The morning started off with a parent delivering a cup of hot water and her daughter handed me three tea bags so I could have my pick. All three were kinds I liked, so it was a tough choice! But now I can enjoy them over break too. Later the girl told me she wanted to make the tea herself for me, but her mom said, "You don't know which kind Miss H likes, so you better let her pick." How sweet!
Kids were bringing in presents and showing me the packages they brought for me. One kid handed me his box and said I should guess what was inside. The gift tag said something along the lines of "you're a teacher who teaches every day, so we know you'll have the guts to play!" When I shook the box, it sounded like a bunch of little pieces click-clacking against each other. This weekend, my friend Laura had told me about this new "game" you play with jellybeans. It's called "Bean Boozled" and it's basically a safer version of Russian roulette. The jelly beans have a good flavored one and a nasty flavored one that look the same, so you never know what you're going to taste! Stinky socks or tutti-fruitti? Lawn clippings or lime? Baby wipes or coconut? Moldy cheese or caramel corn? Yikes!
Other presents I got were gift cards, a willow creek carving (angel holding a book), candle holder, summer sausage, and three scarves. My scarf total is now up to 34. They all made predictions on how many scarves I'll have after we come back from Christmas break. And now they want me to wear all my scarves at once. I don't think they'd all fit around my neck at the same time! Maybe I'll try it and take a picture.
My teacher Secret Santa was Miss N. She gave me a Janette Oke book, one of her favorite authors. I thought it had been her handwriting! Mr. E really liked the 5-in-1 screwdriver I gave him. He said he had a feeling it was either me or Miss H (preschool) who had him since we'd be the only ones jokester enough to give him the spaghetti-os. He had asked his wife if she told either of us that he eats them all the time, but she said she never spilled the beans to either of us! So he was very confused (plus the handwriting was disguised). Yes! Success in surprising!
And now my classroom is all tidy, my presents are boxed up, Joe's second home is nearly ready to go. All that's left is to load my car and pack Joe up and we're off on Christmas break!
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Monday, December 21, 2015
Program Round 1
Well, we made it through round one of the Christmas program.
Today in school one of my 6th grade boys said it went terrible. Last night at the program a church member came over and said it was even better than last year's. So. Mixed reviews. I think it went okay. Our bell songs during offering were not the greatest. I had reminded everyone to check their music and bells and gloves before the service, but one boy only checked that he had gloves. So the beginning of the song comes and he realizes he is missing a bell. So we had to wait for him to get it. Then, in the same song, the beginning players get lost and halfway through the bass players get lost! So it didn't sound the greatest. The second song was much better.
Afterwards, I had sat back in my spot in the front pew and I realized I had forgotten to tell the appropriate speakers to go put their robes on for their parts. Oops. And that I hadn't reminded them to make sure they knew where their robes were in the first place. Ugh. Thankfully, everyone got their robes on in a timely manner and we were none the worse for the wear.
Brady came up to see the program last night. He snuck in right before the service started, so there weren't a ton of open seats... except in the front. So he ended up in the pew right next to where I was directing the bells. Afterwards, we got some funny looks from students (and parents too!) wondering who was that young man standing by Miss H? He isn't one of her brothers! So he got to meet all but one of the teachers along with some parents and pastor and other church members.
Today the 3rd and 4th grade classroom was all abuzz with the news. And the 7th graders grilled me in class. My class is still oblivious. I am interested to see how long it takes them to realize... I did have to limit the 7th graders to one question each about the subject. There's only five of them, so it wasn't an obscene amount of questioning. One kid asked if we met on Eharmony. Another said, "Well it's about time Miss H!" Some of them hadn't heard what his name was, so they tried guessing. One guy said, "I bet it's Andrew. He looks like an Andrew. That's his name isn't it?" So. Now the secret's out. Ah well, it lasted a good long while.
Now I'm off to Pastor's house for round two of baking cookies!
Today in school one of my 6th grade boys said it went terrible. Last night at the program a church member came over and said it was even better than last year's. So. Mixed reviews. I think it went okay. Our bell songs during offering were not the greatest. I had reminded everyone to check their music and bells and gloves before the service, but one boy only checked that he had gloves. So the beginning of the song comes and he realizes he is missing a bell. So we had to wait for him to get it. Then, in the same song, the beginning players get lost and halfway through the bass players get lost! So it didn't sound the greatest. The second song was much better.
Afterwards, I had sat back in my spot in the front pew and I realized I had forgotten to tell the appropriate speakers to go put their robes on for their parts. Oops. And that I hadn't reminded them to make sure they knew where their robes were in the first place. Ugh. Thankfully, everyone got their robes on in a timely manner and we were none the worse for the wear.
Brady came up to see the program last night. He snuck in right before the service started, so there weren't a ton of open seats... except in the front. So he ended up in the pew right next to where I was directing the bells. Afterwards, we got some funny looks from students (and parents too!) wondering who was that young man standing by Miss H? He isn't one of her brothers! So he got to meet all but one of the teachers along with some parents and pastor and other church members.
Today the 3rd and 4th grade classroom was all abuzz with the news. And the 7th graders grilled me in class. My class is still oblivious. I am interested to see how long it takes them to realize... I did have to limit the 7th graders to one question each about the subject. There's only five of them, so it wasn't an obscene amount of questioning. One kid asked if we met on Eharmony. Another said, "Well it's about time Miss H!" Some of them hadn't heard what his name was, so they tried guessing. One guy said, "I bet it's Andrew. He looks like an Andrew. That's his name isn't it?" So. Now the secret's out. Ah well, it lasted a good long while.
Now I'm off to Pastor's house for round two of baking cookies!
Friday, December 18, 2015
Secret Santa
I got a mysterious present in my mailbox at school today.
Well, maybe mysterious isn't the right word for it. It was a book called 30 Second Mysteries with a green card that said, "Merry Christmas Emily! I'm sure your kids will like these mysteries!" So I'm pretty sure it's from my secret santa. But, someone put a candy bar in my mailbox earlier this week with a little note on it, so I thought that was from my secret santa. I guess they both could be.
We teachers decided to exchange names and give a little gift this week and a bigger gift next week. But so far, I've gotten three things in my mailbox! And our big exchange is next Tuesday. Hmm, it's a mystery. I haven't figured out who's handwriting is on the cards either. It is definitely feminine handwriting, but I'm not familiar enough with the female teachers' writing to know which one has my name. Whoever it is, she is really good at giving me presents I like! My kids loved the mysteries (and so do I!). It's fun to try to figure them out; fun enough I think I'll bring it along to my family Christmases.
I had Mr. E for my santa partner. For the little gift this week, I gave him a can of spaghetti o's, since one time I had them in my sack lunch and he said he eats a can of them about every other day for breakfast. I stuck a bow on the top and wrapped some white paper around the jar. I had Brady write the words on it so Mr. E wouldn't recognize my handwriting. Next week's present is a multi-tool screwdriver with about six or seven heads that flip down so you can easily find the tool you need when you need it. I hope he likes it. I was drawing a blank on what to get him.
Christmas program update: Our last practice was today. The robe switcheroo went pretty good. Bell songs are sounding way better... I had one girl sick; hopefully she's better by Sunday! We got everything put away so communion on Sunday morning can run smoothly. All that's left will be to set everything back up after church!
Well, maybe mysterious isn't the right word for it. It was a book called 30 Second Mysteries with a green card that said, "Merry Christmas Emily! I'm sure your kids will like these mysteries!" So I'm pretty sure it's from my secret santa. But, someone put a candy bar in my mailbox earlier this week with a little note on it, so I thought that was from my secret santa. I guess they both could be.
We teachers decided to exchange names and give a little gift this week and a bigger gift next week. But so far, I've gotten three things in my mailbox! And our big exchange is next Tuesday. Hmm, it's a mystery. I haven't figured out who's handwriting is on the cards either. It is definitely feminine handwriting, but I'm not familiar enough with the female teachers' writing to know which one has my name. Whoever it is, she is really good at giving me presents I like! My kids loved the mysteries (and so do I!). It's fun to try to figure them out; fun enough I think I'll bring it along to my family Christmases.
I had Mr. E for my santa partner. For the little gift this week, I gave him a can of spaghetti o's, since one time I had them in my sack lunch and he said he eats a can of them about every other day for breakfast. I stuck a bow on the top and wrapped some white paper around the jar. I had Brady write the words on it so Mr. E wouldn't recognize my handwriting. Next week's present is a multi-tool screwdriver with about six or seven heads that flip down so you can easily find the tool you need when you need it. I hope he likes it. I was drawing a blank on what to get him.
Christmas program update: Our last practice was today. The robe switcheroo went pretty good. Bell songs are sounding way better... I had one girl sick; hopefully she's better by Sunday! We got everything put away so communion on Sunday morning can run smoothly. All that's left will be to set everything back up after church!
Thursday, December 17, 2015
Kindergarten Cuties
The kindergartners are so cute when they do their part of the Christmas program. There's a part in the last song they sing where they say something along the lines of "and Jesus died for YOU" and they point to the audience. One of darling little boys always looks right at me at that part and points to me. I just can't help but smile! He always gives me a high five when we practice walking into church and everyday when he sees me in the hallway, he says "Hi Miss H!" So adorable.
Our bell songs are a little better. We would've had more time to practice, but one of the 7th grade girls was dinking around and wouldn't come out to the car when we had to drive over to church. Sigh. I had to turn the car off and go inside the school to get her. We're going to have an extra bell practice tomorrow afternoon. Practice will be in the morning for once since Miss N has a wedding she has to go to in the afternoon.
We made some last minute changes to the program today. Most of my students have to wear white robes for their speaking parts, and Miss N wanted them to wear the robes for the entire program. The girls were complaining because they'd already picked out special Christmas dresses to wear those nights and now they'll be covered up by a robe. A parent even emailed me about it. I wasn't too thrilled about them wearing robes to begin with, what with all the ups and downs on the risers, so Miss N and I figured out a way they can change into the robes without taking too much time or being too distracting. I hope we can keep everything organized in the back room! Most of the changing will happen after we play bells during the offering. Tomorrow is our last practice before our performance on Sunday, so we'll be having a dress rehearsal tomorrow. I hope we get it all right!
Our bell songs are a little better. We would've had more time to practice, but one of the 7th grade girls was dinking around and wouldn't come out to the car when we had to drive over to church. Sigh. I had to turn the car off and go inside the school to get her. We're going to have an extra bell practice tomorrow afternoon. Practice will be in the morning for once since Miss N has a wedding she has to go to in the afternoon.
We made some last minute changes to the program today. Most of my students have to wear white robes for their speaking parts, and Miss N wanted them to wear the robes for the entire program. The girls were complaining because they'd already picked out special Christmas dresses to wear those nights and now they'll be covered up by a robe. A parent even emailed me about it. I wasn't too thrilled about them wearing robes to begin with, what with all the ups and downs on the risers, so Miss N and I figured out a way they can change into the robes without taking too much time or being too distracting. I hope we can keep everything organized in the back room! Most of the changing will happen after we play bells during the offering. Tomorrow is our last practice before our performance on Sunday, so we'll be having a dress rehearsal tomorrow. I hope we get it all right!
Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Forget-me-not
Ugh. This has been a day of forgetfulness.
Last night after my doctor's appointment, I was supposed to stop and get a refill of my prescription... I remembered that fact once I was already home from the store. Ugh. I had enough medicine for this morning, but I have to run to the store after school now.
This morning I finished correcting all my papers, packed up my bags, got to school, unpacked my bags and looked for the papers to hand back to students... couldn't find them or my flash drive with all my lesson plans on it. Yep. Sitting on my kitchen table. So I had to run home quick and get them. I made it back to school before my students arrived, but that was not how I planned my morning to start.
One of the 5th graders wanted help folding down the nails of her frame to keep the glass in place. The nails had fallen out, so we had to hammer them back in. I should've taken the glass out before pounding, but I thought it would be fine. Nope. The glass cracked. Thankfully, Mrs. B had some Plexiglas at home so Pastor cut a piece that would fit and the student redid her art. And now it won't be so breakable!
Program practice went well again. I'm still a little worried about our bell songs. We drove over to church since it was raining/snowing. It took forever! I don't know why the kids were in no hurry to get to church. But we had enough time to practice everything with a few minutes to spare for recess. Mrs. E wants to have the kindergartners in the gym tomorrow (she doesn't like having them in the gym at the same time as the bigger kids), so I guess we have to find something else to do.
Tonight Mrs. B invited me to bake cookies with her and have supper. The other lady who was supposed to do it with us is not feeling well, so Mrs. B asked if I would check with the other teachers and see if there were any takers. So far, Mr. D declined... he has a new cat at home longing for company and a test to write. We'll see if Miss N is free.
Last night after my doctor's appointment, I was supposed to stop and get a refill of my prescription... I remembered that fact once I was already home from the store. Ugh. I had enough medicine for this morning, but I have to run to the store after school now.
This morning I finished correcting all my papers, packed up my bags, got to school, unpacked my bags and looked for the papers to hand back to students... couldn't find them or my flash drive with all my lesson plans on it. Yep. Sitting on my kitchen table. So I had to run home quick and get them. I made it back to school before my students arrived, but that was not how I planned my morning to start.
One of the 5th graders wanted help folding down the nails of her frame to keep the glass in place. The nails had fallen out, so we had to hammer them back in. I should've taken the glass out before pounding, but I thought it would be fine. Nope. The glass cracked. Thankfully, Mrs. B had some Plexiglas at home so Pastor cut a piece that would fit and the student redid her art. And now it won't be so breakable!
Program practice went well again. I'm still a little worried about our bell songs. We drove over to church since it was raining/snowing. It took forever! I don't know why the kids were in no hurry to get to church. But we had enough time to practice everything with a few minutes to spare for recess. Mrs. E wants to have the kindergartners in the gym tomorrow (she doesn't like having them in the gym at the same time as the bigger kids), so I guess we have to find something else to do.
Tonight Mrs. B invited me to bake cookies with her and have supper. The other lady who was supposed to do it with us is not feeling well, so Mrs. B asked if I would check with the other teachers and see if there were any takers. So far, Mr. D declined... he has a new cat at home longing for company and a test to write. We'll see if Miss N is free.
Tuesday, December 15, 2015
Frames
Our second Christmas present art project was a success! Though it almost took more time to explain than to actually do it.
Only two students wanted to make button collages to go in the frames. Theirs turned out pretty neat! Right now they're drying on the lab table since copious amounts of glue were used to attach the buttons to the paper. Tomorrow will be a little more challenging fitting the designs in the frames.
The majority of the class colored Christmas designs on the glass with permanent marker, flipped the glass over (so the marker was facing the inside of the frame), and put a back on. Mrs. B had picked out some potential patterns to trace/color, but some of the kids weren't too thrilled with them. They used the iPad to look up other options (or my computer) and found some even neater designs. Mr. D and Mr. E lent us their permanent markers and I had brought my mini-tip ones from home, so we had plenty to go around. Most of them finished today. A few have finishing touches to put on, and a bunch have to attach the back of the frame again. Surprisingly, the majority wanted to wrap their presents at home, so they went in the book bags! One less thing for me to worry about at school. Mrs. B will bring tissue paper tomorrow for those few that want to wrap it at school.
Program practice went okay again. Our bell songs need a bunch of work. We had our first day of having both bell choirs play, so there was a bit of scrambling as the 6-7th graders tried to find their bells from where the 5th graders moved them. It will get smoother in time. But overall practice went well. There was even a little time for recess when we got back to school!
Only two students wanted to make button collages to go in the frames. Theirs turned out pretty neat! Right now they're drying on the lab table since copious amounts of glue were used to attach the buttons to the paper. Tomorrow will be a little more challenging fitting the designs in the frames.
The majority of the class colored Christmas designs on the glass with permanent marker, flipped the glass over (so the marker was facing the inside of the frame), and put a back on. Mrs. B had picked out some potential patterns to trace/color, but some of the kids weren't too thrilled with them. They used the iPad to look up other options (or my computer) and found some even neater designs. Mr. D and Mr. E lent us their permanent markers and I had brought my mini-tip ones from home, so we had plenty to go around. Most of them finished today. A few have finishing touches to put on, and a bunch have to attach the back of the frame again. Surprisingly, the majority wanted to wrap their presents at home, so they went in the book bags! One less thing for me to worry about at school. Mrs. B will bring tissue paper tomorrow for those few that want to wrap it at school.
