#15

Finally the end of the week is here! This week was a long one, jam packed with activities both before school and after school, and it's not looking to slow down any time soon.  There are only three weeks of school left! Yikes!

Today was the last spelling test.  Everyone was very thankful to be finished.  We had a good time at the MLC play this afternoon.  It was Peter Pan without any singing.  An excellent production, although I liked last year's play better.  We got our Mystery Class answers back today too.  Since the play was in the afternoon, I didn't have class with the 7/8th graders, so I'll show them on Monday.  We didn't find all of them.  Well, we found them, but our answers were incorrect.  We found 7 out of 10.  Classes who've found 8+ are featured on the website, so we were close!  Maybe next year.

After school today we moved the book fair over to church.  It'll be open afterwards during the Men's/Women's Clubs' pork chop dinner.  Hopefully we get lots of sales!  I think we've made about $500 or so.  I haven't counted up the "All for Books" money we raised via bottle flipping/pjs/lunch switching, but that money will also go towards our goal of $800 (we get to spend that money on books for our classroom).

Now that the book fair is over, hopefully I'll have more time to focus on getting major projects wrapped up: Mystery Class packets/graphs, pinatas, NaNos (we need to publish them soon so the books get here before the end of school!), Malaysia pen pal letters... I think that's everything.  Oh, I need to make sure Miss W has all the assignments she needs from my kiddos.  The next big thing is our Variety Night, May 11th.  Lots of things to do for that!  Next week's after school schedule is filled with practices.  Plus we have a faculty meeting and a PTL meeting to look forward to as well.  Another packed week!

Monday's balloon prize: chew gum in class (they were excited about that one!)

#16

We had quite a time with the cards for Miss W.  I totally spaced on writing one when I got home last night. I didn't remember until this morning, but it was early enough I put my kiddos on it.  Quite a few made one.  They didn't know what her favorite color was, but they all guessed purple.  It's actually blue.  Shucks!  Still, she said she likes purple too.  One girl had to start over three times on the card because she kept spelling words wrong!  They'd gotten stencils from Mrs. E and had fun tracing different things.

Since the spelling errors got in the way of finishing, it made it difficult to have everyone sign the card... the student was working on it in my room during noon recess when Miss W walked in.  Ahh! Quick! Run!  Panicking slightly, she scooped up her supplies and scurried out to the gym.  After it was finished she took it to the 7/8th room to get them to sign it. One of them brought it down to my room so the few working in there could sign it too. And Miss W was standing right there!  Both kids tried to communicate with their eyes like, "Hey! She's standing right there! Don't give it away!!!" But I think they made it worse.  Even so, she didn't say anything (and I'm still not sure if she noticed them or not...).  She was very touched by our cards.  After her 5/6th history lesson today, my kids kind of started clapping (a few of them anyway). A professor from BLC had been observing and she commented later how out of the ordinary that was... my students were so polite and welcoming and caring. She said most other schools/classes aren't like that.  What a nice compliment!

It was too cold to eat lunch outside today. It actually snowed last night.  I had to scrape snow off my car this morning!!! We'll save it for another nicer day.  Tomorrow's balloon activity: go to the MLC play! (Yes, they felt like they were getting gypped since that special activity is already on the calendar).

#17

A parent was here after school running errands, talking to teachers, dropping things off. As she left my classroom, she dug in her pocket, "Here, have one, they're on sale!" It was a carmel filled chocolate Easter egg.  Mmm!

The Wishbone episode today was fun.  So fun, in fact, that my kiddos convinced me to let them watch a second one.  Sigh, they know my weaknesses... They convinced me by saying, "It's educational! We're learning stuff!  And we already have lots of spelling and handwriting done."  All true.  We watched the Ivanhoe episode and the Red Badge of Courage episode.

Tomorrow's special activity will probably not happen tomorrow. We're supposed to eat a picnic lunch outside, but since the weather will be cold and possibly damp, I think we'll wait for a nicer day.  Tomorrow is also Miss W's last day in my classroom. None of my kids made her cards. I brought it up to them and they were just kind of "eh" about it, so I think I'll put something together at home tonight and have them all sign it.

Tonight will be another busy night... bible study at 6, then Guatemala committee meeting at 7. After that I can go home and put my feet up! Maybe I'll read a book.  Or maybe I'll catch up on correcting or typing the Talent Show bulletin.

