days I've been videotaping my English lessons for an assignment at school (TPA, yuck).  Mrs. J and I stressed that this was very important to me, so they shouldn't goof off.  I was surprised how good they were in class!  Afterwards, one girl asked me if I didn't get a teaching job, would I cry?  I told her I would be sad, but I probably wouldn't cry.  Then she said that she cried last year when their student teacher left.  Today I refreshed their memories of why I was videotaping and they all decided they were going to find me a job.  Someone suggested I teach 2nd grade and another student thought I should teach pre-school.  With 19 students on the lookout, I should get a job in no time!

Weepy Wednesday

I made a kid cry yesterday.  Actually, it's more complicated than that... let me rephrase my statement... The student started tearing up when he got frustrated with what I was saying about his paper.  We were working on editing our Body System Research Papers, specifically fixing the beginning summary sentences and ending summary sentences to make them more interesting.  His basically said the same thing over and over, so I tried to get him to fix them.  But he got frustrated when I wouldn't just tell him what to type; he actually asked me to write the sentence on a piece of paper.  I told him no.  He couldn't remember the suggestion I had made (two seconds earlier!) and tears began to form.  Sigh.  Who knew 4th graders could be so moody?

In other news, Tuesday was a pretty goofy day for our classroom.  This was made apparent while standing in line after our bathroom break; about three or four students stuck their heads inside their shirts, pretending they were turtles.  I have no idea what brought this on.  One boy shot out of the bathroom and announced, "Miss Heintz! We're having a farting contest in the bathroom!"  He then proceeded to show me how loud he could armpit fart.

During our small group reading time, we started reading a book about the seven wonders of the world.  Mrs. J asked if anyone in the group could name one of the wonders.  A student piped right up, "I'm one of them, aren't' I?"  Later, a girl countered his first claim, "No, we all are! Because there are seven of them and seven of us... It's us! 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7!"