Program practice went okay again. Our bell songs need a bunch of work. We had our first day of having both bell choirs play, so there was a bit of scrambling as the 6-7th graders tried to find their bells from where the 5th graders moved them. It will get smoother in time. But overall practice went well. There was even a little time for recess when we got back to school!
Monday, December 14, 2015
Shuttle
Kind of a yucky day outside. No, scratch that... it was very yucky out, not just kind of yucky. By afternoon the rain stopped, but it was still gross enough that we needed to shuttle kids over to church for practice. That is always an undertaking. Which kids go in which car? How many trips does each teacher need to take? Do we let the kids cram in the back?
We also added the 5th grade bells to the one song they accompany the choir on. They did pretty good! One or two of them rushed their notes and didn't hold as long as they should've, but we'll iron that out the rest of this week. The 6-7th grade bell choir didn't go as well. The 5th graders use some of the same bells as the older grades, so my kiddos were scrambling to find their books and bells while the rest of the kids waited around for us to play. Then I realized I had left my director book at school. So I had no music to look at. It went okay considering how little we've practiced the songs. We have practice on our own tomorrow afternoon (before the rest of the school comes over), so we can iron out some of the kinks tomorrow. I'm sure we'll sound fine when the concert rolls around. The first day practicing is always a little rough.
We also added the 5th grade bells to the one song they accompany the choir on. They did pretty good! One or two of them rushed their notes and didn't hold as long as they should've, but we'll iron that out the rest of this week. The 6-7th grade bell choir didn't go as well. The 5th graders use some of the same bells as the older grades, so my kiddos were scrambling to find their books and bells while the rest of the kids waited around for us to play. Then I realized I had left my director book at school. So I had no music to look at. It went okay considering how little we've practiced the songs. We have practice on our own tomorrow afternoon (before the rest of the school comes over), so we can iron out some of the kinks tomorrow. I'm sure we'll sound fine when the concert rolls around. The first day practicing is always a little rough.
Friday, December 11, 2015
Six Pack
I caught one of the 6th graders doing something funny at recess. I had called everyone to come in from noon recess, and like usual, most of the boys shot a couple baskets and went to the opposite end of the gym before finally heading to our classrooms. This particular boy shot a basket in the mini-basketball hoop, hung on the rim, then pulled up his shirt to check how much of a six-pack he had going on. He must've liked what he saw because he hopped down and came back to class.
Other news of the day: we finished our read-aloud book and picked one to start next week. It was almost a unanimous vote for Prisoner B-3087. The book is short enough we may even finish it before Christmas break! Speaking of Christmas break... can you believe we only have seven days of school until break! It's insane! One full week and two days.
Program practice at church went well today. We ran through the whole program in about 40 minutes. So it should be around 45-50 minutes or so after we streamline the process and add in the bells/congregation songs. I got the bulletin cover template finished; the kids need to color/design them yet. On my agenda for the weekend is to get the Christmas program bulletin/projector information good to go.
I was supposed to work on the exercise book this weekend, doing a full edit of the entire thing, but the guy doesn't have the final draft finished, so it's pushed off another week. That's fine. I'm sure I can find other things to do this weekend. Saturday noon Mr. D, Mrs. B (1st and 2nd teacher from last year), and I are meeting for lunch at Mexican Villa in Mankato to celebrate Mr. D's birthday. Ivy and I will probably hang out at some point that day... maybe do some Christmas shopping... my list of gifts to buy for people keeps getting longer and longer! Of course I'll read some books at some point. And I have a movie about the holocaust that's due Monday, so I'll need to watch that. Thankfully I'm starting to feel a bit more like myself again. Let's pray I keep getting better!
Other news of the day: we finished our read-aloud book and picked one to start next week. It was almost a unanimous vote for Prisoner B-3087. The book is short enough we may even finish it before Christmas break! Speaking of Christmas break... can you believe we only have seven days of school until break! It's insane! One full week and two days.
Program practice at church went well today. We ran through the whole program in about 40 minutes. So it should be around 45-50 minutes or so after we streamline the process and add in the bells/congregation songs. I got the bulletin cover template finished; the kids need to color/design them yet. On my agenda for the weekend is to get the Christmas program bulletin/projector information good to go.
I was supposed to work on the exercise book this weekend, doing a full edit of the entire thing, but the guy doesn't have the final draft finished, so it's pushed off another week. That's fine. I'm sure I can find other things to do this weekend. Saturday noon Mr. D, Mrs. B (1st and 2nd teacher from last year), and I are meeting for lunch at Mexican Villa in Mankato to celebrate Mr. D's birthday. Ivy and I will probably hang out at some point that day... maybe do some Christmas shopping... my list of gifts to buy for people keeps getting longer and longer! Of course I'll read some books at some point. And I have a movie about the holocaust that's due Monday, so I'll need to watch that. Thankfully I'm starting to feel a bit more like myself again. Let's pray I keep getting better!
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Crabby Crab
I was a bit of a crab today at school... I had a headache and my ears were pluggy again and I just wasn't ready to put up with anything from anyone... so I was crabby at some of the boys who like to push the line. I saw the ringleader giving looks to his friends like, "Oh man is Miss H in a bad mood today! What is her problem?" So I tried to be nicer.
As the day went on I felt a little better, and so did my mood.
We only have two chapters left in our read-aloud book. They convinced me to read extra today, (partly because I wasn't feeling in tip-top shape, partly because it was such a cliff-hanger ending, but mostly because I had a project for them to work on). Since we don't have any snow around (and none in the forecast), Mrs. E thought we might not get to do our December service project of shoveling the white stuff for people, so she added another facet to the project: making Christmas cards for shut-ins and the military members of our church. Each student picked a person and started making a card. A lot of the kids recognized names on the list and picked those people. It was fun to hear them asking each other, "Hey, what do you think [insert name] would like on his card? An elf? A snowmobile?" I can't wait to see what they all come up with.
Another five students presented their powerpoints today. They all did really well! Everyone was SUPER impressed with the quietest girl in school. She's a 6th grader who rarely raises her hand and hardly ever speaks in class. Everyone is a bit on eggshells around her because she used to cry at the drop of a hat... mostly if she was ever embarrassed or didn't know the answer to a question she had to answer. And she HATES public speaking. She is such a good writer with great tongue in cheek humor, it's a shame more people don't realize that about her. But. A little of that came out today when she presented. Oh it makes me smile just thinking about it!
Picture this: it's 2:09 and the boys are antsy to get out to recess, but we have one speaker left for the day and we're going to squeeze it in no matter what. Once they see she only has seven slides, they calm down a bit. She starts her presentation completely facing the board with her back to the audience, but after she presents for a while (complete with changes in inflection and even some slight jokes), she gradually turns toward her classmates.
I was blown away. She did amazing! Afterwards, one boy turned to me and said, "Wow Miss H, [student] is really good at powerpoints!" Then at recess, this girl asked me, "When can we do another powerpoint? That was fun!" Whoda thunk?
As the day went on I felt a little better, and so did my mood.
We only have two chapters left in our read-aloud book. They convinced me to read extra today, (partly because I wasn't feeling in tip-top shape, partly because it was such a cliff-hanger ending, but mostly because I had a project for them to work on). Since we don't have any snow around (and none in the forecast), Mrs. E thought we might not get to do our December service project of shoveling the white stuff for people, so she added another facet to the project: making Christmas cards for shut-ins and the military members of our church. Each student picked a person and started making a card. A lot of the kids recognized names on the list and picked those people. It was fun to hear them asking each other, "Hey, what do you think [insert name] would like on his card? An elf? A snowmobile?" I can't wait to see what they all come up with.
Another five students presented their powerpoints today. They all did really well! Everyone was SUPER impressed with the quietest girl in school. She's a 6th grader who rarely raises her hand and hardly ever speaks in class. Everyone is a bit on eggshells around her because she used to cry at the drop of a hat... mostly if she was ever embarrassed or didn't know the answer to a question she had to answer. And she HATES public speaking. She is such a good writer with great tongue in cheek humor, it's a shame more people don't realize that about her. But. A little of that came out today when she presented. Oh it makes me smile just thinking about it!
Picture this: it's 2:09 and the boys are antsy to get out to recess, but we have one speaker left for the day and we're going to squeeze it in no matter what. Once they see she only has seven slides, they calm down a bit. She starts her presentation completely facing the board with her back to the audience, but after she presents for a while (complete with changes in inflection and even some slight jokes), she gradually turns toward her classmates.
I was blown away. She did amazing! Afterwards, one boy turned to me and said, "Wow Miss H, [student] is really good at powerpoints!" Then at recess, this girl asked me, "When can we do another powerpoint? That was fun!" Whoda thunk?
Wednesday, December 9, 2015
Sneaky
When I sit just right at my computer, anyone coming in the classroom door can't see me. One of the 5th grade boys burst into the room after basketball practice (and I was sitting just so). He was belting out a random song... no words, just singing a melody of a song at the top of his lungs (picture opera-style). I could tell he hadn't noticed me due to the volume of his singing and the fact that he didn't stop. He puttered around his desk, doing whatever he had come in here for. I probably would've let him go without saying anything, but I had a question about his homework, so I spoke up. Oh his face was priceless. Kind of like, "SHOOT, Miss H is still in here. And she caught me being weird... I should get out of here as fast as possible!" All he said was, "Wow, Miss H, I didn't even know you were in here! You're sneaky!" And he tried to book it away. But I made him stay and answer my question.
After school, most of my afternoon was spent getting a seating chart for the risers at the Christmas program. We're starting practice at church this Friday, so everything kind of needs to be in place for that. I think we finally have it figured out! There are all sorts of little things that need to be done that I'd completely forgotten about: bulletin covers, getting inside text ready for the bulletin, sending program information to the projector lady. It's on my to-do list now!
It's also midterms on Friday. With Thanksgiving break and all that, we haven't had many assignments to put in the grade book. Social studies has one assignment and science has none! I suppose I'll grade them on their class participation or something. I did make a note on their midterms that there aren't many assignments for some classes, so the grades will be skewed.
After school, most of my afternoon was spent getting a seating chart for the risers at the Christmas program. We're starting practice at church this Friday, so everything kind of needs to be in place for that. I think we finally have it figured out! There are all sorts of little things that need to be done that I'd completely forgotten about: bulletin covers, getting inside text ready for the bulletin, sending program information to the projector lady. It's on my to-do list now!
It's also midterms on Friday. With Thanksgiving break and all that, we haven't had many assignments to put in the grade book. Social studies has one assignment and science has none! I suppose I'll grade them on their class participation or something. I did make a note on their midterms that there aren't many assignments for some classes, so the grades will be skewed.
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
Picture Frames
Our angel projects are quickly progressing. Time to start thinking about another art project present.
Mrs. B has been on a cleaning out spree in her house and came across a bunch of frames she doesn't need... 14 to be exact. So, she's letting us use them in an art project. I think we are going to have two options. Option one: make a Christmas button collage... a tree or a present or a star or snowflake or something... and put it behind the glass in the frame. Option two: make a stained glass Christmas scene... use permanent markers to color a picture on the glass and have it in the frame. We'll see who picks which project.
This morning I had all the frames on the table and the 6th grade girls noticed the glass was dirty. So they volunteered to clean them. They even got the boys involved; some of the frames were tricky to open (so they could clean both sides of the glass). The boys kept asking me for tools to get the frames open: screwdriver, pliers, smaller screwdriver. I had everything they asked for! Eventually they lost interest and Mrs. B finished up when she came in later.
I'm going to keep this short today. My sore throat is still lingering from last week, and my stomach was bugging me again today... don't worry, I made a doctor's appointment. The soonest they could get me in is next week. So until then, I'll keep plugging away!
Mrs. B has been on a cleaning out spree in her house and came across a bunch of frames she doesn't need... 14 to be exact. So, she's letting us use them in an art project. I think we are going to have two options. Option one: make a Christmas button collage... a tree or a present or a star or snowflake or something... and put it behind the glass in the frame. Option two: make a stained glass Christmas scene... use permanent markers to color a picture on the glass and have it in the frame. We'll see who picks which project.
This morning I had all the frames on the table and the 6th grade girls noticed the glass was dirty. So they volunteered to clean them. They even got the boys involved; some of the frames were tricky to open (so they could clean both sides of the glass). The boys kept asking me for tools to get the frames open: screwdriver, pliers, smaller screwdriver. I had everything they asked for! Eventually they lost interest and Mrs. B finished up when she came in later.
I'm going to keep this short today. My sore throat is still lingering from last week, and my stomach was bugging me again today... don't worry, I made a doctor's appointment. The soonest they could get me in is next week. So until then, I'll keep plugging away!
Monday, December 7, 2015
Do you have everything you need?
Oh I've got the 7th graders paranoid!
It was so ridiculous; they'd all come to class and pretty soon one would say, "Oh wait, I forgot [insert anything you can imagine here]. Can I go back and get it?" Every single one of them. They'd enter the classroom, realize they forgot something, go back and get it, and sometimes even think of something else they forgot to grab! The worst part is, every morning I write a list of what they need for my class on the board, including assignments due! Their excuse was "we don't look at the board." Well start!!!
I got sick of it last week and made a new rule; once you are in the classroom, you are in, no going back for stuff. I even made a sign and taped it to the door. Today was the first day following the rule. I saw them in the hallway mentally checking off all the stuff they had in their hands. One boy paused on the threshold of my classroom and even stepped aside so I could go through first because he was so worried he'd forgotten something for today. I hope their thoughtfulness keeps up!
Other things of note for today... the hymnal angel project is going super fast. Almost everyone is finished folding the pages. Tomorrow people will be ready to glue on a head/ribbon. I found a bunch of red ornament ball thingys in the office no one claimed, and I think they'll work as heads for the angels. We have coffee filters to use as a lace mantel for the angel. Mrs. B said she has some angel hair at home that could work... otherwise we could just go hairless or use yarn. We'll see what the kids want to do tomorrow.
It was so ridiculous; they'd all come to class and pretty soon one would say, "Oh wait, I forgot [insert anything you can imagine here]. Can I go back and get it?" Every single one of them. They'd enter the classroom, realize they forgot something, go back and get it, and sometimes even think of something else they forgot to grab! The worst part is, every morning I write a list of what they need for my class on the board, including assignments due! Their excuse was "we don't look at the board." Well start!!!
I got sick of it last week and made a new rule; once you are in the classroom, you are in, no going back for stuff. I even made a sign and taped it to the door. Today was the first day following the rule. I saw them in the hallway mentally checking off all the stuff they had in their hands. One boy paused on the threshold of my classroom and even stepped aside so I could go through first because he was so worried he'd forgotten something for today. I hope their thoughtfulness keeps up!
Other things of note for today... the hymnal angel project is going super fast. Almost everyone is finished folding the pages. Tomorrow people will be ready to glue on a head/ribbon. I found a bunch of red ornament ball thingys in the office no one claimed, and I think they'll work as heads for the angels. We have coffee filters to use as a lace mantel for the angel. Mrs. B said she has some angel hair at home that could work... otherwise we could just go hairless or use yarn. We'll see what the kids want to do tomorrow.
Friday, December 4, 2015
Psycho
That title pretty much sums up class today.
My kids were SUPER chatty, way more so than usual. Before school they were yelling across the room, distracting each other from saying memory. Some of the girls spent time decorating the classroom: putting up the nativity set, throwing tinsel on the tree, finding homes for our random other decorations. I like it much better for them to do it all! There's something so homey about a lit up Christmas tree.
In religion, we did popcorn Bible reading. So anytime we had to look up a verse, one would read it and then popcorn the next verse to someone else. One kid really wanted to read, but he was being obnoxious about it, so the boys kept popcorning to everyone but him... even the girls! He did get a chance to read... at the way end much later than he'd wanted to. My kids had so much fun doing this, they asked if we could have religion all morning and just keep popcorn reading Bible passages. And they were actually serious. Huh.
We did not spend all morning on religion, though we did take a little longer than normal. We had so many little catch-up things to do. I have about five assignments on the board that one or two people for each haven't finished yet. And they still didn't get them done! Instead, they worked on a project a little, then switched to something else, and then worked on a different thing, or pretended to work on it. I don't know. The people in question were clearly not using their time well. Ergh! It's hard to keep so much straight! Midterms are next week...
Our hymnal angel project got started today. Since we had program practice in the afternoon, I had been planning to give them recess time instead of art and we'd start the project Monday. But they were so crazy this morning that I gave them the choice: shape up and get recess this afternoon, or stay acting the way you are and we do art/science/social studies. Well... they shaped up a little, but not nearly enough. So after math, they sat quietly in their desks while I passed out their social studies tests, then we went over how to make the hymnal angels. I told them I'd give them one more chance (oh I'm such a softie!) to earn their recess back; no complaining or whining or rowdiness and we could go out after dividing the pages of the hymnal so we could start our project Monday. Okay. Deal. So they earned their recess.
