Have you ever had the feeling that you just want to bang your head against a wall? This afternoon was one of those times, except I really did want to turn around and bang my head into the whiteboard or on the podium in my classroom.
The 7th and 8th graders were noisy and didn't want to pay attention today. Some kids asked good questions, but others were playing around with paper scraps (a huge mountain of paper scraps torn from a notebook on the table). Still others were blurting out answers/questions/comments to their neighbors even though I was talking at the time. I knew I should've done an interactive game/demonstration for the respiratory system, or at least waited to teach it. I think any day but Friday would've gone better.
But it is Friday, the end of the quarter, and almost Easter break. Plus we've been cooped up inside for far too long. Sigh. It's about time for spring.
All day I've been antsy, just waiting for the day to end so I can quick finish my grades for the quarter and then fly the coop! Tomorrow afternoon I'm flying to London and it still hasn't sunk in yet. It probably won't until I'm sitting on the plane at the airport.
But back to the head banging... after a not-so-good time in science, my students came back from math. We tried to get started on a new art project, but the boys were too pumped up to concentrate. We're doing a project where they draw 3D letters on a paper as if they fell from the sky in a pile (stacked names). But they didn't want to write their names. One girl wanted to use the word "pink" and since it's her favorite color, I let her. Another wanted to do "hope" so I let her do that too. But the boys didn't care about the project and just wanted a short word so they could be done sooner. I kept rejecting all the words they wanted to do: yak, red, la, DDF, eye (or I, I'm not sure which). And a whole bunch of others I can't remember now.
Finally one decided on "fish dog." Kind of weird, but it was the name of one of his characters from a story he wrote earlier this year. The other boy still couldn't think of any words and kept giggling and giggling. I think we finally agreed he could do the word star, but if his artwork wasn't completed to the best of his ability, I would make him redo it. Hopefully he'll put in some time and effort on this so I don't have to make him stay after school to finish it.
I finally have everything situated for the two days I'm going to be gone next week. All the papers are on a table in Mr. E's room (he's going to watch my kids for our two days of school next week). My students have been briefed. I lined up someone to take care of our tortoise Joe (who is getting friendlier and friendlier every day!). So I guess all that's left to be done is to drive over to Carissa's house and help her pack her suitcase!
Friday, March 22, 2013
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Hockey Goals
We had another floor hockey game today. I was so proud of my 6th graders! One of my students was the goalie for her team and even though the other team kept making goals, she didn't let it get to her. She kept calm and in good spirits and didn't throw a temper tantrum. (However, she wouldn't let anyone else have a turn being goalie... so there's still things to work on). My 6th grader on the other team is a hockey superstar. His team ended up winning 8 to 1. He told me later that he made an assist on every single one of his team's points.
But that's not what made me so happy. What made me so proud watching the game was that even though he could've made almost every shot, he decided to share and passed the ball to a teammate instead. Every single person on his team scored a point, and there were a few kindergarteners and 1st graders on the team. He made sure his younger sister got the ball. And then when she missed, he passed it right back to her and that time she made it in. Then he did the same thing with the kindergarten girl. The crowd went wild when she shot it in the net!
The spelling bee is coming up soon and we need to decide who's going to represent our class. I had a few of my students pegged, but no one wanted to go to the spelling bee. One of my choices said her dad is making her do it. No one else volunteered to go, so I said if I didn't get any volunteers, I was going to start calling parents. Then I realized I would see almost all of them at tonight's Lenten service.
I ended up talking to one of their mothers and she said she would be glad to force her son to do the spelling bee, especially since his sister is doing it and so it wouldn't be a big deal for him to do it as well. Hmm, I wonder what he's going to say tomorrow at school...
But that's not what made me so happy. What made me so proud watching the game was that even though he could've made almost every shot, he decided to share and passed the ball to a teammate instead. Every single person on his team scored a point, and there were a few kindergarteners and 1st graders on the team. He made sure his younger sister got the ball. And then when she missed, he passed it right back to her and that time she made it in. Then he did the same thing with the kindergarten girl. The crowd went wild when she shot it in the net!
The spelling bee is coming up soon and we need to decide who's going to represent our class. I had a few of my students pegged, but no one wanted to go to the spelling bee. One of my choices said her dad is making her do it. No one else volunteered to go, so I said if I didn't get any volunteers, I was going to start calling parents. Then I realized I would see almost all of them at tonight's Lenten service.