#18

Apparently there was an earthquake in Mankato? I'm slightly jealous I didn't get to experience such a thing... Miss W brought it up when she first got here today. She said all the buildings at BLC shook.  The local internet is abuzz with speculation.  Some people think the tremors were caused by a blast at one of the Mankato quarries.  Either way, no damage was reported, though lots of people called in to say they felt it.

Another interesting thing today... one of the 6th graders had taken home a spider from our spider lab and it had babies! (We think). There are four things that look like little spiders in the jar with "Barry" and the 6th grader says she can see them moving.  I looked and they do look like spider-ish things, but I couldn't see them moving.

Today's activity was "sit anywhere for the day". Three kiddos moved their desks into the Gumdrop Gallery Corner. Surprisingly, they focused pretty well back there.  A 5th grade girl moved her desk back against the wall by the outside door (the handle is broken so we can't use the door anyway).  The boys of course moved their desks in a row by each other.  A few of them got moved because they were too noisy/distracting.  And the 6th grade best friends moved their desks side by side.

It made class with the 7th and 8th graders interesting, having the desks all over the place.  They presented their Africa projects today, so it ended up being fine.  We skipped bells (for like the third time in a row) so we could get all the projects presented in one day.  They play on Sunday, but they know the songs well (otherwise we wouldn't be skipping practice). Miss S is going to set up bells at church tomorrow during 5th grade bell practice, that way they get a chance to practice at church and my bell choir can simply practice on Thursday instead of taking time to haul everything over.

Tomorrow's activity: watch a Wishbone episode!

#19

Whew, what a day!

I just got done cleaning up from our first ever family STEAM night.  STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math.  Each teacher came up with an idea and families went around the gym to various stations doing the activities/challenges there.  It was a huge success!

Everyone had a punch card, one sticker/stamp per station.  Once four stations were visited, people could turn their cards in for a door prize.  We drew every half hour.  My challenge was to build a pyramid of red plastic cups and put a Lego guy on the top, without using your hands.  You could use any combination of: two straws, a rubber band, a cotton ball, 1-2ft of string (per person).  Almost every group found a different way of doing it! Some groups tried the super deluxe extra challenging challenge.  The cups started out in a stack and they had to unstack them and then restack them without the use of their hands.  Regular= they could start with the cups already separated on the table.

Other stations: building a bridge of paper and popsicle sticks strong enough to hold a bunch of washers, making a house of gumdrops and toothpicks so the 'wolf' (a hairdryer) couldn't blow the pig (paper) out of the house, "Noah's Ark" where you build a boat of tin foil to hold as many plastic animals as possible, marble painting, making a paper structure strong enough to hold a stack of textbooks.  The robotics team from Mankato West also came and did robot demonstrations for everyone.  You could even try driving the robots yourself!  And there were a few self-guided kit stations for people to try on their own.  We served pizza for supper and had tables set up in the hallway as a 'lunch room'.

The book fair was open too. We had a few grandmas working; they said they had fun.  We sold $250 of books! That puts a hefty dent in the $800 goal of ours.  Hopefully the rest of the week goes just as well.

I bought a pair of flats that are supposed to be the best/most comfortable flats in the world.  I figured they'd be good to wear today since I'd be on my feet a long time.  Ehhh, maybe they're not as comfortable as they appear or maybe I need to break them in more.  My feet are sore.  I think this pair may be a little small; they pinch my toes a bit.  I was hoping they'd stretch out (the company doesn't sell half sizes), and maybe they still will.  Should I let them naturally stretch (they're made of leather) or should I try to stretch them out without my feet in them?  Since I wore them already, I don't think I can exchange them for a larger size...

Birthday

Having a birthday on a school day as a teacher is always interesting.  Are the kids going to remember? Will they make a fuss? Or will it just be like any other day?

While our classroom routine was mostly normal, enough 'birthday' things happened to make this day not ordinary.  My desk featured a bunch of Almond Joy candy bars arranged in 27! (from Mr. D), the E's gave me flowers and a balloon and a card to Barnes and Nobles.  The 3rd and 4th grade girls serenaded me before the bell rang this morning. Then the kindergartners sang to me right after our class devotions. My class pretended that they would sing to me, but I waved them off (I think they were sick of the 'happy birthday' song at that point).  One of my students made me a card at her card-making class and a kindergartner gave me a hand-made card later that day in the hallway.  And everyone liked my gingersnaps!  All in all, it was a very good day.

Books, Books, Books

After school today we had another teacher meeting to go over talent show ideas for us. I made the playlist last night (probably shouldn't have stayed up so late... but it was fun, so it was worth it). We now have a seven minute conglomeration of songs to do our 'skit' to. But this year it's a secret, so don't tell!