Another interesting thing: the 3rd and 4th graders came in to hear me talk about El Salvador. The 7th graders were also in my room at the time, but they'd already heard about it last year (though I had new pictures). I only had a half an hour to talk... I went over by five minutes. But the kids had so many questions! And they were good questions too! I wish we would've had more time. The 7th graders were interested too, though they weren't nearly so curious.
My kids were SUPER chatty, way more so than usual. Before school they were yelling across the room, distracting each other from saying memory. Some of the girls spent time decorating the classroom: putting up the nativity set, throwing tinsel on the tree, finding homes for our random other decorations. I like it much better for them to do it all! There's something so homey about a lit up Christmas tree.
In religion, we did popcorn Bible reading. So anytime we had to look up a verse, one would read it and then popcorn the next verse to someone else. One kid really wanted to read, but he was being obnoxious about it, so the boys kept popcorning to everyone but him... even the girls! He did get a chance to read... at the way end much later than he'd wanted to. My kids had so much fun doing this, they asked if we could have religion all morning and just keep popcorn reading Bible passages. And they were actually serious. Huh.
We did not spend all morning on religion, though we did take a little longer than normal. We had so many little catch-up things to do. I have about five assignments on the board that one or two people for each haven't finished yet. And they still didn't get them done! Instead, they worked on a project a little, then switched to something else, and then worked on a different thing, or pretended to work on it. I don't know. The people in question were clearly not using their time well. Ergh! It's hard to keep so much straight! Midterms are next week...
Our hymnal angel project got started today. Since we had program practice in the afternoon, I had been planning to give them recess time instead of art and we'd start the project Monday. But they were so crazy this morning that I gave them the choice: shape up and get recess this afternoon, or stay acting the way you are and we do art/science/social studies. Well... they shaped up a little, but not nearly enough. So after math, they sat quietly in their desks while I passed out their social studies tests, then we went over how to make the hymnal angels. I told them I'd give them one more chance (oh I'm such a softie!) to earn their recess back; no complaining or whining or rowdiness and we could go out after dividing the pages of the hymnal so we could start our project Monday. Okay. Deal. So they earned their recess.
Another interesting thing: the 3rd and 4th graders came in to hear me talk about El Salvador. The 7th graders were also in my room at the time, but they'd already heard about it last year (though I had new pictures). I only had a half an hour to talk... I went over by five minutes. But the kids had so many questions! And they were good questions too! I wish we would've had more time. The 7th graders were interested too, though they weren't nearly so curious.
Thursday, December 3, 2015
Singing
It is so cute when my big, tough, 5th and 6th graders randomly sing. Today in bells, we had our first practice of the songs we'll play for the Christmas program. One was "Away in a Manger", and I noticed one of the 6th grade boys singing it to himself as he got his music ready. Aww!
Another surprising burst of song happened in social studies of all places. I had played them the song "Follow the Drinking Gourd" a while ago in class when we talked about the Underground Railroad so we could search for the hidden meanings in the song, and a surprising number of students sang the chorus after hearing it a few times that day. Today we were briefly reviewing for the test, and when they came to the question about the "Drinking Gourd", another 6th grade boy started singing the song! And a few others joined in! So adorable.
This other kid (one who gets easily annoyed by his classmates) has a pair of headphones he can listen to classical music with so he doesn't hear the distractions as much. Yesterday I heard someone whistling... it was him! Subconsciously whistling along to the music. He eventually looked up and caught my stare; I gave him the "shh" signal and he looked a little chagrined. Normally, this kid doesn't show excitement about anything, but when it comes to his classical music songs... that's a whole other ball of wax. He'll start singing the melody and wave his arms around like he's directing! His classmates look at him like, "What is he doing?" But they find it amusing too (in a good way).
Another surprising burst of song happened in social studies of all places. I had played them the song "Follow the Drinking Gourd" a while ago in class when we talked about the Underground Railroad so we could search for the hidden meanings in the song, and a surprising number of students sang the chorus after hearing it a few times that day. Today we were briefly reviewing for the test, and when they came to the question about the "Drinking Gourd", another 6th grade boy started singing the song! And a few others joined in! So adorable.
This other kid (one who gets easily annoyed by his classmates) has a pair of headphones he can listen to classical music with so he doesn't hear the distractions as much. Yesterday I heard someone whistling... it was him! Subconsciously whistling along to the music. He eventually looked up and caught my stare; I gave him the "shh" signal and he looked a little chagrined. Normally, this kid doesn't show excitement about anything, but when it comes to his classical music songs... that's a whole other ball of wax. He'll start singing the melody and wave his arms around like he's directing! His classmates look at him like, "What is he doing?" But they find it amusing too (in a good way).
Wednesday, December 2, 2015
The Bus Got Stuck
It was quite quiet this morning when I got to school. The snow and slightly foggy air muffled usual sounds, and no one stopped in to chat before school started. It seemed the quiet lasted longer than normal, and when I looked at the clock, it was already 8:00! Typically, the Nicollet bus drops kids off by 7:55... hmm... that's odd. 8:05...STILL no kids. Finally around 8:10 the Nicollet bus arrived with the New Ulm bus following a few minutes later. What had happened to make them so late? Their bus got stuck in the ditch. Oops. The kids were so excited about it, the bloodthirsty savages.
We had our first day back to Writer's Workshop. I floundered a little, trying to remember how that all worked, since the last time we'd done it was October. The kids were all like, "We know Miss H, we know how to do it!" [just let us work already!] Some of them started some neat new stories. One girl is writing a picture book "when dinosaurs try to paint" and another is writing about a zebra and a lion fighting over a rock (it's a magic rock). Most of the others are working on their pen pal letters. Some are having difficulties deciding what to put in the letter. The computers were slow to let the kids log on (slow as in 15-20 minutes slow), so there was a lot of dinking around waiting.
Basketball update: the girls got creamed... those Janesville girls are just so tall! The boys won their game. Man, the Janesville boys play rough! I still recognize some of my old students from student teaching. They're in 7th grade I think. A few recognize me, though none of them talked to me this time. My current kiddos had practice again tonight. The latest buzz was that the mom who's watching them at practice brought supper (usually it's just a small snack). This mom brought: sloppy joes, chips, pickles, cracker bars... the whole shebang! She even brought one of the extra cracker bars down to me as a treat. Aww! So thoughtful.
Tonight's plans: visit the library and restock my book supply, and Bible Study. Still haven't put up my Christmas tree... maybe that's a job for tomorrow...
We had our first day back to Writer's Workshop. I floundered a little, trying to remember how that all worked, since the last time we'd done it was October. The kids were all like, "We know Miss H, we know how to do it!" [just let us work already!] Some of them started some neat new stories. One girl is writing a picture book "when dinosaurs try to paint" and another is writing about a zebra and a lion fighting over a rock (it's a magic rock). Most of the others are working on their pen pal letters. Some are having difficulties deciding what to put in the letter. The computers were slow to let the kids log on (slow as in 15-20 minutes slow), so there was a lot of dinking around waiting.
Basketball update: the girls got creamed... those Janesville girls are just so tall! The boys won their game. Man, the Janesville boys play rough! I still recognize some of my old students from student teaching. They're in 7th grade I think. A few recognize me, though none of them talked to me this time. My current kiddos had practice again tonight. The latest buzz was that the mom who's watching them at practice brought supper (usually it's just a small snack). This mom brought: sloppy joes, chips, pickles, cracker bars... the whole shebang! She even brought one of the extra cracker bars down to me as a treat. Aww! So thoughtful.
Tonight's plans: visit the library and restock my book supply, and Bible Study. Still haven't put up my Christmas tree... maybe that's a job for tomorrow...
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
Game Day
No two hours late this morning! The roads were not that bad when I went to school, and now it's warm enough that everything is melted off. I think we're in for a stretch of good weather!
My kids were a little crazy today, but not too bad. They got to pick their NaNo prizes for writing their words. Quite a few didn't make their goals... I was surprised. And they were really close too! Some less than 100 words off! But they had finished their stories and didn't need/want to write more. And then I have other students who are not finished with their stories, but did reach their goals. The other complicated thing is that we changed our goals partway through the month. So most of the students who didn't get their goals this time around did reach their first goals... so which goal do I go with??? Would it be cheating to go back to their first goals (if they didn't make the second)???
We had an impromptu PE session today. Normally PE is Monday/Wednesday, but with school called off yesterday, they didn't have it. And no basketball practice either. Needless to say, my kiddos were freaking out a bit by the lack of practice since their first game of the season is today. So Mr. E did PE today. I was supposed to watch the Kindergartners for him since that's what he normally does at that time, but Mrs. E said she could watch her class and I could go get stuff done. Woohoo! I took advantage of the extended Cyber Monday deals and ordered more books for my classroom (I even had a gift certificate to use!). Sigh. There is just never enough money for all the books I want to buy! Still, a few more will be crossed off the "to-buy" list.
My room is being used as a locker room for the Janesville girls. Their game started about ten minutes ago, so now that I have everything on my "to-do-today" list, I think I'll go watch!
My kids were a little crazy today, but not too bad. They got to pick their NaNo prizes for writing their words. Quite a few didn't make their goals... I was surprised. And they were really close too! Some less than 100 words off! But they had finished their stories and didn't need/want to write more. And then I have other students who are not finished with their stories, but did reach their goals. The other complicated thing is that we changed our goals partway through the month. So most of the students who didn't get their goals this time around did reach their first goals... so which goal do I go with??? Would it be cheating to go back to their first goals (if they didn't make the second)???
We had an impromptu PE session today. Normally PE is Monday/Wednesday, but with school called off yesterday, they didn't have it. And no basketball practice either. Needless to say, my kiddos were freaking out a bit by the lack of practice since their first game of the season is today. So Mr. E did PE today. I was supposed to watch the Kindergartners for him since that's what he normally does at that time, but Mrs. E said she could watch her class and I could go get stuff done. Woohoo! I took advantage of the extended Cyber Monday deals and ordered more books for my classroom (I even had a gift certificate to use!). Sigh. There is just never enough money for all the books I want to buy! Still, a few more will be crossed off the "to-buy" list.
My room is being used as a locker room for the Janesville girls. Their game started about ten minutes ago, so now that I have everything on my "to-do-today" list, I think I'll go watch!
Monday, November 30, 2015
Rip the Page
Last day of November... time to take off the desk calendar page! I love having a fresh piece of paper. No spills, no ink globs, no doodles or random scribbles in the margins. Of course, it doesn't stay like that for long!
The morning was nice and clear, although a little dreary. Just a little spitting precipitation, no snow yet. The kids were all jumpy and hard to settle. They were chatting up a storm and distracting themselves! I actually put on classical music to get them to work quietly... it kind of worked.
And then the computers wouldn't let them log on. The IT guys actually answered, but they said to let it keep loading and see if it would let them on. It didn't work. Eventually we got it figured out and my kids could get on the computers, but it messed up our last day of NaNo time, so we'll fudge the date a bit and let them write for a morning in December.
Since they couldn't work on the computers, they needed something to do that was writing related without technology. Aha! Pen pal letters! It's surprising how many of them don't remember the format for writing a letter. Most got a pretty good start today introducing themselves and their favorite things. Each is going to add his or her school picture to the bottom by the signature so the Romanian students can see what we look like. I'm hoping to get those sent off by the end of the week. Hopefully their English is good enough they can understand them!
School got called off early today. We found out after lunch that we'd go home at 1:40. At the time, nothing was coming down, no clouds, completely calm. But right at 1:30, snow started, and now it's pretty big flakes. So I should boogie out of here pretty quick. This is the last thing I have to do before packing up. Maybe 2 hours late tomorrow? Who knows!
The morning was nice and clear, although a little dreary. Just a little spitting precipitation, no snow yet. The kids were all jumpy and hard to settle. They were chatting up a storm and distracting themselves! I actually put on classical music to get them to work quietly... it kind of worked.
And then the computers wouldn't let them log on. The IT guys actually answered, but they said to let it keep loading and see if it would let them on. It didn't work. Eventually we got it figured out and my kids could get on the computers, but it messed up our last day of NaNo time, so we'll fudge the date a bit and let them write for a morning in December.
Since they couldn't work on the computers, they needed something to do that was writing related without technology. Aha! Pen pal letters! It's surprising how many of them don't remember the format for writing a letter. Most got a pretty good start today introducing themselves and their favorite things. Each is going to add his or her school picture to the bottom by the signature so the Romanian students can see what we look like. I'm hoping to get those sent off by the end of the week. Hopefully their English is good enough they can understand them!
School got called off early today. We found out after lunch that we'd go home at 1:40. At the time, nothing was coming down, no clouds, completely calm. But right at 1:30, snow started, and now it's pretty big flakes. So I should boogie out of here pretty quick. This is the last thing I have to do before packing up. Maybe 2 hours late tomorrow? Who knows!
Tuesday, November 24, 2015
Food Sculptures
We got our first communication from our Romanian pen pals today! I feel a little bad since we haven't sent them anything yet; my students have been focusing on their NaNo stories. But next week we'll send them something! Our pen pals made a powerpoint with pictures of themselves doing a Christmas program (super fancy costumes) and playing football (aka-soccer) and with awards for something. There weren't too many words, but it was still pretty neat. We're going to write letters introducing ourselves and maybe send some pictures and/or videos of us doing stuff in a powerpoint. That's the plan anyway. They want to send a Christmas care package via mail, so I need to talk to their teacher about it first.
Our tree weaving projects are coming along nicely. I had them paint the background during read aloud... it took them longer to paint than I thought, which led to even more read-aloud time... something they were only too happy to accept. After lunch, we had art (no math today!) and set up the plate looms and got started weaving. It goes pretty fast. Some were almost finished at the end of art today. A few of the girls are double-weaving their projects, so they're doing it all in one color loosely, then weaving over it with another color. They're all pretty excited about their weaving skills. Now they want to make a huge loom, or I suggested weaving on a box. There's a bunch of shoe boxes in the hallway; we might make looms out of them. But it's getting closer to Christmas and with that comes Christmas present art projects. Mrs. B had a bunch of ideas. To tell you the truth, present-making projects hadn't crossed my mind! I'm glad I have her around to remind me of important stuff.
Another day of Christmas program practice, and another day of hearing my male students complain about gypped recess. Sigh. I am not looking forward to hearing these arguments day after day for the rest of December. After practice, we went to the gym and made food sculptures from the Food Drive donations we collected. My class had some last minute donations this morning... we had about 160 items from our classroom (one kid brought in a big box). Apparently I told them there might be a prize of extra recess. Since our class was obviously the winner of the classroom contest, my main recess supporter kept bugging and bugging, "Do we get our extra recess today? Do we? When do we get it? Is it time now?" Another kid thought we were getting a pizza party. I don't know where he got that idea!
The sculpture building went pretty well. We looked up pictures of sculptures on the internet... they can be super creative: Big Bird, Minions, a bus, the Hunger Games symbol, a giant piece of pie... the list goes on and on. Most of our little groups made crosses or buildings. One group made a basketball. Another made a baby. A different group made a chef Boyardee guy almost as tall as a kindergartner! Then we put all our food together to make giant letters: ILS, and we stood behind them and took an all school picture. And had ice cream afterward as a snack.
Now my classroom is tidied up, the shades are drawn, my desk is in order... I think I am ready to get out of here! Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
Our tree weaving projects are coming along nicely. I had them paint the background during read aloud... it took them longer to paint than I thought, which led to even more read-aloud time... something they were only too happy to accept. After lunch, we had art (no math today!) and set up the plate looms and got started weaving. It goes pretty fast. Some were almost finished at the end of art today. A few of the girls are double-weaving their projects, so they're doing it all in one color loosely, then weaving over it with another color. They're all pretty excited about their weaving skills. Now they want to make a huge loom, or I suggested weaving on a box. There's a bunch of shoe boxes in the hallway; we might make looms out of them. But it's getting closer to Christmas and with that comes Christmas present art projects. Mrs. B had a bunch of ideas. To tell you the truth, present-making projects hadn't crossed my mind! I'm glad I have her around to remind me of important stuff.