I ended up talking to one of their mothers and she said she would be glad to force her son to do the spelling bee, especially since his sister is doing it and so it wouldn't be a big deal for him to do it as well. Hmm, I wonder what he's going to say tomorrow at school...
Friday, March 15, 2013
Random Occurences of the Week
We're studying poetry in reading this week. This is an acrostic poem one of the 6th graders wrote:
My teacher
Is nice,
Smart and
Scientific.
Her
Expressions are
Incredible.
Nobody
Tries to make her into a
Zebra.
Yesterday after school, Mr. E came rushing into my room saying he had something for me to dissect. I followed him out to the front door of our school and he told me to look out the window. There, in the corner of the doorway was a muskrat! Just chilling out. After I identified the creature, Mr. E and his son looked up info about it on the internet and decided they should shoot it since it probably had rabies. Before they could, it ran underneath the outside stairs by my classroom. So they put out some raw fish to lure it out. I didn't see it when I left last night, so they must've gotten it.
My teacher
Is nice,
Smart and
Scientific.
Her
Expressions are
Incredible.
Nobody
Tries to make her into a
Zebra.
Yesterday after school, Mr. E came rushing into my room saying he had something for me to dissect. I followed him out to the front door of our school and he told me to look out the window. There, in the corner of the doorway was a muskrat! Just chilling out. After I identified the creature, Mr. E and his son looked up info about it on the internet and decided they should shoot it since it probably had rabies. Before they could, it ran underneath the outside stairs by my classroom. So they put out some raw fish to lure it out. I didn't see it when I left last night, so they must've gotten it.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Trials and Tribulations
PTL last night, plus another meeting afterwards didn't get me home until 10:00pm last night. Then I had to lesson plan for the 7/8th grade science so I didn't get to bed until 11:00... something that happens once in a blue moon. This morning during breakfast, I realized I forgot to make a worksheet to go along with the lesson, but I figured I would have enough time to make one at school.
I noticed right away that something was wrong in my classroom. My whiteboards weren't in their normal places, yes, the big ones that are screwed into the wall. And then I noticed the new TeamBoard that had been installed at the front of the room. Sigh. I wish the IT guys would've told me they were coming to install it. I could've moved everything out of the way for them, but no, they were still mad at me.
Heavily sighing, I made my way to my desk, and that's when I discovered I didn't see my calendar on the wall. And then where were my Spanish vocab flash cards and the cans of student names and other posters I had had in the front of the room? Answer: they were scattered in piles around the room. Not on my desk where I would be sure to find them, but on my students' desks and chairs by the computers. So that took extra time to get straightened up.
The whole time I was straightening up, I kept thinking about my students' reactions to the board when they arrived. All of them would want to touch it and try it out, but it is hooked up to my computer, so everything they do on the board shows up on my computer screen. Imagine having your mouse fly all over the screen while you're typing; you can't get anything done! So I was scrambling to get as much done as I could before the bus came, but of course, today the bus dropped them off super early. And then came the questions. I compromised by saying we'd try the board out right before lunch because I needed to use the computer.
In other notes, my student's science projects are due tomorrow. There is a class ice cream party scheduled for tomorrow as a reward for answering the Challenge of the Week correctly enough times, but I told them if they ALL didn't bring their science projects to school, we wouldn't have the party. Hopefully that is incentive enough for them to bring their projects to school completed. Now I just need to go get the ingredients...
After school, one of the girls who doesn't have computer access stayed after school to work on her project. Of course that meant I didn't get much accomplished, but we worked together on what things to put on her board and I helped her put together her report booklet, so I'm pretty sure she'll have hers finished by tomorrow.
This morning, Joe the tortoise was up and moving around. He was actually not buried under his pile of dirt, so my students enjoyed watching him. One girl was super excited that she could pet him on the head and he wouldn't go into his shell. It's times like these I'm glad we got a class pet. I still haven't seen him eating, but since he doesn't move around a lot and his food dish always seems less full in the morning, I'm pretty sure he's doing okay (probably eating at night or before I get to school in the morning).
I noticed right away that something was wrong in my classroom. My whiteboards weren't in their normal places, yes, the big ones that are screwed into the wall. And then I noticed the new TeamBoard that had been installed at the front of the room. Sigh. I wish the IT guys would've told me they were coming to install it. I could've moved everything out of the way for them, but no, they were still mad at me.