We wrote a note on the board in the office saying "Reminder, NO teacher skit this year." just in case they're curious and peek at our meeting list on the board. We have lots of nosy kids! They keep coming up to teachers asking why we're not doing a skit.  Various answers: the school board won't let us, Miss S doesn't want to do it, we're trying something new, too much work.  I think we've got them all fooled!  

After the planning meeting, we set up for the Scholastic book fair.  It seems like there's less stuff than previous years.  Normally we're creatively stacking books to fit them all on the table, but there is quite a bit of empty space.  Ms. F and Miss S helped set up; the other teachers had other meetings they had to be at (or other things to do).  A few kids had stayed after to catch up on work; they helped set up tables/open boxes/pull things out.  They got bored rather quickly (they're not book-lovers).  Tomorrow is just a preview day. The fair officially opens on Monday.

Right as we were finishing up, the UPS dropped off another box of books... my Scholastic book order! Yay! Even more books to add to my to-read pile.  Again, I wish I could pause time to catch up on my reading.

We popped our first balloon today... tomorrow there is 20 days of school left.  The balloon prize: Miss H brings treats.  It's rather fitting since it's my birthday tomorrow.  I think I'll bake gingersnaps.  I got a bunch of rhubarb over the weekend and made rhubarb sauce last night. I had thought about making rhubarb crisp and sharing that with my students, but only three out of ten students likes rhubarb, so I'll take that as a no.  I guess I'll make it for myself and share it with my family!

Africa Speaker

Our Africa speaker showed up today.  It was a little up in the air because he'd emailed me over the weekend to see if we could switch the speaking day to Wednesday instead of Thursday (a day early). I didn't see it until Tuesday, but emailed him back saying it would work. He never responded so I wasn't sure if we were doing Wednesday or sticking with Thursday.  All day kids were asking me and I kept telling them, "I haven't heard anything."  Thankfully, Miss W was flexible about her lesson and came prepared, just in case. He did show up though!  And his presentation was wonderful.

His parents were missionaries in Africa (Zimbabwe at first, now Cameroon) and he lived there until he was eight years old.  At that time, they moved to the US. Just a few years ago his parents moved back to Cameroon to get the seminary going again.  So our speaker travels back and forth quite a bit over long breaks.  He spoke about the mission work his dad does, what churches are like there, what it was like growing up in Africa, the growing conditions (hot, wet, always rainy and humid).  He said there is always plenty to eat there because of the climate, but the problem is getting protein. They eat anything with protein: dogs, cats, guinea pigs, rats, etc. The closest grocery store to buy meat is six hours away.  The local marketplace will butcher three cows or so each day and that's the meat available. Get it quick or it goes bad in the heat! Plus they don't keep their area clean, so it's best to avoid buying from there.

He told us a story about the pet dog he had in Africa. It was getting older, so one of the guys/pastors he knew asked him one day if, when his dog died, our speaker would give the dog to him so he could eat it.  Uhhh... no?  He said he told the guy no because the meat was bad since they gave it vaccines and stuff.

There are also crocodiles and hippos in all freshwater. He said both are super vicious and will come after you if you even step foot in the water.  And the hippos are not like the ones from captivity, those are babies compared to what's in Cameroon.  His dad and some of the other pastors go hunting.  Hippos are so tough, there's only a quarter sized place behind their ear that will work to bring them down.  And then they pick up the animal by boat and wrap a seat belt around it to drag it to shore. But the other hippos won't let them near the body so the other hunters have to shoot their guns into the water as they go to scare the hippos away.  The one his dad got was so heavy it broke two seat belts. They had to tie three together to let it be strong enough.  He said the hippos are about the length of the white folding table plus a desk at the end and are the width of about 2-3 exercise balls (10ft x 4-6ft). Holy cow! That's huge!!!

Malaysia

Pen pal letters came today, all the way from Malaysia!  The teacher made each person in our class a bookmark with his/her name written in calligraphy.  She wrote me a letter and every person in my class got a letter too!  Some even got two letters.  My students devoured the letters. They wouldn't stop reading.  It was amazing.  Some started writing back right away.  Since their letters to us were so fancy (some drew pictures, some used fancy paper, everyone had neat handwriting), we have to step up our game.  We got stationary from the office and I know at least one person is making a fancy envelope. Others drew some pictures or included a school photo.  Sigh, if only it weren't the end of the school year... then we could exchange more letters!  Hopefully we'll be able to connect with them next year too.