Another day of Christmas program practice, and another day of hearing my male students complain about gypped recess. Sigh. I am not looking forward to hearing these arguments day after day for the rest of December. After practice, we went to the gym and made food sculptures from the Food Drive donations we collected. My class had some last minute donations this morning... we had about 160 items from our classroom (one kid brought in a big box). Apparently I told them there might be a prize of extra recess. Since our class was obviously the winner of the classroom contest, my main recess supporter kept bugging and bugging, "Do we get our extra recess today? Do we? When do we get it? Is it time now?" Another kid thought we were getting a pizza party. I don't know where he got that idea!
The sculpture building went pretty well. We looked up pictures of sculptures on the internet... they can be super creative: Big Bird, Minions, a bus, the Hunger Games symbol, a giant piece of pie... the list goes on and on. Most of our little groups made crosses or buildings. One group made a basketball. Another made a baby. A different group made a chef Boyardee guy almost as tall as a kindergartner! Then we put all our food together to make giant letters: ILS, and we stood behind them and took an all school picture. And had ice cream afterward as a snack.
Now my classroom is tidied up, the shades are drawn, my desk is in order... I think I am ready to get out of here! Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
Monday, November 23, 2015
3D Earth
Today was... interesting. Everyone has Thanksgiving fever. Even me. We all want the week to be over so we can have Thanksgiving vacation! Woohoo! Lots of my students who are normally okay behavior-wise were hard to settle this morning.
Some of my students were ready to take their weavings off their looms. Most listened to instructions and got it figured out... a few just took the whole thing off the loom and then said, "Now what Miss H?" Well, now you have to be extra super careful it doesn't come completely apart... Even those kids got it figured out eventually. Mrs. B ran errands and picked up some heavy-duty paper plates for me so we can take our weaving to the next level. Tomorrow we're painting the plates to look like a landscape scene, then we're weaving a tree using the plate as a loom. It's a super cool project and I can't wait to see what the kids do with them! I still need to refresh my memory on how to teach the project...
The 7th graders had their 3D earth projects due today. I had them make models and label them instead of giving them another boring test. One girl made a rice-crispy bar Earth with frosting. The boys pretty much made the typical foam ball Earths (they said it took FOREVER to paint them), and the other girl made a paper plate Earth with yarn and glitter glue to show the layers. I promised them I'd correct their projects tonight so they'd have their grades tomorrow. Still gotta do that yet. I had written on their whiteboard in the morning that they'd present their projects, and I wish now I would've had them simply hand them in. There isn't a whole lot to talk about; everyone's information should be the same. A few of them did extra neat things; one boy drew in tectonic plate lines, another found actual places around the globe that have shear, compression, and tension stress and labeled them. But listening them read their information from their description cards got old really fast. We had some other miscellaneous things to finish up too: take down the bells at church (they played super well on Sunday!), give a spelling test to a 7th grader who'd been absent Friday, and correct two spelling books that had not been at school to be corrected Friday. We got it all done!
I had planned for my 5th and 6th graders to have a workday on their solar system powerpoints, but alas the computers did not work. So on to plan B. Wishbone episode! We watched the one on the Moonstone. Then it was time for Christmas program practice. We read through half the program and will do the other half tomorrow. My class was not happy we missed PE/afternoon recess. Unfortunately, that's the way it's going to be for the rest of December... program practice at 2:00, right at PE time.
Some of my students were ready to take their weavings off their looms. Most listened to instructions and got it figured out... a few just took the whole thing off the loom and then said, "Now what Miss H?" Well, now you have to be extra super careful it doesn't come completely apart... Even those kids got it figured out eventually. Mrs. B ran errands and picked up some heavy-duty paper plates for me so we can take our weaving to the next level. Tomorrow we're painting the plates to look like a landscape scene, then we're weaving a tree using the plate as a loom. It's a super cool project and I can't wait to see what the kids do with them! I still need to refresh my memory on how to teach the project...
The 7th graders had their 3D earth projects due today. I had them make models and label them instead of giving them another boring test. One girl made a rice-crispy bar Earth with frosting. The boys pretty much made the typical foam ball Earths (they said it took FOREVER to paint them), and the other girl made a paper plate Earth with yarn and glitter glue to show the layers. I promised them I'd correct their projects tonight so they'd have their grades tomorrow. Still gotta do that yet. I had written on their whiteboard in the morning that they'd present their projects, and I wish now I would've had them simply hand them in. There isn't a whole lot to talk about; everyone's information should be the same. A few of them did extra neat things; one boy drew in tectonic plate lines, another found actual places around the globe that have shear, compression, and tension stress and labeled them. But listening them read their information from their description cards got old really fast. We had some other miscellaneous things to finish up too: take down the bells at church (they played super well on Sunday!), give a spelling test to a 7th grader who'd been absent Friday, and correct two spelling books that had not been at school to be corrected Friday. We got it all done!
I had planned for my 5th and 6th graders to have a workday on their solar system powerpoints, but alas the computers did not work. So on to plan B. Wishbone episode! We watched the one on the Moonstone. Then it was time for Christmas program practice. We read through half the program and will do the other half tomorrow. My class was not happy we missed PE/afternoon recess. Unfortunately, that's the way it's going to be for the rest of December... program practice at 2:00, right at PE time.
Friday, November 20, 2015
No Zombie
I feel WAY more like myself today. Compared to the rest of the week... I had been a zombie. Today I had snack at school and actually ate all my hot lunch. I think I'm finally mending up.
For art today I taught my class weaving. When they heard that's what we were doing they all groaned. "Oh man! I hate weaving! It's so hard! I can't do it! I'm so bad at it!" I asked when they had done it last... pretty much everyone said 1st or 2nd grade. Ha. That's why! I guaranteed them that it would be easier this time around. And guess what? It was! Everyone got the hang of it super fast. The trickiest part was getting the weaving boards all set up. Some of them liked it so much they worked on it during recess. Others asked if they could bring it home with them! Sweet! Even my non-art-lovers seemed to have a good time. This is good because next week we're taking weaving to the next level and making a paper plate weaving so it looks like a tree. It's a pretty sweet project.
There's supposed to be snow coming tonight. From the dim light outside my classroom it looks a bit hazy, like maybe some little flakes are coming down, but not a ton yet. Meh. I'm not ready for snow. At least I don't have many places to go this weekend. I need to get the exercise book finished tomorrow or Sunday, so lots of writing is planned. And my kids sing/play bells Sunday. Pretty much gonna hunker down and get some rest. Only two days of school next week and then Thanksgiving break!!!
For art today I taught my class weaving. When they heard that's what we were doing they all groaned. "Oh man! I hate weaving! It's so hard! I can't do it! I'm so bad at it!" I asked when they had done it last... pretty much everyone said 1st or 2nd grade. Ha. That's why! I guaranteed them that it would be easier this time around. And guess what? It was! Everyone got the hang of it super fast. The trickiest part was getting the weaving boards all set up. Some of them liked it so much they worked on it during recess. Others asked if they could bring it home with them! Sweet! Even my non-art-lovers seemed to have a good time. This is good because next week we're taking weaving to the next level and making a paper plate weaving so it looks like a tree. It's a pretty sweet project.
There's supposed to be snow coming tonight. From the dim light outside my classroom it looks a bit hazy, like maybe some little flakes are coming down, but not a ton yet. Meh. I'm not ready for snow. At least I don't have many places to go this weekend. I need to get the exercise book finished tomorrow or Sunday, so lots of writing is planned. And my kids sing/play bells Sunday. Pretty much gonna hunker down and get some rest. Only two days of school next week and then Thanksgiving break!!!
Thursday, November 19, 2015
Drip, Drip, Drip
One of the 6th graders thought it would be funny if he pretended to be sleeping during class. I knew he was faking it, but he wouldn't quit. So I borrowed a trick from my old high school math teacher. He kept a water bottle with holes in the lid on a shelf, and any time a student fell asleep, he'd hold the water bottle over that student's head and tilt it and tilt it and tilt it until water dripped on the sleeping person.
So I give him a warning about his possible bath... eyes stay closed. I casually swing by my desk, pick up my water bottle, talking the whole time, saunter his way... the class is watching, watching, watching. Just as I'm about to drip water on him, his eyes fly open and he scoots out of the way, "Whoa! She actually's doing it!" Ha. He didn't believe me. Next time I think I'll use the spray bottle.
I've been kind of forgetful today. It was a 6th grader's birthday, and she brought cupcakes for the whole class (I was able to eat mine! Yay! I've been feeling a lot better today...). Still, we forgot to sing to her for her birthday! Oh well, we'd do it at the end of the day before getting on the bus. Yep, I forgot again. And I remembered as we made our way to the buses. Sigh. She was cool about it though; the kindergartners had sung when she dropped of Mrs. E's cupcake, so she did get the birthday song.
So I give him a warning about his possible bath... eyes stay closed. I casually swing by my desk, pick up my water bottle, talking the whole time, saunter his way... the class is watching, watching, watching. Just as I'm about to drip water on him, his eyes fly open and he scoots out of the way, "Whoa! She actually's doing it!" Ha. He didn't believe me. Next time I think I'll use the spray bottle.
I've been kind of forgetful today. It was a 6th grader's birthday, and she brought cupcakes for the whole class (I was able to eat mine! Yay! I've been feeling a lot better today...). Still, we forgot to sing to her for her birthday! Oh well, we'd do it at the end of the day before getting on the bus. Yep, I forgot again. And I remembered as we made our way to the buses. Sigh. She was cool about it though; the kindergartners had sung when she dropped of Mrs. E's cupcake, so she did get the birthday song.
Wednesday, November 18, 2015
Jello Earthquake
The 7th graders did a cool experiment today. Or, at least, I thought it was cool. We've been studying earthquakes in science, and only briefly touched on earthquake resistant buildings. So I found a lab that had students build an earthquake resistant structure out of toothpicks and marshmallows. To test them for earthquake resistance, you put them on a layer of jello and jiggle it around. Then they can assess, redesign, and retest. Last night I made some jello in a 9x13 pan and I actually remembered to bring it to school today! The 7th graders seemed to have a good time. One kid made an almost circular building on the first try (it didn't move around at all). I limited their building resources, and that was the trickiest part for most of them. "I just need one more toothpick!" Yep, not happening. Still, they each got to try two or three different designs.
We got a little off topic today in American History. Last time, we talked about slavery and the Underground Railroad, but didn't have a chance to listen to the song "Follow the Drinking Gourd", which is a song they'd sing to give instructions on how to escape to freedom. I was going to have them listen to that song and then switch to a new topic, but the website that had the song on it also had information about quilts and the secret messages they held. And along with that was an interactive "game" where you could design your own quilt. So we did! I drew sticks and they'd come up and pick a color and a shape to put in the square... and then they discovered they could layer them to get even more patterns... so we did that for the rest of the time. Our block turned out really cool! We put a cross in the middle and called it "A New Beginning".
And now it's time for me to go home! I have bible study tonight and lots of writing planned... and a plan to take it easy and go to bed early. Only two more days left this week! For whatever reason (probably cause I haven't been feeling well), this week has been dragging on and on and on...
We got a little off topic today in American History. Last time, we talked about slavery and the Underground Railroad, but didn't have a chance to listen to the song "Follow the Drinking Gourd", which is a song they'd sing to give instructions on how to escape to freedom. I was going to have them listen to that song and then switch to a new topic, but the website that had the song on it also had information about quilts and the secret messages they held. And along with that was an interactive "game" where you could design your own quilt. So we did! I drew sticks and they'd come up and pick a color and a shape to put in the square... and then they discovered they could layer them to get even more patterns... so we did that for the rest of the time. Our block turned out really cool! We put a cross in the middle and called it "A New Beginning".
And now it's time for me to go home! I have bible study tonight and lots of writing planned... and a plan to take it easy and go to bed early. Only two more days left this week! For whatever reason (probably cause I haven't been feeling well), this week has been dragging on and on and on...
Tuesday, November 17, 2015
Toilet Paper Planets
We did a science lab today about planetary distances that was kinda, meh. It's one straight out of the science book. Each kid got to be a planet, and we used toilet paper to represent the distance (counting squares to find the right locations). Mr. E had PE in the gym, so we started on the other end of the hall and worked our way toward the gym. Pluto was only a couple steps inside the gym. It was an okay lab; not much for the kids to do. We spent more time going over how to do it than actually making our model. And once they were in position, there wasn't much for them to do. They just stared at each other and chatted. So. That was that.
I brought a sack lunch to school today. The doctor thinks part of my stomach lining is irritated, so I need to keep my diet bland for a while and take something to cut down on the acid in my stomach so the lining can heal. It's going to take a few days for everything to start getting back to normal. But even today by the time lunch/afternoon rolled around I was feeling a lot better. I still didn't eat a ton, but it was more than just crackers! Mrs. B brought me a smoothie with yogurt in it for snack. She is such a God-send!
At the beginning of the day, my kids all wanted to know what I found out at my appointment... so I told them about my stomach being irritated, possibly from taking advil or just general stress. One kid, "So you're saying it's because of us?" No, I'm not pointing any fingers. He gave me a slightly teasing, mischievous smile, "No, you're really saying we're the cause of your stress."
Another random funny thing happened in religion. One kid who only sometimes wears his glasses pulled them out and perched them on his nose (like a librarian). Out of the blue (in the middle of class), he said something in a fancy accent, along the lines of, "I'm ready to check out a book!"
Well, that's all I got for today. My presentation yesterday went really well, although it zapped all my energy. I did notice a few guys in the back closing their eyes for a while, but I'll just chalk that up to the late hour... Now I'm headed for home to work on recuperating (and writing too).
I brought a sack lunch to school today. The doctor thinks part of my stomach lining is irritated, so I need to keep my diet bland for a while and take something to cut down on the acid in my stomach so the lining can heal. It's going to take a few days for everything to start getting back to normal. But even today by the time lunch/afternoon rolled around I was feeling a lot better. I still didn't eat a ton, but it was more than just crackers! Mrs. B brought me a smoothie with yogurt in it for snack. She is such a God-send!
At the beginning of the day, my kids all wanted to know what I found out at my appointment... so I told them about my stomach being irritated, possibly from taking advil or just general stress. One kid, "So you're saying it's because of us?" No, I'm not pointing any fingers. He gave me a slightly teasing, mischievous smile, "No, you're really saying we're the cause of your stress."
Another random funny thing happened in religion. One kid who only sometimes wears his glasses pulled them out and perched them on his nose (like a librarian). Out of the blue (in the middle of class), he said something in a fancy accent, along the lines of, "I'm ready to check out a book!"
Well, that's all I got for today. My presentation yesterday went really well, although it zapped all my energy. I did notice a few guys in the back closing their eyes for a while, but I'll just chalk that up to the late hour... Now I'm headed for home to work on recuperating (and writing too).
Monday, November 16, 2015
El Salvador
Well, I made it through another day of school. I have a doctor's appointment in a bit, so I'm leaving school early (Mr. E has PE today and will send my kids home). Tonight, I'm presenting at church about my trip to El Salvador, so hopefully the appointment doesn't take too long.
Friday, November 13, 2015
BINGO
Today's afternoon was a bit out of the ordinary. For lunch we had Mexican Haystacks (chips with nacho cheese and hamburger) which always takes a long time to serve. And the kids fuss about recess. So Mr. E and I worked out a deal... we'd stay out for recess until 12:30, he'd keep my kids at math until 1:45 when the Lion's Club ladies came to talk about the Peace Posters. I am still not feeling the greatest, so I gave the 7th graders a work day for their 3D earth projects. When the Lion's club came, they all went down to Mr. E's room (he forgot they had to talk about how the Halloween party went too) and I had 15 minutes of quiet to correct papers, etc.
All the winners of the Peace Poster contest were in my class! And they all spent so much time on their posters, I'm glad they won. Everyone who participated got a certificate, and two of the winners' names were spelled wrong! Josie was Jose and Beka was Becka. The ladies are seeing if they can print new ones. After the award ceremony, we all went to the gym for all-school BINGO. It was super fun! We had younger kids paired up with older kids and we got two or three rounds in before the end of the day. And cookies and juice afterwards.
All in all, a good end to the week. Now I'm off for Fairmont to watch my cousins' play! The rest of the weekend I'm planning to hunker down and see if I can get over feeling crummy.
All the winners of the Peace Poster contest were in my class! And they all spent so much time on their posters, I'm glad they won. Everyone who participated got a certificate, and two of the winners' names were spelled wrong! Josie was Jose and Beka was Becka. The ladies are seeing if they can print new ones. After the award ceremony, we all went to the gym for all-school BINGO. It was super fun! We had younger kids paired up with older kids and we got two or three rounds in before the end of the day. And cookies and juice afterwards.