Heavily sighing, I made my way to my desk, and that's when I discovered I didn't see my calendar on the wall. And then where were my Spanish vocab flash cards and the cans of student names and other posters I had had in the front of the room? Answer: they were scattered in piles around the room. Not on my desk where I would be sure to find them, but on my students' desks and chairs by the computers. So that took extra time to get straightened up.
The whole time I was straightening up, I kept thinking about my students' reactions to the board when they arrived. All of them would want to touch it and try it out, but it is hooked up to my computer, so everything they do on the board shows up on my computer screen. Imagine having your mouse fly all over the screen while you're typing; you can't get anything done! So I was scrambling to get as much done as I could before the bus came, but of course, today the bus dropped them off super early. And then came the questions. I compromised by saying we'd try the board out right before lunch because I needed to use the computer.
In other notes, my student's science projects are due tomorrow. There is a class ice cream party scheduled for tomorrow as a reward for answering the Challenge of the Week correctly enough times, but I told them if they ALL didn't bring their science projects to school, we wouldn't have the party. Hopefully that is incentive enough for them to bring their projects to school completed. Now I just need to go get the ingredients...
After school, one of the girls who doesn't have computer access stayed after school to work on her project. Of course that meant I didn't get much accomplished, but we worked together on what things to put on her board and I helped her put together her report booklet, so I'm pretty sure she'll have hers finished by tomorrow.
This morning, Joe the tortoise was up and moving around. He was actually not buried under his pile of dirt, so my students enjoyed watching him. One girl was super excited that she could pet him on the head and he wouldn't go into his shell. It's times like these I'm glad we got a class pet. I still haven't seen him eating, but since he doesn't move around a lot and his food dish always seems less full in the morning, I'm pretty sure he's doing okay (probably eating at night or before I get to school in the morning).
Monday, March 11, 2013
Weird High Schooler
Surprise, surprise. No smartboard installed. The IT guys are apparently still livid with me ordering them around. I'm guessing they probably didn't even read my second email (I wasn't thinking at the time and titled it "SMARTboard"). I'm starting to think maybe we should just install it ourselves; it looks pretty easy. But we'll see.
This weekend I chopped off my hair for Locks-of-Love... actually, the ponytails of hair are in a bag in my car waiting to be mailed. When I went to church on Sunday, no one said anything about my haircut. I think it's because from the front, it looks like my hair is behind me and from the back, it looks like my hair is in front of me (unless you look closely).
Then, this morning, my students saw me for the first time. I was writing our assignments for the day on the board, so my back was to them. One girl spotted it immediately. Her classmate didn't notice for about 20 minutes. When he finally did notice, he said, "Woah, Miss H. you look like you're my sister's age... like you're in high school."
Later on, a student who gets dropped off at school late came into our room as usual, but stopped in her tracks, giving me a weird look. I had almost forgotten that I recently underwent a drastic hair change, but then remembered after seeing her look. She then proceeded to announce that I looked weird. When Mr. E visited our room to give me the 6th graders' math assignment, one of the girls whispered to him "did you see Miss Heintz's haircut?"
We started our school-wide floor hockey tournament today. 6 teams will play each other in the next two weeks and after Easter, we'll have a single elimination tournament. Following this will be the big teacher-vs.-student match.
This weekend I chopped off my hair for Locks-of-Love... actually, the ponytails of hair are in a bag in my car waiting to be mailed. When I went to church on Sunday, no one said anything about my haircut. I think it's because from the front, it looks like my hair is behind me and from the back, it looks like my hair is in front of me (unless you look closely).
Then, this morning, my students saw me for the first time. I was writing our assignments for the day on the board, so my back was to them. One girl spotted it immediately. Her classmate didn't notice for about 20 minutes. When he finally did notice, he said, "Woah, Miss H. you look like you're my sister's age... like you're in high school."
Later on, a student who gets dropped off at school late came into our room as usual, but stopped in her tracks, giving me a weird look. I had almost forgotten that I recently underwent a drastic hair change, but then remembered after seeing her look. She then proceeded to announce that I looked weird. When Mr. E visited our room to give me the 6th graders' math assignment, one of the girls whispered to him "did you see Miss Heintz's haircut?"