I forgot my water bottle at home today. I packed everything else in my teacher bag, but not that.  I automatically reached for it once I got to school and thought, "Oh no!"  I didn't realize how much water I drink during the day!  Thankfully I had a water bottle in my car, but it's a smaller one and it was empty before 3:30 (and I didn't feel like going all the way into the hallway to refill it).  I'll be sure to remember it tomorrow!

Before Easter break I thought my to-do list was pretty short, I wouldn't have to do too much over break, so it took it easy.  It was a very relaxing break!  But then I came back to school and... yeah, I should've tried to get a few more things accomplished.  I had lesson plans from my student teacher to look over (she sent them to me on Monday), a class website to update, Scholastic book fair stuff to do, posters to put up, books to catalog, balloons to hang from the ceiling, talent show ideas to come up with, STEAM night ideas to come up with, field trip forms to print off... sigh, I'm feeling time crunched again.  But in my defense it's mostly stuff I need internet for/is easier to do at school.  I think I've hit my maximum potential for today; it's time to go home.  I called the library and they have a wi-fi box still there. If no one gets there before me, I think I'll check it out to see if I'll be more productive at home, or at least cross a few more things off the to-do list before tomorrow.

Closet

Miss W had another teacher observe her lesson today. It just so happened to be my favorite education professor from BLC.  It was so good to see her again! She arrived early while the 7/8th graders had study hall and Mystery Class, so we even got to catch up a little.  It was a great end to a "Friday".
One of the 7th graders who likes it quiet when he works had asked to work in the doorway of the closet.  I'd said yes and promptly forgot about him.

Ten minutes later, after Dr. B arrived and I went over to say hi, I realized he had blockaded himself in the closet putting a small folding table across the opening so no one else could get in or out.  She was curious why he was in the closet so I told her the story.  Then she said, "I didn't even notice him there. All of a sudden I heard a cough, looked over, and there was a little head sticking out over the top!"

Our Mystery Classes are coming along.  The 5-6th class is slower than the 7-8th graders.  I need to spend more time with my own class to help them figure out what to search for.  But Mystery Class was not the biggest complaint of the day.  No, the 7-8th graders mostly complained about how difficult their take home animal science test was.  Some said it took them two hours to do!  Well, they didn't take notes in class, so, there you go.  And a lot of them just used their books and not the powerpoints on the website.  Although that's a little of my fault; I told them they could use their resources, but not the internet. Since they have to use the internet to get to the powerpoints...

Well, I'm wrapping things up at school for the week.  Time to head Fulda-way.  I ran errands last night, so all I have to do is pack up my classroom and get in the car.  We are off school until Tuesday!  It will be nice to let everyone have a break from each other (and hopefully get rid of these yucky germs still going around).

All for Literacy

Kids finally remembered to bring their money in for special activities today. I had three 3/4th grade girls eating in my classroom, and four of five boys ate in Mr. D's room with four more 7th grade boys.  A few kids wore pjs today and a bunch said they plan to do it tomorrow as well.  One 5th grader said she planned to wear pjs tomorrow and then said, "You should too Miss H!" Uh, most likely not.  Hopefully we can keep up the momentum!

I had a phone chat with the Scholastic consultant today after school and we talked more about the online book fair and All for Literacy (raising money for books).  Book fair stuff is mostly what I've been working on since school got out.

It's hard to believe tomorrow is the last day of school this week!  I'm trying to decide if I should run my errands tonight still or if I should wait until tomorrow and do them before I head to Fulda for the long weekend.  There's weather spotting training in Worthington tomorrow night, so I do have a bit of a time crunch.  But maybe that would give me added incentive to pack up at school quickly... Hmm... I have one book due at the library this week and I'm just about finished with it. So if I read it over supper, I could possibly finish in time to get it back to the library tonight before it closes.  Well, I guess we'll see!

Laid-back

Today seemed pretty laid back. There's no spelling, handwriting, or memory work due since we only have three days of school because it's Holy Week. Still, some students got a head start on next week's spelling/handwriting.  They do have science labs and a social studies project/report due Wednesday, but not a boatload of assignments.  Since the workload is light, I let them work on Mystery Class for a round (answers to the 10 locations are due next Friday).  Not a lot of time!  The 7th and 8th graders are doing better on finding the locations. Of course, they've also been doing it for 3-4 years, so they know how it goes.  Each year I'm finding easier ways of teaching Mystery Class, which is good since kids at the beginning of my teaching career complained it was too hard.  It's still challenging, but much easier to complete (at least I think so).