All in all, a good end to the week. Now I'm off for Fairmont to watch my cousins' play! The rest of the weekend I'm planning to hunker down and see if I can get over feeling crummy.
Thursday, November 12, 2015
Short and Sweet
The one bad thing about not feeling well and skipping out of school things early is that everyone asks how you're feeling the next day. Well, I'm not 100%, but I'm feeling a little better. It comes and goes. Mrs. B brought me some tea with honey. That was lovely. I could sip on it all morning. Miss H watched my class at afternoon recess so I could do some work in my classroom (or just take a few minutes to regroup).
My first conference is at 3:15 today, so I'll keep this post short and sweet. My schedule is to go straight through with no breaks from 3:15-7:30. And I just found out a group of 20 people is coming to tour the school, like, right now, to learn more about it. I guess it's a group of people that go tour places to find out more about the community. Well, why not? But my room is clean, I'm all set up for conferences, so I should be okay for visitors.
My first conference is at 3:15 today, so I'll keep this post short and sweet. My schedule is to go straight through with no breaks from 3:15-7:30. And I just found out a group of 20 people is coming to tour the school, like, right now, to learn more about it. I guess it's a group of people that go tour places to find out more about the community. Well, why not? But my room is clean, I'm all set up for conferences, so I should be okay for visitors.
Wednesday, November 11, 2015
Blech
Miss H is playing hooky from the PTL meeting tonight. Actually, I have permission from the Erdmans. I haven't been feeling the greatest today, a bit achy and chilled and slightly feverish, so I'm going to go home and attempt to sleep it off. Of course I start to feel sick the day before Parent Teacher Conferences! Thankfully I don't have a whole lot to do in my classroom tonight, so I should get out of here pretty soon.
The school day was all right. Very productive morning. I had a bag of new books I'd gotten from the library book sale on my desk to be catalogued and one of my biggest readers caught sight of them. She pulled out a book and flipped through it. "Miss H, can I read this now?" Sure, as long as you put it back. Apparently once I gave permission for that one book, she took it to mean free reign on the rest of the books in the bag. I saw her put the first back, pull out another one, put that one back, pull out another one. She's going to read them all before I even get them catalogued! They're mostly picture books, a lot of traditional literature, so not very long at all.
My NaNo story is lagging behind. I'm at 7,000 when I should be around 10,000-11,000. Still, my word count is nothing to sneeze at. I had a good discussion with some of my kids about my story; they were very encouraging. I might need to pick their brains to get more ideas for my story. One kid hasn't started his yet. Or, he says he has, but it's at home somewhere where he can't find it. I made him write at school and he stared at his paper for most of the time. So. I'm a little worried about that. Might be a good idea to mention something at conferences tomorrow.
Anyway, I think it's about time for me to go home. Hopefully I'm feeling back to normal tomorrow!
The school day was all right. Very productive morning. I had a bag of new books I'd gotten from the library book sale on my desk to be catalogued and one of my biggest readers caught sight of them. She pulled out a book and flipped through it. "Miss H, can I read this now?" Sure, as long as you put it back. Apparently once I gave permission for that one book, she took it to mean free reign on the rest of the books in the bag. I saw her put the first back, pull out another one, put that one back, pull out another one. She's going to read them all before I even get them catalogued! They're mostly picture books, a lot of traditional literature, so not very long at all.
My NaNo story is lagging behind. I'm at 7,000 when I should be around 10,000-11,000. Still, my word count is nothing to sneeze at. I had a good discussion with some of my kids about my story; they were very encouraging. I might need to pick their brains to get more ideas for my story. One kid hasn't started his yet. Or, he says he has, but it's at home somewhere where he can't find it. I made him write at school and he stared at his paper for most of the time. So. I'm a little worried about that. Might be a good idea to mention something at conferences tomorrow.
Anyway, I think it's about time for me to go home. Hopefully I'm feeling back to normal tomorrow!
Tuesday, November 10, 2015
Grades
Report cards went home today...
I'm always a little nervous about grades. Mostly because I don't put a whole lot of stock in them; as long as the students are trying their best (and that's something I can tell), and as long as they're learning, I am happy. But everyone else expects grades, so we have a grade book. Sometimes the grades aren't what the parents think their children should be getting, and then they come asking me, "Why did my kid get this grade?" And then the explaining... Sigh. It stresses me out. Anyway. I'll just have to put on my big girl pants and deal with it.
Before school this morning was a little crazy. Mr. E hadn't gotten me my math grades on Monday, so I had to write them all in this morning, then make copies of the report cards in case someone lost theirs, then print a separate grade percentage page that I put inside the report cards, and stick them all in the little folder each goes in. And put them in the mailboxes. And deal with all the missing papers students forgot to hand in (or had to fix). But I got it all done!
With the start of the new quarter, we FINALLY got to change seats. As soon as the kids walked in the door, "Miss H, you didn't move our desks! Don't we get new seats?" Yep, I wasn't about to move 15 desks all by myself. "When do we get our new spots?" After answering that question twice, I wrote a note on the board "We will move seats AFTER religion." We move our desks in a big circle for religion, so everyone already has to move their desks a little. I wrote the new arrangement on the board, prefacing it with the whole don't-get-mad-and-complain spiel. One kid in particular was not happy with this new arrangement. His best buds get to sit by each other for the second time in a row and he's stuck by people he didn't want to be by (I know because I took a survey of the class... name three people you work well with and one you don't work well with). But everyone has to go somewhere, and this kid likes to run his mouth, especially around his friends. So far his new spot has been good. There are two boys who I think might need to be moved closer to the front... time will tell.
I think my little plants are toast. I forgot to extra water them for the long weekend... they're pretty crispy. I doused them with water, but they might be beyond help. Joe's doing fine though... I remembered to feed him. Currently, he's under a bunch of his bedding, which fits tomorrow's forecast of rain. We'll see if Joe the weather tortoise is right!
I'm always a little nervous about grades. Mostly because I don't put a whole lot of stock in them; as long as the students are trying their best (and that's something I can tell), and as long as they're learning, I am happy. But everyone else expects grades, so we have a grade book. Sometimes the grades aren't what the parents think their children should be getting, and then they come asking me, "Why did my kid get this grade?" And then the explaining... Sigh. It stresses me out. Anyway. I'll just have to put on my big girl pants and deal with it.
Before school this morning was a little crazy. Mr. E hadn't gotten me my math grades on Monday, so I had to write them all in this morning, then make copies of the report cards in case someone lost theirs, then print a separate grade percentage page that I put inside the report cards, and stick them all in the little folder each goes in. And put them in the mailboxes. And deal with all the missing papers students forgot to hand in (or had to fix). But I got it all done!
With the start of the new quarter, we FINALLY got to change seats. As soon as the kids walked in the door, "Miss H, you didn't move our desks! Don't we get new seats?" Yep, I wasn't about to move 15 desks all by myself. "When do we get our new spots?" After answering that question twice, I wrote a note on the board "We will move seats AFTER religion." We move our desks in a big circle for religion, so everyone already has to move their desks a little. I wrote the new arrangement on the board, prefacing it with the whole don't-get-mad-and-complain spiel. One kid in particular was not happy with this new arrangement. His best buds get to sit by each other for the second time in a row and he's stuck by people he didn't want to be by (I know because I took a survey of the class... name three people you work well with and one you don't work well with). But everyone has to go somewhere, and this kid likes to run his mouth, especially around his friends. So far his new spot has been good. There are two boys who I think might need to be moved closer to the front... time will tell.
I think my little plants are toast. I forgot to extra water them for the long weekend... they're pretty crispy. I doused them with water, but they might be beyond help. Joe's doing fine though... I remembered to feed him. Currently, he's under a bunch of his bedding, which fits tomorrow's forecast of rain. We'll see if Joe the weather tortoise is right!
Friday, November 6, 2015
23,203
23,203. That's how many words my students wrote this week. Can I get a yeehaw? One was sick today, so his words aren't counted in this total. Mrs. B has been writing too, but I don't know how many words she has. I have 4,172, so I'm a little behind on my story. Last night I was so pooped after a crazy day of school and Ivy's art thing, I had no creative energy. I did work on the exercise book a bit though. It's a lot easier to write when the thoughts have already been thought for you.
I gave out BINGO prizes today since it's the end of the quarter. One 6th grade girl got a blackout. A few others got bingos. The rest of the class has been steadily reading, but they didn't read the right genre of books to get a bingo. And most of them forgot to write the titles in their Reading Notebooks. So. No prizes for them. NaNo prizes on the other hand went like hotcakes! Each 500 words is a chance for a prize: the 500s are a piece of candy and the 1000s are a bigger prize from the prize box. I was surprised that so many of them chose to combine two of their candy prizes to get a big prize from the lab table. I'm going to need more things next week though; 15 kids picking multiple things has cleaned me out pretty good! The most popular items are caramel apple suckers and Slinkys. And things from El Salvador.
Now I'm off to Fulda for the weekend! No school on Monday for the end of the quarter. I need to get my grades done, my NaNo progressing, and a lot of the exercise book written. Monday Dad and I are preg checking cows. Is it weird I'm a little excited for that???
I gave out BINGO prizes today since it's the end of the quarter. One 6th grade girl got a blackout. A few others got bingos. The rest of the class has been steadily reading, but they didn't read the right genre of books to get a bingo. And most of them forgot to write the titles in their Reading Notebooks. So. No prizes for them. NaNo prizes on the other hand went like hotcakes! Each 500 words is a chance for a prize: the 500s are a piece of candy and the 1000s are a bigger prize from the prize box. I was surprised that so many of them chose to combine two of their candy prizes to get a big prize from the lab table. I'm going to need more things next week though; 15 kids picking multiple things has cleaned me out pretty good! The most popular items are caramel apple suckers and Slinkys. And things from El Salvador.
Now I'm off to Fulda for the weekend! No school on Monday for the end of the quarter. I need to get my grades done, my NaNo progressing, and a lot of the exercise book written. Monday Dad and I are preg checking cows. Is it weird I'm a little excited for that???
Thursday, November 5, 2015
What's with the suit?
One of the 6th grade boys wore a suit to school today. Just because he could. I think he's looking for attention. Yesterday he wore a polo shirt and jeans, an outfit unheard of in my class of Under Armour-clad athletes. Everyone wanted to know why he was so dressed up, and he said he just felt like wearing it... maybe tomorrow he'd wear a suit! No one expected him to do it, but that's what he wore to school today! He changed clothes after math so he could play football at afternoon recess... though he didn't have any tennis shoes.
I'm going to keep this short today since Ivy has her art thing. Tomorrow is the end of the quarter, so we're dishing out prizes for NaNo word counts and BINGOs. The 7th graders will probably watch a Bill Nye episode on plate tectonics. I have an art project planned, but I'm not real excited about it... maybe I'll change my mind at the last second.
I'm going to keep this short today since Ivy has her art thing. Tomorrow is the end of the quarter, so we're dishing out prizes for NaNo word counts and BINGOs. The 7th graders will probably watch a Bill Nye episode on plate tectonics. I have an art project planned, but I'm not real excited about it... maybe I'll change my mind at the last second.
Wednesday, November 4, 2015
Frog
At noon recess, the football boys found a frog. I saw them out on the football field, making their way toward me cupping something in their hands. Ploop! The frog slipped to the ground. And the 4-square girls screamed. Apparently they hate frogs. I don't know what ended up happening to it. One girl said she kicked it and it was dead, but I don't know if I believe her. The last I saw of it, it was hopping away from all the noisy kids.
Turns out there were a few of my kiddos who hadn't actually started their NaNos yet. Well, they started typing, but it was just a random story and not actually the stuff they'd prepared last week. I don't get it. We spent so much time developing the characters and coming up with ideas of what would happen to them, and then when it comes time to write, they don't even write about it! Maybe I should make a more obvious connection between those pieces of paper/characters and the start of their story. But, I got those two students squared away and as far as I know they're bustling along in their stories. It's so great to have them call me over and say, "Miss H, look how many words I have! I'm already up to [insert big number here]." Even my reluctant writer wrote 250 words just today! Hopefully he can keep up the pacing. Now our greatest trouble is finding enough computers for everyone to use. There are two Daily 5 rounds they can work on their stories. But 15 kids with only 6 computers makes it a little tricky. So far they've been good about switching rounds so everyone can have a turn on the computer.
I only have one student without a parent teacher conference time. And I only have one slot left from 3:15-7:30 (conference times are 15 minutes). Whew! Next Thursday is going to be a whirlwind day! And in between now and then I need to enter grades, get report cards ready, and gather all the stuff to talk to parents about. I kinda forgot how much goes into these conferences.
I'd like to put my grades in the grade book before Friday, but I don't think I'll have time. Tomorrow after school we have a faculty meeting, and then Ivy has an art gallery open house thing (for her internship) in Mankato from 5-7. Mr. E promised to keep the meeting short so I could get out of school fast! Tack on correcting spelling papers and NaNo-ing and the exercise book I'm editing, it's going to be a full night!
Turns out there were a few of my kiddos who hadn't actually started their NaNos yet. Well, they started typing, but it was just a random story and not actually the stuff they'd prepared last week. I don't get it. We spent so much time developing the characters and coming up with ideas of what would happen to them, and then when it comes time to write, they don't even write about it! Maybe I should make a more obvious connection between those pieces of paper/characters and the start of their story. But, I got those two students squared away and as far as I know they're bustling along in their stories. It's so great to have them call me over and say, "Miss H, look how many words I have! I'm already up to [insert big number here]." Even my reluctant writer wrote 250 words just today! Hopefully he can keep up the pacing. Now our greatest trouble is finding enough computers for everyone to use. There are two Daily 5 rounds they can work on their stories. But 15 kids with only 6 computers makes it a little tricky. So far they've been good about switching rounds so everyone can have a turn on the computer.
I only have one student without a parent teacher conference time. And I only have one slot left from 3:15-7:30 (conference times are 15 minutes). Whew! Next Thursday is going to be a whirlwind day! And in between now and then I need to enter grades, get report cards ready, and gather all the stuff to talk to parents about. I kinda forgot how much goes into these conferences.
I'd like to put my grades in the grade book before Friday, but I don't think I'll have time. Tomorrow after school we have a faculty meeting, and then Ivy has an art gallery open house thing (for her internship) in Mankato from 5-7. Mr. E promised to keep the meeting short so I could get out of school fast! Tack on correcting spelling papers and NaNo-ing and the exercise book I'm editing, it's going to be a full night!
Tuesday, November 3, 2015
Typical
Nothing too extraordinary to report today. Just a few random thoughts about the day...
More NaNo progress. I'm at 2017 words now, and my kids are still excited about writing. I think on Friday we'll have to have a goal assessment to see if any kids need to make their word count goals higher. We've been doing way more writing this year than last year, and I can definitely tell the practice has helped my students write more and write faster. I've seen a lot of them using periods in the right places! Yay! Still need to work on dialogue though. We'll work on that.
We examined our sprouts in science. Most of them forgot where they'd put their lab sheet from last week. Then commenced a giant man-hunt for the lost papers. All but two found where they put them.
School pictures came in today. My hair looks dumb in mine. But it's kind of silly to have teacher retakes for pictures, so I guess I'll just deal with it. All my kids' turned out cute! A few didn't show their teeth in their smiles... they look better with toothy smiles.
After school, Miss N and I met to assign students Christmas program speaking parts. I think we have it mostly figured out. The bell songs for November sound really good, probably the best prepared we've ever been for songs. I'm thinking we might need to add some more songs to our repertoire because there's not much to work on during practice. Perhaps Christmas songs should be pulled out...
I'm not liking how early it gets dark out. It's so bright driving to school in the morning and by the time I pack up to go home, it's totally dark! I wish it'd be the other way around. This too shall pass, I suppose.
More NaNo progress. I'm at 2017 words now, and my kids are still excited about writing. I think on Friday we'll have to have a goal assessment to see if any kids need to make their word count goals higher. We've been doing way more writing this year than last year, and I can definitely tell the practice has helped my students write more and write faster. I've seen a lot of them using periods in the right places! Yay! Still need to work on dialogue though. We'll work on that.
We examined our sprouts in science. Most of them forgot where they'd put their lab sheet from last week. Then commenced a giant man-hunt for the lost papers. All but two found where they put them.
School pictures came in today. My hair looks dumb in mine. But it's kind of silly to have teacher retakes for pictures, so I guess I'll just deal with it. All my kids' turned out cute! A few didn't show their teeth in their smiles... they look better with toothy smiles.