We started our school-wide floor hockey tournament today. 6 teams will play each other in the next two weeks and after Easter, we'll have a single elimination tournament. Following this will be the big teacher-vs.-student match.
Friday, March 8, 2013
Drama, Drama, Drama
At our faculty meeting yesterday, we spent quite a while talking about the technology issues we've been having in our school. Well, since Mr. E and I are the only ones who ever contact our IT guys, we got put in charge of talking to them about the list. I guess I was only in charge of talking to them about installing a SMARTboard in my room. We had a board donated to our school by 3M and they planned to deliver it to our school Friday afternoon (yes, it is currently leaning against a wall in my room, but more on that later). Since my science lessons are all in SMARTboard software format, I wanted to get this thing up and running so I didn't have to change everything over to powerpoint!
Last night, I didn't feel like calling the IT guys, so I kept putting it off and putting it off and putting it off... and never called them. This morning, Mr. E came into my room five minutes before the bell rang and asked if I had talked to them at all. Nope. So we decided I should send them an email.
Three minutes before the bell rang: I'm sitting at my desk, frantically trying to send an email to the IT guys about installing this board after school today while six 6th graders are talking to me all at once, "Miss H, can I say memory work? Can we do a play for religion? Did you feed Joe today? Can we work on memory work during Word-Work? Want to hear what happened after school yesterday?" Yikes! Needless to say, the email I sent wasn't my best work. I remember pressing the send button and thinking, "Hmm, maybe I should look this over one more time... nah, the IT guys won't care." Well... maybe I should've listened to myself...
Lunch time: Mr. E comes into our classroom while everyone is eating. He says that he just called the IT guys and told them about everything on our list. And the one guy was "on fire" about the email I sent him this morning. Now, normally when Mr. E says "on fire," it's not a good thing. The IT guy said that they like to be asked to do things, not told that they have to do them. And he had half a mind to not install the board at all this weekend just to prove his point. Sigh. So then I decided to send another email explaining about the first one I had sent... but first I had to do recess duty.
After lunch, I tried to send another email, but didn't have enough time, so I saved it as a draft and got the 7th and 8th graders situated. We had to adjust our schedule because the 7th and 8th graders had a guest speaker coming at 1:00 and we couldn't meet at our normal time. I'm really glad I didn't send that email, because it didn't have quite the right tone and my mind was clearer after school.
We squeezed three speakers in for 7/8th geography, they went back to their room for a speaker, my 6th graders came back for science, then we switched to art, followed by 6th grade recess and 7/8th grade science. Yep, the 7/8th graders came back to my room for the last half hour of the day. We were doing Mystery Class. It's amazing how focused they are on their work. Every time we do this activity, I'm impressed. While they were recording data and making graphs, the people dropped off the board.
And then I realized that they weren't donating a SMARTboard, they were donating some kind of interactive board I had never heard of before. After a little more research (Mr. E handing me a packet of papers), I discovered that we are now the owners of a TeamBoard. I wanted to do some searching on the internet, but the 7/8th graders were writing down information that was pulled up on my computer. The freeze button on my remote doesn't work either, so I was kind of stuck. So I had to wait until after school to do that. And send another email.
So. The email is sent. The board is against the wall. Will I get it installed by Monday? I don't know. It seems pretty simple: hang the board up, plug the USB into the computer, you're good to go. But if that's the case, maybe the board should go in someone else's room that doesn't have a projector???
To end on a better note: I finally have a picture of Joe, our tortoise
He's still crabby, but I'm pretty sure he's eating and drinking at night.
Thursday, March 7, 2013
Apples to Apples, Science Edition
Holy buckets! Today has been go, go, go right from the beginning. We went to Martin Luther High School this morning for some presentations from the Minnesota Science Museum. The first one was geared towards 3-6th graders; it was about solids, liquids, and gases. The guy presenting had really sticky-up hair and cool science glasses (okay, so they looked more like your typical nerd glasses, but I thought they worked with his image). He showed us all sorts of cool things with dry ice, liquid nitrogen, and vinegar/baking soda. There was constant audience participation, and one of my students got to go up and help out! The students from our school kept asking really good questions and making great predictions about what was going to happen. Of course, they didn't want to share them with the whole group, but that's okay. At least their brains were engaged.
