Finally Friday

I tell you, that new parking lot pavement is sure getting a lot of good use!  The girls in younger grades have been doing sidewalk chalk all over the pavement.  One day my car got boxed in by a circle they drew around it.  The older girls saw what fun the younger girls were having and have been borrowing Mrs. E's sidewalk chalk at noon recess.  But there is one girl who insists on ruining the others' fun by sabotaging her classmates' drawings.  Mr. E chewed her out for it today.


Instead of having the reading buddies come to our room, my class went down to their room today.  I wanted to make jello for the 8th graders' "jello cell lab" today, but didn't want to make it too early so it would be completely set.  We added different fruit to represent the organelles found in a plant cell.  None of them are too keen to eat it.  It still wasn't set by the end of class, so we'll have to eat it on Monday.  With our extra time, we watered the prairie planting. 


One 8th grader borrowed a pail from Mr. D.  All of a sudden, the handle cracked and sent the full bucket straight into the concrete.  The rest of the pail shattered and completely soaked her shoe.  Lovely.  The girls were all worried Mr. D would be mad the pail broke... he wasn't.  He laughed and said he never uses the pail, so it was no big deal.


Last night was my correcting papers/watch a movie night.  One of the 5th graders really wanted me to watch "Heaven is For Real", so much so that he brought the movie in so I could borrow it from him.  So that was the movie I watched last night.  Not gonna lie, I cried.  At least three Kleenex worth.  It was pretty hard for me to watch (spiritually).  Did this kid really see heaven?  Did he really see God?  I'm such a miserable sinner I'm definitely not worthy enough to look at the face of God.  But then I remember that Jesus took away my sins when he died on the cross.  So in God's eyes I am worthy.  Still, tough things to think about.  I wasn't a huge fan of how the movie portrayed the pastor and church.  All in all, I wanted it to be more Lutheran.  I did get my papers corrected!  They were a little better than last week, although a few students forgot to do a page.  Sigh.  I think I'm going to have to restrict the game usage during Word Work time.  Right now they have to do two pages in their spelling book before doing any games.  Next week they'll have to have all the pages finished before doing games.  I know they're not going to like that.  Oh well, they can always earn the privilege back.


We finished our read aloud book Poached.  It took us almost double our normal read aloud time, but I just couldn't stop so close to the end.  We had to do some juggling of our spelling tests/English test and still got everything finished by lunchtime.  Now to pick the next book.  I have six books I'd like to read to them... should we vote or should I just pick?  We'll probably end up reading all of them by the end of the year.  I'm thinking Artemis Fowl or No More Dead Dogs.  One of the 5th graders thought we should read a "Choose Your Own Adventure" story as a class and vote on the choices.  That's not a bad idea.


This afternoon was our big art project day.  We have a few projects we've been working on, so today we spent time finishing them up.  I think we're going to have to do something different with our Friday schedule.  Normally they'll come back from math, we do 45 minutes of art, and then recess for 15 minutes.  At least, that's what I want to have happen.  But some students go over to Nicollet for special services at 2:15, and I don't want them to completely miss their recess.  So maybe we should do 15 minutes of recess and then do art for 45 afterwards.  Hmm.  Thinks to think on.


There was slightly less picking today in my classroom.  However, at lunch one 5th grader tried to kick a 6th grader in the shin (again, I didn't see it).  Two other 5th grade boys held him back so he couldn't get to this girl (her "body-guards").  Sigh.  If only I could be everywhere at once!  This same kid purposely elbowed his classmate while they were crossing paths on the way to lunch.  The class was calling for blood... So I gave this kid the consequence of running two laps around the soccer field at recess.  He immediately said, "Awesome!"  One boy was irate, "Miss H, you shouldn't give him a punishment he actually likes! It should be something awful that he hates!"  Before I could answer, another classmate chimed in, "But what if [the kid] was just saying that because he really doesn't want to do it and he's trying to make Miss H think he likes it so she won't make him do it again?"  I had been thinking along those lines.  Plus he misses out on playing with his classmates, but he's still getting exercise.  And his classmates don't have to put up with him for at least 5-10 minutes.  Win win?  Maybe.  Or at least pretty close to a win win.