After school, Miss N and I met to assign students Christmas program speaking parts. I think we have it mostly figured out. The bell songs for November sound really good, probably the best prepared we've ever been for songs. I'm thinking we might need to add some more songs to our repertoire because there's not much to work on during practice. Perhaps Christmas songs should be pulled out...
I'm not liking how early it gets dark out. It's so bright driving to school in the morning and by the time I pack up to go home, it's totally dark! I wish it'd be the other way around. This too shall pass, I suppose.
Monday, November 2, 2015
Happy Birthday
One of the 5th graders had a birthday today. His mom dropped off a cake this morning. At lunch, his sister asked if there was any cake left... probably hoping she'd get some of the leftovers... with 15 kids plus 5 teachers, there wasn't any cake to spare. We cleaned the plate! The boys in my class, tricksters they are, decided it would be funny to pretend it was not this kid's birthday and to say nothing about it at all the whole day. That would've been fine, but then they started saying stuff like, "Hey [other student], isn't it your birthday today?" "Nope, it's not mine." "Well, [another student] isn't it your birthday?" "Nope." When the birthday boy said, "It's my birthday!" The ringleader said, "No, I'm pretty sure your birthday is December 2nd. It's not yours today." Yeah, the birthday boy didn't get the joke. So I put the kibosh on that.
Our NaNo kickoff went pretty well today. Yesterday I wrote about 800 words of my own story. I think I'm going to go with the teacher goal of 30,000 words. That means I only write 1,000 a day, which I think is doable. For those of you who don't know, I've been doing some freelance writing on the side lately. The guy who hired me has a new assignment: to write a manual on exercising training from his 90 page outline. Basically I have to put his words into paragraph format. Not super difficult, just time consuming. Add that on to school work and NaNo... I'm a busy girl.
But back to my kiddos! My top writer last year started his yesterday and he coincidentally also has 800 words. Or he did at the start of the day. He wrote more during Daily 5 this morning. I've got some catching up to do! Some kids now have 300 words, others have 50 or 80. All have something! One kid had typed about 300 words and logged off his computer. He thought he'd saved it, but when he logged on later, he couldn't find it! He had to start over. Bummer.
Oh, other good news! The seeds are sprouting! The sunflowers have grown the most so far, beans next, then peas/corn. My kiddos were so excited to see the sprouts. I need to remember to have them examine the roots/leaflets for geotropism or the other tropisms. Tomorrow perhaps.
Our NaNo kickoff went pretty well today. Yesterday I wrote about 800 words of my own story. I think I'm going to go with the teacher goal of 30,000 words. That means I only write 1,000 a day, which I think is doable. For those of you who don't know, I've been doing some freelance writing on the side lately. The guy who hired me has a new assignment: to write a manual on exercising training from his 90 page outline. Basically I have to put his words into paragraph format. Not super difficult, just time consuming. Add that on to school work and NaNo... I'm a busy girl.
But back to my kiddos! My top writer last year started his yesterday and he coincidentally also has 800 words. Or he did at the start of the day. He wrote more during Daily 5 this morning. I've got some catching up to do! Some kids now have 300 words, others have 50 or 80. All have something! One kid had typed about 300 words and logged off his computer. He thought he'd saved it, but when he logged on later, he couldn't find it! He had to start over. Bummer.
Oh, other good news! The seeds are sprouting! The sunflowers have grown the most so far, beans next, then peas/corn. My kiddos were so excited to see the sprouts. I need to remember to have them examine the roots/leaflets for geotropism or the other tropisms. Tomorrow perhaps.
Friday, October 30, 2015
Rosie the Riveter
Most kids thought I was a janitor today. Or a mechanic. Though I guess Rosie the Riveter was technically a mechanic. I wish I would've printed a picture of her to show the kiddos who asked. I made a little nametag sticker that said "Rosie". A lot of kids actually called me Rosie instead of Miss H!
The carnival went super well. There was a great variety of games that lots of kids could be playing at the same time. No one had to wait in line very long. The hairsprayers and face painters were close to the back door so no one was overpowered by the fumes. The fingernail polishers had a vast array of colors (some of which they couldn't open... Rosie the Riveter had to use her muscles to twist them free). Two girls painted the nails and one girl dried them with a special nail dryer machine thing. I let each painter paint one nail on each hand (I'm not much of a nail polish girl). One finger ended up neon orange with blue confetti (a layer called fuzzy paint?), and the other hand sports a blue nail with subtle yellowish sparkles. I'm so fancy!
Aside from the carnival, not too much was accomplished in our room. We had religion and read-aloud like normal. Halloween cookies with frosting and sprinkles were for snack (some assembly required), so that took more time than usual. And our chapter ended on a cliff-hanger, of course, so we had to keep reading, of course. Reading buddies got moved up a bit so we could set up in the gym for the preschool class to have carnival time. After the preschool carnival, we took spelling tests and it was time for lunch!
Normally, we eat lunch at two folding tables, but the kiddos used them in carnival set up and left them in the gym... so today and today only we ate lunch at our desks. I hate doing that. Desks are for learning, not eating meals, and there's more community sitting around a big table. Tacos were for lunch today, another time-consuming serving. Before I even got back to the classroom with my tray, a student asked if he could go out for recess. Are you kidding me? I sat down at my desk and three more boys huddled around asking if they could go out. At least let me eat my taco first! One kid actually tried to argue with me, "But Miss H, it's almost noon! It's time for recess!" Yeah, and we could wait to go out until I've eaten all my food. That shut him up quick. So recess was definitely the low point of the day. But the rest of the day made up for it!
The carnival went super well. There was a great variety of games that lots of kids could be playing at the same time. No one had to wait in line very long. The hairsprayers and face painters were close to the back door so no one was overpowered by the fumes. The fingernail polishers had a vast array of colors (some of which they couldn't open... Rosie the Riveter had to use her muscles to twist them free). Two girls painted the nails and one girl dried them with a special nail dryer machine thing. I let each painter paint one nail on each hand (I'm not much of a nail polish girl). One finger ended up neon orange with blue confetti (a layer called fuzzy paint?), and the other hand sports a blue nail with subtle yellowish sparkles. I'm so fancy!
Aside from the carnival, not too much was accomplished in our room. We had religion and read-aloud like normal. Halloween cookies with frosting and sprinkles were for snack (some assembly required), so that took more time than usual. And our chapter ended on a cliff-hanger, of course, so we had to keep reading, of course. Reading buddies got moved up a bit so we could set up in the gym for the preschool class to have carnival time. After the preschool carnival, we took spelling tests and it was time for lunch!
Normally, we eat lunch at two folding tables, but the kiddos used them in carnival set up and left them in the gym... so today and today only we ate lunch at our desks. I hate doing that. Desks are for learning, not eating meals, and there's more community sitting around a big table. Tacos were for lunch today, another time-consuming serving. Before I even got back to the classroom with my tray, a student asked if he could go out for recess. Are you kidding me? I sat down at my desk and three more boys huddled around asking if they could go out. At least let me eat my taco first! One kid actually tried to argue with me, "But Miss H, it's almost noon! It's time for recess!" Yeah, and we could wait to go out until I've eaten all my food. That shut him up quick. So recess was definitely the low point of the day. But the rest of the day made up for it!
Thursday, October 29, 2015
Star Wars Battle
Whew, it feels like a Star Wars battle is going on inside my head... pew! pew! pew! lasers going everywhere! My thoughts are bouncing in a million directions!
The good news is the plug in my tire is still holding. There really isn't any bad news today. My kids have been a little overwhelmed with the amount of paperwork I'm having them do for NaNo prep, and so have I in trying to keep everything straight in the grade book. One whiteboard is covered in names of assignments and students who haven't handed it in yet. Then came the questions, "Miss H, I'm done with spelling, can I do an extra Work on Writing round instead?" Or "I'm done with everything, can I do Read to Self?" One after another, and each one I had to think over in my head, should I let them or shouldn't I? When I wasn't meeting with students on their writing ideas, I met with them on their read-to-self books.
Finally at lunchtime I had a break! For about a minute. Chicken Fajitas were on the menu, and they take forever to serve. By the time I got back to the classroom with my tray, the boys were raring to go to recess. Watching me like a hawk, they raced to the gym when I took my last bite of fajita. I finished eating my lunch standing in the gym. And then they complained when I called them in from recess at the normal time. I didn't even get to go to the Bookmobile today! Sigh. But enough of the pity party.
My class is getting excited about the Fall Carnival tomorrow. I've had kids bringing in candy and supplies all week! I've decided to be Rosie the Riveter tomorrow. I should've planned that last week and brought a coverall/boots/red bandanna from home. In my classroom I have a red/orange/yellow bandanna that will have to do. I'm borrowing a coverall from someone, so that's covered. Not sure what to do about boots. Eh, if all else fails, I can wear all black and be a mime.
The good news is the plug in my tire is still holding. There really isn't any bad news today. My kids have been a little overwhelmed with the amount of paperwork I'm having them do for NaNo prep, and so have I in trying to keep everything straight in the grade book. One whiteboard is covered in names of assignments and students who haven't handed it in yet. Then came the questions, "Miss H, I'm done with spelling, can I do an extra Work on Writing round instead?" Or "I'm done with everything, can I do Read to Self?" One after another, and each one I had to think over in my head, should I let them or shouldn't I? When I wasn't meeting with students on their writing ideas, I met with them on their read-to-self books.
Finally at lunchtime I had a break! For about a minute. Chicken Fajitas were on the menu, and they take forever to serve. By the time I got back to the classroom with my tray, the boys were raring to go to recess. Watching me like a hawk, they raced to the gym when I took my last bite of fajita. I finished eating my lunch standing in the gym. And then they complained when I called them in from recess at the normal time. I didn't even get to go to the Bookmobile today! Sigh. But enough of the pity party.
My class is getting excited about the Fall Carnival tomorrow. I've had kids bringing in candy and supplies all week! I've decided to be Rosie the Riveter tomorrow. I should've planned that last week and brought a coverall/boots/red bandanna from home. In my classroom I have a red/orange/yellow bandanna that will have to do. I'm borrowing a coverall from someone, so that's covered. Not sure what to do about boots. Eh, if all else fails, I can wear all black and be a mime.
Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Sleet
The big news of the day came at 2:40, right before we were about to pray. "IT'S SNOWING!!!!!" someone shouted, and the class flocked to the windows. Some didn't stop their. About five of them opened our outside door and went onto the porch to appreciate the first snow of the year. It was actually more like sleet, and it melted by the time we finished praying. Oh man, I was not sure if I'd be able to get those kids back in the room. Eventually they did come back and we prayed and dismissed. One kid had a meltdown because he insisted it was sleeting outside and a classmate repeatedly said "it's snowing, it's snowing!" most likely to make the first kid mad. Sigh.
Our day actually went pretty smoothly overall. We've been having noise issues in class for a long time now, but this morning Mrs. B reminded me about the noise level chart I have stuck on the board. I don't think I ever explained it to the class, so in the middle of our NaNo prep, I did. We went over the five noise levels (0= Silence is Golden, 1= Spy Talk, 2= Low Flow, 3=Formal Normal, 4= Loud Crowd, 5=Out of Control... only to be used outside). Then came practice time. It was amazing. We started with a level 3 and they did it perfectly! Way quieter conversation than they'd been doing moments before. We practiced each level... even #5. I prefaced it as "this is the ONLY time you will ever do this indoors." I can't believe how well it worked to change our noise levels.
NaNo prep for the day involved planning our villains. I shared my homework with the class, the drawn pictures of our rainbow lady. The boys were bummed she was pretty looking; they want ugly and action-y. Our villain... well... since our rainbow is a Korean rainbow, they wanted the villain to be someone in Korea. I'll bet you can guess who they picked to be the villain. I'm going to have to do some tweaking; there might be more than one villain in this story. My idea is to have the old rainbow woman (my class's choice of protagonist) tell a story to the audience about something that happened to her when she was younger. Maybe, how she got to be a rainbow in the first place, kind of like a constellation story or a myth. Isn't it neat how all the other stuff we talk about in class gets tied in somehow? So with that in mind, I wanted the villain to be the reason she was turned into a rainbow. Korean dictator? I don't think he'd be able to do that. One girl had the idea that the main character is bad and being a rainbow was a punishment; she had to do a certain number of good things before the spell would be broken. Aha! Then the other villain (dictator) would try to stop her or undo the good things, or he could be the last good thing she has to do before the spell is broken but he's too bad. Or something. I'm still working out the kinks. But I think I can get 50,000 words from that story. Ugh. That's so many. My kids are getting excited to work on theirs. I have some chomping at the bit... "Can we start on Saturday?" Nooo, that's still October. "How about Sunday?" Yes, Sunday is in November, you can start. Some have even picked their editing partners for after NaNo! I've been checking off their character sheets as they finish them, and let me tell you, there will be some pretty interesting stories this year. I'm excited!
Normally this would be a good place to stop my post for the day, but yesterday after school I had a wee bit of car trouble... so I wanted to give an update. I found a slow leak in my back left tire. Turns out a shingle nail had poked in right at the place where a patch might not stick. So the tire guys stayed a little late and patched it for me. They cautioned it might not stay in place and I should watch it over the next few days. So far, so good! No tire pressure light has come on. Hopefully that will be the case when I go out to my car tonight!
Our day actually went pretty smoothly overall. We've been having noise issues in class for a long time now, but this morning Mrs. B reminded me about the noise level chart I have stuck on the board. I don't think I ever explained it to the class, so in the middle of our NaNo prep, I did. We went over the five noise levels (0= Silence is Golden, 1= Spy Talk, 2= Low Flow, 3=Formal Normal, 4= Loud Crowd, 5=Out of Control... only to be used outside). Then came practice time. It was amazing. We started with a level 3 and they did it perfectly! Way quieter conversation than they'd been doing moments before. We practiced each level... even #5. I prefaced it as "this is the ONLY time you will ever do this indoors." I can't believe how well it worked to change our noise levels.
NaNo prep for the day involved planning our villains. I shared my homework with the class, the drawn pictures of our rainbow lady. The boys were bummed she was pretty looking; they want ugly and action-y. Our villain... well... since our rainbow is a Korean rainbow, they wanted the villain to be someone in Korea. I'll bet you can guess who they picked to be the villain. I'm going to have to do some tweaking; there might be more than one villain in this story. My idea is to have the old rainbow woman (my class's choice of protagonist) tell a story to the audience about something that happened to her when she was younger. Maybe, how she got to be a rainbow in the first place, kind of like a constellation story or a myth. Isn't it neat how all the other stuff we talk about in class gets tied in somehow? So with that in mind, I wanted the villain to be the reason she was turned into a rainbow. Korean dictator? I don't think he'd be able to do that. One girl had the idea that the main character is bad and being a rainbow was a punishment; she had to do a certain number of good things before the spell would be broken. Aha! Then the other villain (dictator) would try to stop her or undo the good things, or he could be the last good thing she has to do before the spell is broken but he's too bad. Or something. I'm still working out the kinks. But I think I can get 50,000 words from that story. Ugh. That's so many. My kids are getting excited to work on theirs. I have some chomping at the bit... "Can we start on Saturday?" Nooo, that's still October. "How about Sunday?" Yes, Sunday is in November, you can start. Some have even picked their editing partners for after NaNo! I've been checking off their character sheets as they finish them, and let me tell you, there will be some pretty interesting stories this year. I'm excited!
Normally this would be a good place to stop my post for the day, but yesterday after school I had a wee bit of car trouble... so I wanted to give an update. I found a slow leak in my back left tire. Turns out a shingle nail had poked in right at the place where a patch might not stick. So the tire guys stayed a little late and patched it for me. They cautioned it might not stay in place and I should watch it over the next few days. So far, so good! No tire pressure light has come on. Hopefully that will be the case when I go out to my car tonight!
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Constellations
My kids had a blast in science today. We started our unit on Space with a lesson on constellations. There isn't a whole lot in the book about this subject, but I have a make-your-own constellation activity that I usually do. This year, I used my document reader to show a constellation map (one that spins to show the stars in the sky at different times of the year). Then I showed some of the better known constellations and told them the stories behind the shapes. It was super interesting because the 7th graders had just given presentations on the Greek gods and goddesses, and many constellations have to do with these same beings. My kids don't know a whole lot about Greek mythology, and they love stories, so they were very interested. After showing pictures, I gave them a star map and had them connect dots to make a creature. They got to write a myth to go along with it. I couldn't believe how much fun they had! One boy even asked if he could stay in from recess to keep working on the story! A bunch said they wished we could do stuff like this every day. I have no clue what made it so fun for them.