After that presentation, my 6th graders bolted for my car and we headed into Fairmont for lunch. They were set on eating at Subway, and when we finally found one, they each ordered a foot-long. A customer who was sitting in the booth behind us said, "Excuse me ma'am, but what kind of trip are you on?" I told him we were on a science trip. He replied, "Oh. I was wondering what they were doing that they were so hungry!" I turned around and saw that every last one of my 6th graders had eaten their whole 12 inch sub. Wow! And they all got chips to go along with their meal. Note to self: always bring snacks on a field trip so my students don't starve.
One of the boys ordered pickle chips and he finished off his meal by dumping all the crumbs of flavor into his mouth. Blech! His face afterwards was priceless; he was squinting for about two minutes afterwards... it's making my mouth water just thinking about all that sour!
We finished our meal and arrived back at MLHS with about 45 minutes until the next presentation (this one about the brain, geared for 7-8th graders). Thankfully, I had planned ahead and brought Apples to Apples. We found some couches outside the lunchroom and I gave my 6th graders the option of a nap or playing the game. Only one girl wanted to play at first, so we pulled out the cards and the two of us began to play. Pretty soon one of the boys joined in, and then another girl, and another boy, until everyone was playing. We did a modified version of the game: each person puts down one card before seeing what the green card is. I ended up winning with 6 cards, not that I was trying to win... I guess I just know my students.
While we were playing, the regular MLHS students were eating lunch. Of course, one of the boys decided to "be cool" and say "what's up man?" to everyone walking past... the first person he saw was one of my cousins coming out of the lunch room. I had waved since I of course recognized him, and my 6th grader gave me a weird look until I explained that I actually knew him. A few minutes later, the janitor stopped by to observe our game. And then a few more minutes later, another cousin of mine walked past, did a double take, and then said hi. She ended up sitting right in front of my class during the next science presentation.
Our school's 7th and 8th graders also came to this brain presentation. I didn't think this one was as good as the first one. There were less interactions and the presenter was using some pretty big words. My 6th graders said they understood maybe two of the words she said the entire hour (I think that's a bit of an exaggeration), but she was talking about the same things I had just taught the 7th and 8th graders yesterday. After we got back to school, I asked one of the 7th graders what he thought and he said it was really interesting knowing what each part of the brain controls. Hmm. I'm glad someone thought it was worthwhile. I wonder what the rest of his classmates thought.
We arrived back at school 15 minutes before the bus came to pick everyone up, and just in time for Bookmobile. I finally picked up the movie that had been waiting for me for a few weeks. Then my 6th graders all wanted to have recess time since they had been, "sitting on our butts all day." So we headed into the gym for about 5 minutes of hockey. Everyone packed up, went home, and then we teachers had a faculty meeting.
So now I'm pretty much drained of all energy. I need to stop at the library at some point before the weekend, get groceries, and get a haircut, but I don't feel like doing all that right now. Tomorrow, a SMARTboard is supposed to be dropped off at 3:15, and I don't know if I'm going to have to stick around while they install it or not, otherwise I can just go after school tomorrow. Then I'm off to visit Carissa and plan our Ireland/London/Scotland excursion. Whew!
After that presentation, my 6th graders bolted for my car and we headed into Fairmont for lunch. They were set on eating at Subway, and when we finally found one, they each ordered a foot-long. A customer who was sitting in the booth behind us said, "Excuse me ma'am, but what kind of trip are you on?" I told him we were on a science trip. He replied, "Oh. I was wondering what they were doing that they were so hungry!" I turned around and saw that every last one of my 6th graders had eaten their whole 12 inch sub. Wow! And they all got chips to go along with their meal. Note to self: always bring snacks on a field trip so my students don't starve.
One of the boys ordered pickle chips and he finished off his meal by dumping all the crumbs of flavor into his mouth. Blech! His face afterwards was priceless; he was squinting for about two minutes afterwards... it's making my mouth water just thinking about all that sour!
We finished our meal and arrived back at MLHS with about 45 minutes until the next presentation (this one about the brain, geared for 7-8th graders). Thankfully, I had planned ahead and brought Apples to Apples. We found some couches outside the lunchroom and I gave my 6th graders the option of a nap or playing the game. Only one girl wanted to play at first, so we pulled out the cards and the two of us began to play. Pretty soon one of the boys joined in, and then another girl, and another boy, until everyone was playing. We did a modified version of the game: each person puts down one card before seeing what the green card is. I ended up winning with 6 cards, not that I was trying to win... I guess I just know my students.