This weekend my farmer and I went to the SPAM museum in Austin, MN.  Originally, we were going to ride horse, but since it looked like rain we thought we'd go the safer route and find something to do inside.  All the stuff we found on Explore MN was outside stuff, not open until May, or was far away.  He likes SPAM a lot, I like museums a lot, so we figured, why not?

It was really neat! They had samples of SPAM, Tocino and Portuguese Sausage. Fun facts: Tocino is only sold in the Philippines while Portuguese Sausage is only sold in Hawaii.  Tocino has so much sugar in it that when you fry it, the sugar leeches out and caramelizes into a coating over the meat.  On average, each person in Guam eats 25 cans of SPAM per year.  Outside the US, the following countries are huge eaters of SPAM: South Korea, Great Britain, and the Philippines.

The gift shop had all 15 flavors of SPAM for sale; 12 were in a variety pack! So my farmer bought his breakfast for the next couple months... we showed his parents after we got back and they suggested having a 'SPAM tasting' so everyone could try all the kinds.  That would be interesting!

Sunshine

Not a whole lot to report today; it was pretty standard.  One kid still out sick, one left early to go to his grandpa's funeral. Everyone else was mostly calm all day.  We did spelling tests, Mystery Class, worked on pinatas, made Easter cards for shut-ins, and had recess outside.  I had my windows open all day to let in the fresh air.  Now I'm going to spend more time outside digging up raspberry plants!

A lady from church has a ton she doesn't want anymore (over 100 she says). So I'm digging some up for my mom and my farmer's mom.  Tomorrow is the MLHS rummage sale $$ bag day, so I'll see both of them there.  It's supposed to be 80 degrees tomorrow and then rain on Sunday, a perfect weekend for planting.

Messy

Pinata time again this morning during read aloud.  They were quieter today, but then an incident happened to liven things up...  One of the 6th grade girls somehow tipped over their glue container into the other 6th grade girl's crate.  It splashed glue on the other girl's pants, shoes, books, Bible, and the carpet.  Gross.  

She cleaned herself up pretty good. The floor is, eh whatever, since the carpet gets cleaned each summer.  The books... *wince* well, the spiller got most of the Bible's pages apart again.  There are a few in Matthew stuck together beyond repair.  One of the classroom library books also had some damage, not as bad as the Bible, but two pages are permanently stuck together.  

Someone left his/her phone in a desk, and I can't figure out who it is. I keep hearing a buzzing sound coming from one of the pods, but it quits before I can get over there!

Two of my kiddos were sick today.  One didn't come to school (she didn't look so hot yesterday, so that's not a surprise). Then another one went down during religion with a bad stomachache.  Hopefully that's all that bite the dust in here!

I've been spending most of my after school afternoon doing things to get ready for the Scholastic Book Fair. The consultant basically said if we don't earn $800 total on the fair, it's not worth it for them to send the book fair to us, so we're under a bit more crunch than usual! There's a program called All For Books where schools raise money for literacy and Scholastic matches it dollar for dollar.  We have special activities students can participate in in April to try to get more books for our classrooms.  Kids can spend $1 to eat lunch in a different classroom, chew gum for the morning, wear PJs to school, have 15min of Lego building in Mrs. E's room, have 15min of playtime with the preschool room.  The 15min sessions are limit one per student per week, time TBD at teacher's discretion. Hopefully lots of kids will do it!  Then, the actual week of the book fair, we're having bottle flipping challenges.  Pay $0.25 for three flips.  The more flips you complete, the more prizes you earn!  

...I finally located the source of the strange vibrating noise... it was a FitBit. Or a fitness watch; not sure if it's a real FitBit or just an off-brand.  That explains why no one was frantically coming back to school to grab a left-behind phone. And it also explains why it would be in a desk; I was thinking, "Man, someone was gutsy enough to keep their phone in their desk during the day? They know the rules." There must be an alarm set on the watch; I think I shut it off.

Llama Letter

I can't remember if I mentioned a while ago that the two 6th grade girls took it upon themselves to write a letter to a llama farm. Well, they did.  They love llamas and felt like writing a letter to someone, so they googled "llama farms" and found one in Waconia, MN, and wrote them a letter.  Guess what came in the mail today... a reply!