The 7th graders and I had great discussions going during the presentations. They presented information on one god/goddess and since Greek mythology is all intertwined, they made connections between their person and their classmates' people. We found brothers and sisters and aunts and parents... lots of good stuff.
Our NaNo characters were created today. I model building a character for the class (and let them help decide things about it) to use in my NaNo story. We ended up with an 11,000 year old Korean rainbow who lives in North Korea in a dynamite forest. Yeah. How's that gonna work? I have a plan though... The old rainbow is going to tell a story about when she was younger, so it will be a kind of 2nd person narrator. The only thing is, I don't know what her story should be about. We're creating villains tomorrow, so maybe that will jog my creativity.
The church year chain was finished today! Now I just need to hang it up. But I think that's a job for tomorrow. I need to get gas and groceries, and maybe sneak in a trip to the library...
The 7th graders and I had great discussions going during the presentations. They presented information on one god/goddess and since Greek mythology is all intertwined, they made connections between their person and their classmates' people. We found brothers and sisters and aunts and parents... lots of good stuff.
Our NaNo characters were created today. I model building a character for the class (and let them help decide things about it) to use in my NaNo story. We ended up with an 11,000 year old Korean rainbow who lives in North Korea in a dynamite forest. Yeah. How's that gonna work? I have a plan though... The old rainbow is going to tell a story about when she was younger, so it will be a kind of 2nd person narrator. The only thing is, I don't know what her story should be about. We're creating villains tomorrow, so maybe that will jog my creativity.
The church year chain was finished today! Now I just need to hang it up. But I think that's a job for tomorrow. I need to get gas and groceries, and maybe sneak in a trip to the library...
Monday, October 26, 2015
Camp Omega Recap
Last Friday after we got back to school, I thought about writing about our trip, but my feet were wet and I was tired so I told myself I would write it once I got to Fulda. And then once I got there, I decided it could wait. So here we are!
Thursday was the perfect weather for Camp Omega. We were outside in sweatshirts and no jackets! The sun was shining, there wasn't much wind, perfect for a nature walk. Our first task was to find non-man-made things for each letter of the alphabet. We split into our "car" groups; the 5th grade girls had ridden with me, and I was their team leader for pretty much all of the trip. It was so fun! Normally I'm working with the boys, putting out behavior fires and helping with homework, and the girls don't demand as much attention. They were so excited to be with me; it was nice! We missed some tough letters like J, Q, U, V, X, Y. We were bummed we didn't find all of them.
Afterwards, we moved on to archery, always a fun activity. There was enough time for the kids to do two rounds and the chaperones one. Recurve bows were our only option to shoot, and it was hard for the kids to pull back the string, so Zach (our Camp Omega leader) moved the quivers/line of fire closer. Then they could hit the target! We took lots of good pictures.
For lunch we had chicken strips, which coincidentally was what was on the school lunch menu for the day. Camp Omega added a session to all school groups... service project. Our group was split into three: one group split wood with a wood splitter, another swept leaves off the sidewalk, and my group swept out the shop and put hoses away. It didn't take my group long to do our job. No one was supervising (except me) so we were at a loss of what to do afterward. We watched some cats they had running around, took a "nap" in the sun, rolled down the big hill by the dining hall (I did not participate in that one), then saw the other sweeping group playing Gaga Ball and joined them. It took the wood choppers the longest to finish. Then on to canoeing.
It was then I realized I had not put on sunscreen. Oops. Everyone found a canoe and paddles and life jackets and jumped right in! Or should I say, paddled right in? Some of the boys tried to ram canoes and splash everyone. For a while there was a splash war going on. The boy I was with was a good partner and we were too fast for anyone to splash us! I had given my camera to one of the 6th grade girls to take pictures on the water (she was a middle sitter and didn't have to paddle). Then we handed the camera to Zach to take a group picture. That took some finagling! We grabbed paddles and pulled each other's canoes close together and hung on to each other's gunwales. But we were all facing the wrong direction! So the outside canoes paddled while the inside canoes held on. And we spun around! It was pretty awesome. And the picture turned out fantastic.
Fort building was next, or should I say Survival Shelter Building. Again, car groups were sent off to build a shelter that would blend in and withstand rain. My 5th grade girls and I found a big stump we could make a lean-to shelter. Our roof was pretty solid. We had two big branches leaned up on top of the stump and we filled in the space between with smaller sticks. On top of all that we threw a layer of leaves. The side of the lean-to was more sticks leaned against it, but that wasn't as air-tight. The other groups came up with some pretty neat shelters too. Afterwards we played more Gaga Ball and had supper (turkey, mashed potatoes, etc.).
Right as we finished cleaning up, the power went off. And it didn't come back on. Zach called the electric company and they said it'd be on by 9:00pm. Okaaay. We played Eagles Eggs and Flashlight Gaga Ball until it was time for campfire. Oh, and we did read-aloud while it was still light enough. By the time campfire/worship/highs and lows was over, the power was back on. More Gaga Ball until 9:00 cabin time. Everyone got ready for bed and we had lights out by 10:00. Most were sleeping by 10:30. And with the sleeping came snoring, the kind of snoring you hear in movies. I'm not entirely positive which people were snoring, but there were at least three! Still, with all that, I was out light a light! No kids got homesick this year, although there were some who got up at 4:00am to play Gaga Ball. They were dressed and ready to go and even left the cabin! The walls are so thin, you can hear what anyone says anywhere in the cabin, so even though the boys were on a separate side, we girls could hear their Gaga Ball plan. One of the other female chaperones got up and chewed them out and sent the 4:00am-ers back to bed. I'm so thankful she did it instead of me! I could stay snuggled down in my sleeping bag.
The boys still got up pretty early to play Gaga Ball, but at the more decent hour of 6:30am. Breakfast was egg/sausage/cheese sandwiches. The weather started out nice before breakfast (sweatshirt weather again), but in the time it took to walk to breakfast it had cooled down enough we wanted our winter jackets if we were going to be outside. Fire building was our first activity... and of course it started sprinkling. Still, all of our car groups got a fire going, even my group of little 5th grade girls! Annnnd then it began to downpour. We hustled to the Beta Center (where they do the teaching of sessions before going out into the wilderness) to learn about orienteering. Most chaperones had brought one or two umbrellas along, so we snagged those from the cars as we had more wilderness to explore yet that morning. Zach taught us how to use compasses to find directions (something I've never been able to figure out... but I know now!), then he gave us a scavenger hunt questionnaire to find the answers to. By that point it was merely sprinkling, so we felt confident in braving the weather. Partway through, it downpoured again. The 5th grade girls and I were close enough to our shelter from yesterday that we ran ahead and hunkered down inside. It was waterproof! Well, it dripped in a few places, but it kept us mostly dry! Eventually we had to move on. We only got partly soaked. One girl didn't bring a spare sweatshirt and jeans, so once we were finished being in the rain I loaned her one from my winter emergency kit in the back of my car. She is so tiny she practically drowned in it, but it was warm and dry and fuzzy, so there were no complaints!
Normally at the end of Camp Omega there are tons of complaints and it's hard to drag them away. This year it was too wet to play Gaga Ball the second day, so they couldn't argue about that. And their shoes were so soggy from walking in the wet grass and leaves I think everyone was mostly ready to go home when we did. We packed up our stuff, did a little read-aloud, and left camp by 1:15 to put us back to school by 2:15; just enough time for recess before going home for the day. I love my kids, but being around them all for over 30 hours with no breaks is tough. Let's keep it in 9 hour increments.
Today was back to normal. We began work on our church year chain (colors of the liturgy) and I think we'll finish stapling tomorrow. We did more NaNo prep work. And we did a plant science experiment. Ugh, I'm so mad! I was going to bring back corn and soybeans from the farm this weekend and I totally forgot! I got halfway home last night when I suddenly remembered. But I wasn't about to turn around and go back. I had some sunflower seeds in the closet and a few kernels left from last year, so we made due with what I had on hand. Hopefully the experiment works!
Mrs. B invited me over for supper tonight since all her people are gone (Pastor's conference). So I best head over there soon!
Thursday was the perfect weather for Camp Omega. We were outside in sweatshirts and no jackets! The sun was shining, there wasn't much wind, perfect for a nature walk. Our first task was to find non-man-made things for each letter of the alphabet. We split into our "car" groups; the 5th grade girls had ridden with me, and I was their team leader for pretty much all of the trip. It was so fun! Normally I'm working with the boys, putting out behavior fires and helping with homework, and the girls don't demand as much attention. They were so excited to be with me; it was nice! We missed some tough letters like J, Q, U, V, X, Y. We were bummed we didn't find all of them.
Afterwards, we moved on to archery, always a fun activity. There was enough time for the kids to do two rounds and the chaperones one. Recurve bows were our only option to shoot, and it was hard for the kids to pull back the string, so Zach (our Camp Omega leader) moved the quivers/line of fire closer. Then they could hit the target! We took lots of good pictures.
For lunch we had chicken strips, which coincidentally was what was on the school lunch menu for the day. Camp Omega added a session to all school groups... service project. Our group was split into three: one group split wood with a wood splitter, another swept leaves off the sidewalk, and my group swept out the shop and put hoses away. It didn't take my group long to do our job. No one was supervising (except me) so we were at a loss of what to do afterward. We watched some cats they had running around, took a "nap" in the sun, rolled down the big hill by the dining hall (I did not participate in that one), then saw the other sweeping group playing Gaga Ball and joined them. It took the wood choppers the longest to finish. Then on to canoeing.
It was then I realized I had not put on sunscreen. Oops. Everyone found a canoe and paddles and life jackets and jumped right in! Or should I say, paddled right in? Some of the boys tried to ram canoes and splash everyone. For a while there was a splash war going on. The boy I was with was a good partner and we were too fast for anyone to splash us! I had given my camera to one of the 6th grade girls to take pictures on the water (she was a middle sitter and didn't have to paddle). Then we handed the camera to Zach to take a group picture. That took some finagling! We grabbed paddles and pulled each other's canoes close together and hung on to each other's gunwales. But we were all facing the wrong direction! So the outside canoes paddled while the inside canoes held on. And we spun around! It was pretty awesome. And the picture turned out fantastic.
Fort building was next, or should I say Survival Shelter Building. Again, car groups were sent off to build a shelter that would blend in and withstand rain. My 5th grade girls and I found a big stump we could make a lean-to shelter. Our roof was pretty solid. We had two big branches leaned up on top of the stump and we filled in the space between with smaller sticks. On top of all that we threw a layer of leaves. The side of the lean-to was more sticks leaned against it, but that wasn't as air-tight. The other groups came up with some pretty neat shelters too. Afterwards we played more Gaga Ball and had supper (turkey, mashed potatoes, etc.).
Right as we finished cleaning up, the power went off. And it didn't come back on. Zach called the electric company and they said it'd be on by 9:00pm. Okaaay. We played Eagles Eggs and Flashlight Gaga Ball until it was time for campfire. Oh, and we did read-aloud while it was still light enough. By the time campfire/worship/highs and lows was over, the power was back on. More Gaga Ball until 9:00 cabin time. Everyone got ready for bed and we had lights out by 10:00. Most were sleeping by 10:30. And with the sleeping came snoring, the kind of snoring you hear in movies. I'm not entirely positive which people were snoring, but there were at least three! Still, with all that, I was out light a light! No kids got homesick this year, although there were some who got up at 4:00am to play Gaga Ball. They were dressed and ready to go and even left the cabin! The walls are so thin, you can hear what anyone says anywhere in the cabin, so even though the boys were on a separate side, we girls could hear their Gaga Ball plan. One of the other female chaperones got up and chewed them out and sent the 4:00am-ers back to bed. I'm so thankful she did it instead of me! I could stay snuggled down in my sleeping bag.
The boys still got up pretty early to play Gaga Ball, but at the more decent hour of 6:30am. Breakfast was egg/sausage/cheese sandwiches. The weather started out nice before breakfast (sweatshirt weather again), but in the time it took to walk to breakfast it had cooled down enough we wanted our winter jackets if we were going to be outside. Fire building was our first activity... and of course it started sprinkling. Still, all of our car groups got a fire going, even my group of little 5th grade girls! Annnnd then it began to downpour. We hustled to the Beta Center (where they do the teaching of sessions before going out into the wilderness) to learn about orienteering. Most chaperones had brought one or two umbrellas along, so we snagged those from the cars as we had more wilderness to explore yet that morning. Zach taught us how to use compasses to find directions (something I've never been able to figure out... but I know now!), then he gave us a scavenger hunt questionnaire to find the answers to. By that point it was merely sprinkling, so we felt confident in braving the weather. Partway through, it downpoured again. The 5th grade girls and I were close enough to our shelter from yesterday that we ran ahead and hunkered down inside. It was waterproof! Well, it dripped in a few places, but it kept us mostly dry! Eventually we had to move on. We only got partly soaked. One girl didn't bring a spare sweatshirt and jeans, so once we were finished being in the rain I loaned her one from my winter emergency kit in the back of my car. She is so tiny she practically drowned in it, but it was warm and dry and fuzzy, so there were no complaints!
Normally at the end of Camp Omega there are tons of complaints and it's hard to drag them away. This year it was too wet to play Gaga Ball the second day, so they couldn't argue about that. And their shoes were so soggy from walking in the wet grass and leaves I think everyone was mostly ready to go home when we did. We packed up our stuff, did a little read-aloud, and left camp by 1:15 to put us back to school by 2:15; just enough time for recess before going home for the day. I love my kids, but being around them all for over 30 hours with no breaks is tough. Let's keep it in 9 hour increments.
Today was back to normal. We began work on our church year chain (colors of the liturgy) and I think we'll finish stapling tomorrow. We did more NaNo prep work. And we did a plant science experiment. Ugh, I'm so mad! I was going to bring back corn and soybeans from the farm this weekend and I totally forgot! I got halfway home last night when I suddenly remembered. But I wasn't about to turn around and go back. I had some sunflower seeds in the closet and a few kernels left from last year, so we made due with what I had on hand. Hopefully the experiment works!
Mrs. B invited me over for supper tonight since all her people are gone (Pastor's conference). So I best head over there soon!
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
Tobacco Education
We had a guest speaker today. A dental hygiene student from MSU came to talk about tobacco with my students. She was a little late because of the detours (supposedly going to be opened back up on Saturday!) and we had some issues getting her laptop set up, but better late than never. Mr. E was good about letting my class show up to PE late.
Overall, our day was much better than yesterday. After chapel, Mr. E took four of the boys into the office and had a chat with them. Meanwhile, we finished our read-aloud book, Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper. I had to read the sad chapter today. I've been warning them that this chapter was coming up and I just might cry when I read it. One of the boys grabbed the box of Kleenex and set it next to me, just in case. Always so thoughtful, my students! Their faces while I was reading... they were absolutely riveted. Completely sucked into the story. It was awesome. And of course we couldn't stop at just one chapter, so we finished the book and skipped Writing Workshop today. We'll start our new read-aloud at Camp Omega tomorrow. They want to read a fantasy book, but I think we're going to go with Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson.
The 7th graders have been great this week. We started a unit on Earth's layers and tectonic plates, and they're soaking it all up. Such good discussions. Instead of doing a test on this chapter, I might have them build a model of Earth's layers... maybe with some kind of food! I'll work on that this weekend.
I'm ducking out of my classroom much sooner today than usual. I have to deposit all our class funds into our class account so we're ready for tomorrow, and the bank closes at 3:30. I'm not planning to come back to school afterward, so I'm booking it to get everything packed up and ready to go. Tonight there is ladies' bible study and I still need to pack. It's going to be busy!
Overall, our day was much better than yesterday. After chapel, Mr. E took four of the boys into the office and had a chat with them. Meanwhile, we finished our read-aloud book, Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper. I had to read the sad chapter today. I've been warning them that this chapter was coming up and I just might cry when I read it. One of the boys grabbed the box of Kleenex and set it next to me, just in case. Always so thoughtful, my students! Their faces while I was reading... they were absolutely riveted. Completely sucked into the story. It was awesome. And of course we couldn't stop at just one chapter, so we finished the book and skipped Writing Workshop today. We'll start our new read-aloud at Camp Omega tomorrow. They want to read a fantasy book, but I think we're going to go with Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson.