While we were playing, the regular MLHS students were eating lunch. Of course, one of the boys decided to "be cool" and say "what's up man?" to everyone walking past... the first person he saw was one of my cousins coming out of the lunch room. I had waved since I of course recognized him, and my 6th grader gave me a weird look until I explained that I actually knew him. A few minutes later, the janitor stopped by to observe our game. And then a few more minutes later, another cousin of mine walked past, did a double take, and then said hi. She ended up sitting right in front of my class during the next science presentation.
Our school's 7th and 8th graders also came to this brain presentation. I didn't think this one was as good as the first one. There were less interactions and the presenter was using some pretty big words. My 6th graders said they understood maybe two of the words she said the entire hour (I think that's a bit of an exaggeration), but she was talking about the same things I had just taught the 7th and 8th graders yesterday. After we got back to school, I asked one of the 7th graders what he thought and he said it was really interesting knowing what each part of the brain controls. Hmm. I'm glad someone thought it was worthwhile. I wonder what the rest of his classmates thought.
We arrived back at school 15 minutes before the bus came to pick everyone up, and just in time for Bookmobile. I finally picked up the movie that had been waiting for me for a few weeks. Then my 6th graders all wanted to have recess time since they had been, "sitting on our butts all day." So we headed into the gym for about 5 minutes of hockey. Everyone packed up, went home, and then we teachers had a faculty meeting.
So now I'm pretty much drained of all energy. I need to stop at the library at some point before the weekend, get groceries, and get a haircut, but I don't feel like doing all that right now. Tomorrow, a SMARTboard is supposed to be dropped off at 3:15, and I don't know if I'm going to have to stick around while they install it or not, otherwise I can just go after school tomorrow. Then I'm off to visit Carissa and plan our Ireland/London/Scotland excursion. Whew!
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
Booking Tickets and Playing Dolls
On Sunday our school went ice skating and one particular 1st grader decided I was going to be her new best friend. She made me follow her around and skate with her until her mom finally told her to "leave Miss H. alone!" Well, on Monday during recess, she asked me to play dolls with her. She and another 1st grader had brought Woody, Bullseye, and Jessie dolls to school and I got to be Jessie. Bullseye kept sneaking off while Woody and Jessie were sleeping. It reminded me of all those times my sisters and I played Barbies.
Then today this same girl had brought a bigger doll to school and wanted me to play house with her. So I was the babysitter and had to take the baby to the beach. And build a sandcastle. And make sure the baby didn't wake up. I ended up spending the whole recess carrying this baby doll around complete with diaper bag full of shoes and other accessories.
Joe, our class tortoise, is still grumpy. I think he ate some lettuce last night because there wasn't as much in his food dish. We cut a hole in the side of an ice cream pail and replaced the clay hiding spot in the tank. One of the 6th graders noticed that Joe had a bunch of white stuff on his head; it turns out it was clay that had rubbed off the hideout thing! The damp soil in the terrarium caused the clay to soften and rub off. I just hope this ice cream pail won't get too hot under the heat lamp.
After school, I started looking at tickets for my upcoming trip to Ireland. Wow, there are lots of options! Carissa and I narrowed it down to a flight on a Saturday morning so we'd arrive in London at 8:35am. But when I tried to book them, my credit card wouldn't be accepted. Of course the number to call was busy. I waited about 6 minutes before I gave up. Then I called Carissa again and she said she'd look after she got home from church. So I went to church, listened to the school children sing, and debated about heading over to school to try one more time to book the flight... I gave in. The website still wouldn't work, so I called a different number on the website and finally got a hold of a human being. He didn't know what was going on with the site, so he looked for an alternative flight. And the tickets he found weren't as cheap as the first ones I had found so I decided to try booking them one more time. It didn't work.
So now I'm waiting on the phone one more time, hoping to get the same guy on the phone to book these tickets to London. Ugh. Hopefully someone answers soon.
Friday, March 1, 2013
Slow-Mo Joe, the tortoise (and our cricket stowaway)
Well, our new class pet is hunkered down in his new terrarium. We made it to Pet Expo and back with no problems. Only two 6th graders didn't accompany us. One was visiting a grandparent, and hadn't been in school today. The other just decided he didn't want to come.