The person wrote a front and back page response plus sent a brochure along.  He wanted to know how they found their llama farm and how they got so interested in llamas.  The farm has about 70 llamas which they rent out to 4Hers.  They do birthday parties, field trips, etc.  This year seven baby llamas are due.  Man, the girls were excited!  They got the letter during noon recess and immediately ripped it open.  My favorite part of the letter was the closing, "I hope all your llama dreams come true."  The girls plan to write back tomorrow during Writing Workshop.

The other thing that has my students all abuzz is a contest put on by Scholastic and Roald Dahl. Students age 12 and under can submit 100 word story ideas that are creative and imaginative. Five will win 'golden tickets' and have their stories become a reality.  There are five categories: turn the idea into a play, into a short story book, into a movie (get to pitch it to a real Hollywood producer), into a Minecraft world, or into a candy.  Here's the official website if you want to check out all the rules: http://www.imaginormouschallenge.com/prizes/. Winners fly to New York AND London with their families.  Pretty sweet!

I had another brainstorm this morning during Daily 5.  My kiddos are always asking to use the bathroom in the morning during our Daily 5 rounds. There are plenty of times for them to go during the day, so I hate to let them go all the time.  I usually let them have one "emergency pass" each week that they can use anytime.  I've been writing names on the calendar so I keep track of which students have used their passes, but lately I haven't been remembering which ones have been redeemed.  So I took some wooden turtles from the closet (cutout shapes found on a rummage sale) and wrote each kiddo's name on one.  There are plenty of cutouts; I figured they could take them home at the end of the year.  Each student got to pick the color of his/her name... it was very exciting.  Some kids were like, "I'm never going to use my bathroom pass, so do I even need one?" This sparked another thought from their classmates, "If they don't use them, can they give their pass to me to use?!"  Hmm, I have to think about that... Right now I have six turtles on my bookshelf, waiting to be returned until Monday.  It's funny to see the strategies my students use.  Some use them right away on the first day, others hang on to theirs until Friday, just in case.  One of the Friday savers told me (last Friday), "Miss H, I'm going to use my pass right now. I don't really have to go that bad, but I wouldn't want it to go to waste!"

Sick

Lots of kids in younger grades have been out sick or sent home sick from school. At first it was kindergarten, then 1-2nd grade, now the 3-4th graders are dropping. Hopefully it misses my class altogether! So far no one has been out...

Another beautiful day today! The kids played softball at both recesses.  I played catcher this afternoon.  It was way more fun than I had back in my middle school days.  One of the 7th graders saw me with my glove and said, "Miss H, why didn't you play with us at noon recess? You should tomorrow."  Maybe I will.  I could be all time pitcher if they'd let me...

Bookshelf

A bookshelf fell over this morning.  Actually, it had a little help.  Two boys were tussling on the cube in the reading corner and their tussle knocked the bookshelf backwards.  There wasn't anyone to stop it... and if there were, it's way too heavy for one person to save.  It didn't crash all the way to the ground; the lab table stopped it from falling.  We hefted it back into place and pounded the nails back in.  The books survived unscathed while the bookshelf is a little worse for the wear.  Not all the nails went back in right (or pulled out enough for me to pound them in).  Sigh. It could've been worse. At least no one got hurt.  My students decided we need a new place for the cube since everyone argues over who gets to sit on it when we meet in the reading corner (which causes shoving and some near-misses with the bookshelf).  I agree.  Right now it's in the middle of the reading corner, and it just might stay there!

Today was our student teacher's first day.  She just observed and spent time getting to know some of the students during our study hall.  Oh it's going to be so hard to give up science to her! She showed me her lesson plan for Wednesday on the Nervous System.  Not too heavy on the content as far as I could see, then again, it's really annoying to put everything you plan on saying into the lesson plan, so I'm sure it will be fine.  After class, she commented that both classes have a lot of energy.  That's definitely true. She also said she thinks the 7th and 8th graders will be challenging... they even had a (mostly) good day today! No one got into arguments or yelled at each other too much.  Hopefully they'll keep up the good behavior when she teaches them too. 

The 7th and 8th graders and I switched up the spelling week schedule a bit today.  Next week is a short week of school; this week is a full week.  This week's spelling is review (always less work than a typical week), so they wanted to know if we could flip spelling so the longer/regular week is this week and the review week is next week when there's less time.  Sure! Why not?  Some people already handed in their spelling words x3 this week, so they're ahead of the game for next week.  

I am so glad April Fool's Day was not on a school day!  My kids apparently are big into pranks and told me all about the pranks they did on their parents.  That reminded me of this hilarious spelling test prank a teacher pulled on his students earlier last week... I showed it to my kiddos. They thought it was great. Here it is if you want to watch it too.