The 7th graders have been great this week. We started a unit on Earth's layers and tectonic plates, and they're soaking it all up. Such good discussions. Instead of doing a test on this chapter, I might have them build a model of Earth's layers... maybe with some kind of food! I'll work on that this weekend.
I'm ducking out of my classroom much sooner today than usual. I have to deposit all our class funds into our class account so we're ready for tomorrow, and the bank closes at 3:30. I'm not planning to come back to school afterward, so I'm booking it to get everything packed up and ready to go. Tonight there is ladies' bible study and I still need to pack. It's going to be busy!
Tuesday, October 20, 2015
Roasty Toasty
Yesterday was supposed to be the hot one, but it's even toastier in my classroom today! I thought it was going to be cooler, so I wore a sweater... not the best decision ever. Even with the windows open and my sleeves rolled up, I am pretty roasty! And since I can't bring myself to turn on the AC, I should suffer in silence and not complain. Pretty soon it will be winter and then I'll be wishing for some of this warm!
Picture day was today. It's funny to see how people react to it. Some of the girls come to school super spiffed up with their hair curled and extra fancy jewelry and clothes. Some of the boys come to school with nicer clothes than usual, itching and scratching until after pictures and then scurry off to the bathroom to change into something more comfortable. And other boys wear their typical comfy clothes and just throw a nice shirt on over top two minutes before it's their turn with the picture man. Hey, the picture is only from the waist up!
I think a storm is coming. My kids were kinda crazy today... really at each others' throats. We all made it to the end of the day, but life got a little rough. We took our first science test in the afternoon right before our end of the day recess. Two students took the longest time to finish. Of course the majority of the class finished way sooner... no one wanted to find something to do. They all stared off into space or made faces at the people still working on the test. Lovely. Just lovely. The boys especially wanted to go out for recess. I could feel the dissension in the ranks, but didn't want to abandon the test takers in the classroom while the majority went out. And then one particular student got on his soap box about how at noon recess there were seven people in the classroom unsupervised and way less than seven people were still taking the test now! And everyone should get to go out for recess RIGHT NOW! Oh, it was not good. They nearly mutinied! ... I need to find a better way of doing that, giving longer-test-takers the time they need while the speedsters aren't sitting there bored.
I finally came up with an alternative assignment for the two boys not going to Camp Omega. I made up a research worksheet for them... they have to find five survival facts and list where they found them, draw pictures of three types of shelters and describe how to build one in detail, write a 1/2 page paper on orienteering, and list four methods of fire building and pick one they would do and explain why. All stuff we're going to be doing at Camp Omega, but something they can research and hand in. So. Hopefully that's not too much and everyone is happy with it. They are missing a two day field trip after all. I don't think the rest of the class knows these two boys are not going. We'll find out on Thursday I guess.
Oh! The Fall Carnival is planned! I still need to come up with a schedule for next Friday, but the kids all know what they're doing and have been making signs for their stations. Next step, figure out a costume!
Picture day was today. It's funny to see how people react to it. Some of the girls come to school super spiffed up with their hair curled and extra fancy jewelry and clothes. Some of the boys come to school with nicer clothes than usual, itching and scratching until after pictures and then scurry off to the bathroom to change into something more comfortable. And other boys wear their typical comfy clothes and just throw a nice shirt on over top two minutes before it's their turn with the picture man. Hey, the picture is only from the waist up!
I think a storm is coming. My kids were kinda crazy today... really at each others' throats. We all made it to the end of the day, but life got a little rough. We took our first science test in the afternoon right before our end of the day recess. Two students took the longest time to finish. Of course the majority of the class finished way sooner... no one wanted to find something to do. They all stared off into space or made faces at the people still working on the test. Lovely. Just lovely. The boys especially wanted to go out for recess. I could feel the dissension in the ranks, but didn't want to abandon the test takers in the classroom while the majority went out. And then one particular student got on his soap box about how at noon recess there were seven people in the classroom unsupervised and way less than seven people were still taking the test now! And everyone should get to go out for recess RIGHT NOW! Oh, it was not good. They nearly mutinied! ... I need to find a better way of doing that, giving longer-test-takers the time they need while the speedsters aren't sitting there bored.
I finally came up with an alternative assignment for the two boys not going to Camp Omega. I made up a research worksheet for them... they have to find five survival facts and list where they found them, draw pictures of three types of shelters and describe how to build one in detail, write a 1/2 page paper on orienteering, and list four methods of fire building and pick one they would do and explain why. All stuff we're going to be doing at Camp Omega, but something they can research and hand in. So. Hopefully that's not too much and everyone is happy with it. They are missing a two day field trip after all. I don't think the rest of the class knows these two boys are not going. We'll find out on Thursday I guess.
Oh! The Fall Carnival is planned! I still need to come up with a schedule for next Friday, but the kids all know what they're doing and have been making signs for their stations. Next step, figure out a costume!
Monday, October 19, 2015
Attack of the Lady Bugs
Noon recess was a battle zone. Apparently, all the girls in my class are terrified/grossed-out/completely disgusted by lady bugs. And guess what was cruising around the playground today? Yep. Lady bugs. One of the 5th graders stood on the picnic table to get away from them. "[friend], come over here! There are less lady bugs... I think!" Mmm, not really, but it gave her slight peace of mind. We spent recess pointing out the latest attackers and flicking them off each other. Thankfully, not too many have found their way into our classroom. Most of the other rooms have swarms in the corners near the ceiling, but we have escaped thus far.
I made another girl cry today. It's the same one who usually cries, although this year the tears have not made as many appearances. She was upset because I made the groups for our science review game and she got stuck in a group with all boys (boys she does not like/get along with) and no girls. After the game she came up to me and said, "Miss H. I did not like that." Yep. I totally get it. But we all have to do things we don't like in this world. Since they were pretty good during the game, next time I'll let them pick their own groups. Our test on plants is tomorrow, and I noticed a bunch of study guides lying on the floor/on desks... this does not bode well. Actually, those boys are pretty bright and will probably do well on the test without studying. But I still worry anyway.
Today I introduced our big project for November... National Novel Writing Month, aka NaNoWriMo. As soon as I brought up NaNo, the 6th graders wanted to show off last year's chart! They were able to color in their part of the graph each day to show how many words they had so far. It was a huge hit. I guess I'll have to do the same thing again!
Some of my kids have started NaNo stories already, but once I made it clear their word count starts at zero on November 1st no matter how much they've written beforehand, they decided it would be too much work to figure out how many words they have. So I think everyone will start a new story from scratch. I'm also going to let each of them make their own word count goals (with a minimum goal of 2,000). We'll set our goals next Friday, right before NaNo starts. All the NaNo sites for teachers say it's important for teachers to write with their students to set a good example. I guess that means I need to do NaNo too. I just don't know how I'm going to write 50,000 words this year! Although, I think that every year. But this year has been crazier than normal. We'll see I guess! With my kiddos egging me on, watching, it might be enough motivation to get the job done.
I made another girl cry today. It's the same one who usually cries, although this year the tears have not made as many appearances. She was upset because I made the groups for our science review game and she got stuck in a group with all boys (boys she does not like/get along with) and no girls. After the game she came up to me and said, "Miss H. I did not like that." Yep. I totally get it. But we all have to do things we don't like in this world. Since they were pretty good during the game, next time I'll let them pick their own groups. Our test on plants is tomorrow, and I noticed a bunch of study guides lying on the floor/on desks... this does not bode well. Actually, those boys are pretty bright and will probably do well on the test without studying. But I still worry anyway.
Today I introduced our big project for November... National Novel Writing Month, aka NaNoWriMo. As soon as I brought up NaNo, the 6th graders wanted to show off last year's chart! They were able to color in their part of the graph each day to show how many words they had so far. It was a huge hit. I guess I'll have to do the same thing again!
Some of my kids have started NaNo stories already, but once I made it clear their word count starts at zero on November 1st no matter how much they've written beforehand, they decided it would be too much work to figure out how many words they have. So I think everyone will start a new story from scratch. I'm also going to let each of them make their own word count goals (with a minimum goal of 2,000). We'll set our goals next Friday, right before NaNo starts. All the NaNo sites for teachers say it's important for teachers to write with their students to set a good example. I guess that means I need to do NaNo too. I just don't know how I'm going to write 50,000 words this year! Although, I think that every year. But this year has been crazier than normal. We'll see I guess! With my kiddos egging me on, watching, it might be enough motivation to get the job done.
Wednesday, October 14, 2015
Shout Outs
Miss N gave me a pretty cool idea today. She has a "shout out" box at the front of the classroom where kids can write compliments to each other and they'll be read to the class at the end of the day. Today, one of her kids wrote one to me! "This compliment is for Miss Hins. This person is a nice prcine [person] she dus reding buttes [reading buddies]. From your friend, [student]" How sweet is that? I think I'm going to start doing that with my class. Miss N said she got the idea from Pinterest.
I also had a good idea today. Our iPads are never charged up because I always forget to plug them in. The open outlets are on the other side of my desk where I can't get to them easily and the charging cords are in a desk drawer. I found a metal hook in my desk, bent it slightly so one end is flat, then stuck it to the side of my desk by the iPads with a magnet. Now we can hook the charging cords to my desk so they're by the iPads, but not in the way! And my kiddos can charge them when they need it. Yes!
After school today we teachers got together in the office to make gift bags for the LEC speakers. Here I was thinking it would take us a half an hour or so... it only took us 10-15 minutes to make 36 bags. We got an assembly line going and stuffed the bags with candy, granola bars, gum, mints, fruit snacks, water, etc. Then someone put tissue paper in the top. We divided the bags amongst the teachers so one person doesn't have to bring all 36 to the conference tomorrow. The back of my vehicle is a lot more slippery than my old car (things tend to slide around when they're back there), so I put my portion of the bags on the floor behind my seat. Hopefully they don't get too mushed!
I actually got my to-do list for this week entirely done! And a few things on next week's list as well! I think I'm going to focus on schoolwork tonight, planning everything for next week so I don't have to think about it on my days off the rest of this week. And after posting this, I should be finished with my things at school, and I can even go home early! Woohoo!
I also had a good idea today. Our iPads are never charged up because I always forget to plug them in. The open outlets are on the other side of my desk where I can't get to them easily and the charging cords are in a desk drawer. I found a metal hook in my desk, bent it slightly so one end is flat, then stuck it to the side of my desk by the iPads with a magnet. Now we can hook the charging cords to my desk so they're by the iPads, but not in the way! And my kiddos can charge them when they need it. Yes!
After school today we teachers got together in the office to make gift bags for the LEC speakers. Here I was thinking it would take us a half an hour or so... it only took us 10-15 minutes to make 36 bags. We got an assembly line going and stuffed the bags with candy, granola bars, gum, mints, fruit snacks, water, etc. Then someone put tissue paper in the top. We divided the bags amongst the teachers so one person doesn't have to bring all 36 to the conference tomorrow. The back of my vehicle is a lot more slippery than my old car (things tend to slide around when they're back there), so I put my portion of the bags on the floor behind my seat. Hopefully they don't get too mushed!
I actually got my to-do list for this week entirely done! And a few things on next week's list as well! I think I'm going to focus on schoolwork tonight, planning everything for next week so I don't have to think about it on my days off the rest of this week. And after posting this, I should be finished with my things at school, and I can even go home early! Woohoo!
Tuesday, October 13, 2015
UGH
I had to do a bunch of hard things today. It makes me want to bang my head against my desk and yell "UGH!"
First, one of my students who hates reading was super obstinate today. Not sure why. He decided he didn't want to read and was going to do everything in his power to avoid it. And he did the same for bell practice. I had to use my scary teacher voice on him. Never a fun thing to do. Eventually he joined the class, but he was still being a poop during practice.
After school I had to have a conversation with a potential chaperone for our Camp Omega trip next week. PTL agreed to pay for two chaperones (besides me), so I told parents the first two to send back the permission forms would get the paid for registrations. Anyone else would have to pay the $76 fee. Well, wouldn't you know, I get two permission slips from female chaperones back within five minutes of each other. And the first one says she's willing to pay if she doesn't get it, but the second/later one doesn't have that option checked. So now what? Fifteen students won't fit in three cars that hold only four passengers! Mr. E and I got it all straightened out with the mom, and the board of education is going to try to find the extra money somewhere so this parent doesn't have to pay.
As soon as we had all that figured out (and I sent the signed forms back to Camp Omega), I got a call from a parent asking if it would be okay for her two sons to not go on the trip because their sister was coming home from college and Thursday night would be the only time she could spend time with them. UGH! Right after I sent the forms back.
I hate it when parents ask if their kids can stay home from field trips. I'm putting in a lot of work to get everything in order, and it's supposed to be a fun time! And if I let one kid stay home, what's to stop the others from saying, "eh, think I'll stay home too." But I already let one kid do that for our Fort Ridgely field trip, so if I told the other family the boys have to go, they'll cry, "unfair, unfair!" and I'll be in trouble. Sigh. So once again, I talked to Mr. E and we decided not to fight the parent on this. So those boys will be staying home. And now I have to refigure all my money calculations on how much each family owes.
Sunday we're doing a bake sale/serving donuts after church to raise more money. I don't know how that's going to go. It sounds like a lot of parents aren't going to be helping. I just don't want to be the only one there on Sunday. Wouldn't that be great?
On the plus side, we did get a volunteer for the male chaperone. And one of the first graders brought me a piece of rhubarb pie fresh from the oven at snack time (their class made a pie I guess?). The 7th graders got excited about the Greek mythology project I'm having them do. And we had a really good Writing Workshop/Daily 5 morning jam-packed with learning. After school we had a Christmas Program planning meeting (I know, Christmas already?) and have a good start on all that. So really, most of the day has been good... it's just this last part that's been stressful.
With all this stuff going on for Camp Omega and our fundraiser and finishing up Silent Auction stuff and getting midterm grades ready for tomorrow, my brain feels like it's going in a million directions at once! So. Now that everyone else is gone and my room is quiet once again, time to get things done, one little bit at a time.
First, one of my students who hates reading was super obstinate today. Not sure why. He decided he didn't want to read and was going to do everything in his power to avoid it. And he did the same for bell practice. I had to use my scary teacher voice on him. Never a fun thing to do. Eventually he joined the class, but he was still being a poop during practice.
After school I had to have a conversation with a potential chaperone for our Camp Omega trip next week. PTL agreed to pay for two chaperones (besides me), so I told parents the first two to send back the permission forms would get the paid for registrations. Anyone else would have to pay the $76 fee. Well, wouldn't you know, I get two permission slips from female chaperones back within five minutes of each other. And the first one says she's willing to pay if she doesn't get it, but the second/later one doesn't have that option checked. So now what? Fifteen students won't fit in three cars that hold only four passengers! Mr. E and I got it all straightened out with the mom, and the board of education is going to try to find the extra money somewhere so this parent doesn't have to pay.
As soon as we had all that figured out (and I sent the signed forms back to Camp Omega), I got a call from a parent asking if it would be okay for her two sons to not go on the trip because their sister was coming home from college and Thursday night would be the only time she could spend time with them. UGH! Right after I sent the forms back.
I hate it when parents ask if their kids can stay home from field trips. I'm putting in a lot of work to get everything in order, and it's supposed to be a fun time! And if I let one kid stay home, what's to stop the others from saying, "eh, think I'll stay home too." But I already let one kid do that for our Fort Ridgely field trip, so if I told the other family the boys have to go, they'll cry, "unfair, unfair!" and I'll be in trouble. Sigh. So once again, I talked to Mr. E and we decided not to fight the parent on this. So those boys will be staying home. And now I have to refigure all my money calculations on how much each family owes.
Sunday we're doing a bake sale/serving donuts after church to raise more money. I don't know how that's going to go. It sounds like a lot of parents aren't going to be helping. I just don't want to be the only one there on Sunday. Wouldn't that be great?
On the plus side, we did get a volunteer for the male chaperone. And one of the first graders brought me a piece of rhubarb pie fresh from the oven at snack time (their class made a pie I guess?). The 7th graders got excited about the Greek mythology project I'm having them do. And we had a really good Writing Workshop/Daily 5 morning jam-packed with learning. After school we had a Christmas Program planning meeting (I know, Christmas already?) and have a good start on all that. So really, most of the day has been good... it's just this last part that's been stressful.
With all this stuff going on for Camp Omega and our fundraiser and finishing up Silent Auction stuff and getting midterm grades ready for tomorrow, my brain feels like it's going in a million directions at once! So. Now that everyone else is gone and my room is quiet once again, time to get things done, one little bit at a time.
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