The first thing we did when we arrived at the pet store was to look at all the other animals. Then we picked out some food/water dishes (the food dish we picked out is pretty big, so I'm thinking we might go down to a smaller one... we'll see). Finally we picked out our tortoise. The lady who got him out of the pen said it was probably a boy because of the way he was holding his tail. Everyone wanted to get a boy, so that's the one we picked. I remember reading that the males are slightly concave on the bottom, and this one is not, but that could be because it is still small and hasn't finished developing.
Here's what our terrarium currently looks like:
Our little guy dug himself a hole under this green thing and is just sitting there. Thank goodness it's the weekend; that will give him a little time to get situated before noisy kids start bugging him. I'll probably stop in at school tomorrow to check in on him and see if he ate any lettuce.
We had a surprise stowaway in the box we brought our tortoise in. The girls were taking turns holding the box and one shouted, "Ahh! The turtle pooped!" It turns out it was just a cricket that had sneaked a ride. We tossed the cricket in the terrarium so our little buddy has some company. Since we were missing two 6th graders, we decided to wait until Monday to officially name our new pet. The 6th grade boy that came with said we should name him Fat Joe, or Slow-Mo since turtles/tortoises move slowly. The girls wanted to name it Joe too, or Bobert or a few other names I can't think of right now. I think we're going to go with Slow Mo Joe, and call him Joe for short, or maybe MoJo. That name seems to meet everyone's approval.
All day I've been researching (in between teaching) what to feed a tortoise, how to care for it, etc. I don't want our money to go to waste! Most sites say to have your tortoise checked out by a vet, but I don't know if the vets in this area would know what to do with a tortoise. You're supposed to take a fecal sample and have it checked for parasites. Then I found a website that gives you instructions on how to search for worm eggs yourself... possible 7th and 8th grade science lab? Hmm, if only we had better microscopes. Maybe at the end of the year we'll test it out. I do kind of think I should deworm our new pet, just in case. They say to use Panacur, so I'll have to stop at the vet's office at some point and see if I can get a hold of some.
The first thing we did when we arrived at the pet store was to look at all the other animals. Then we picked out some food/water dishes (the food dish we picked out is pretty big, so I'm thinking we might go down to a smaller one... we'll see). Finally we picked out our tortoise. The lady who got him out of the pen said it was probably a boy because of the way he was holding his tail. Everyone wanted to get a boy, so that's the one we picked. I remember reading that the males are slightly concave on the bottom, and this one is not, but that could be because it is still small and hasn't finished developing.
Here's what our terrarium currently looks like:
Our little guy dug himself a hole under this green thing and is just sitting there. Thank goodness it's the weekend; that will give him a little time to get situated before noisy kids start bugging him. I'll probably stop in at school tomorrow to check in on him and see if he ate any lettuce.
We had a surprise stowaway in the box we brought our tortoise in. The girls were taking turns holding the box and one shouted, "Ahh! The turtle pooped!" It turns out it was just a cricket that had sneaked a ride. We tossed the cricket in the terrarium so our little buddy has some company. Since we were missing two 6th graders, we decided to wait until Monday to officially name our new pet. The 6th grade boy that came with said we should name him Fat Joe, or Slow-Mo since turtles/tortoises move slowly. The girls wanted to name it Joe too, or Bobert or a few other names I can't think of right now. I think we're going to go with Slow Mo Joe, and call him Joe for short, or maybe MoJo. That name seems to meet everyone's approval.
All day I've been researching (in between teaching) what to feed a tortoise, how to care for it, etc. I don't want our money to go to waste! Most sites say to have your tortoise checked out by a vet, but I don't know if the vets in this area would know what to do with a tortoise. You're supposed to take a fecal sample and have it checked for parasites. Then I found a website that gives you instructions on how to search for worm eggs yourself... possible 7th and 8th grade science lab? Hmm, if only we had better microscopes. Maybe at the end of the year we'll test it out. I do kind of think I should deworm our new pet, just in case. They say to use Panacur, so I'll have to stop at the vet's office at some point and see if I can get a hold of some.
Spelling Word Challenge
I just wanted to share this little spelling assignment from this week.
The underlined words are spelling words. In case you can't read this student's handwriting, it says: "Once upon a time there was a principal that taught a kid a lesson not to be bad and not to worship idols but one day the principal had a sharp pain and died he loved shopping so they burried him in the grocery store aisle."
I thought the shopping thing was an interesting twist...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)