In like a lion

Tomorrow is March! MARCH! Hooray!

I've been looking forward to March 1st for a long time. Like a month or so.

March is the first month where there are days that, while they don't exactly feel like spring, hint that spring will eventually come. February 28 is so cold and snowy and wintery, but March 1 is an entirely different kind of day in my book.

Daylight savings starts this month! I am 128 times happier when there is more sunlight at the end of the day.

March is the month where baseball gets going! Spring is coming!

March 1 is the day I get to go to my 3rd (of 4!) conference training thingy for this social skills program at my school. It's the most relaxing and fun training, and it's made better by the fact that I can look at the clock and know that my students are in literacy, or math, or whatever, and I don't have to be the one dealing with those hellions. I mean children.

March 1 is the first day of my kickboxing class! If you had asked me to tell my thoughts on the gym 3 months ago, I would have said "Blech! Gym! Stupid, stupid gym!" But that was because I had been paying since December '08 but hadn't been since April '08. And for those few months that I DID go, all I did was run on the treadmill and it was really boring. But then in January I discovered that there are fun classes that I love. And then mid-January I discovered that I don't really care if I look like an idiot prancing around the room because at least I'm moving and sweating. So when they announced there would be a new kickboxing class, and that it's a "fusion of hip hop dance and kickboxing," I got excited. I'm going to look like an idiot and I don't mind!

Ahhh, March.

Coming to terms with the Olympics, and old age

I'm totally in Olympics mode right now. It's been timed perfectly with my school vacation last week. I've been up hours past my regular bedtime, crossing my fingers for the kind of cute ice skater clad in Vera Wang spandex, who looks like he also takes part in the Jersey Shore "GTL" routine.

I suppose he's a little tanner than you should be in February, and he uses more hair product in one night than I go through all year, but there's something oddly irresistible. No? Just me?

I've always liked the Olympics. Unlike the World Series, NBA championship, Stanley Cup, etc., I like that it's more of a world competition, not just the U.S. competing against ourselves. I dreamed of competing in gymnastics for a long time (and was pretty convinced I had a shot until I was about 9, and already taller than most of the famous gymnasts--I wasn't bothered by the fact that I still couldn't do a split). But even once I realized I was not going to be representing my country on the balance beam one day, I liked the idea that other people did that and looked up to those athletes who worked so hard for years and years to do it.

This year though, I've been watching all of the athlete profiles and realizing that there's very few now who are older than me. And the ones that are in their late 20s, or god-forbid---30! Well, the commentator has to talk about how this is their last shot, or how they retired 3 years ago but decided to give the sport one more shot in Vancouver. I'm realizing that the next time the winter olympics are held, there will be almost no athletes older than me. When did this happen? And why can't I retire at 23 also??

Thinking (Or trying to find anything to do other than school work)

Thoughts for the new year:

I still haven't decided whether I'm going to say "Two thousand ten," "Twenty-ten," or maybe just "Ten." How are you going to say this year?

How do we talk about the last 10 years? The 2000s? That doesn't seem right. Life was so much simpler in the 1900s.

I just realized I started my blog just over 5 years ago now, in December of '04.

It has snowed almost non-stop for almost 3 days now. Why couldn't it be timed so that I could have a snow day to ease back into school?

I am dreading (DREADING) going back to school tomorrow. February vacation isn't really that far away, but man, my class blows.

I'm also dreading having to wear real clothes tomorrow. I've worn some version of fleece or sweats almost non-stop with the exception of drinking hours each evening for the past 4 days.

I like making desserts because I love eating desserts. To close out 2009, I tried to make a fancy-ish dessert for a New Year's Eve party. I told one of the party hosts how I was making a really fun dessert. It took me several trips to multiple stores to get all of the ingredients. It took hours (really) to make a part, cool a part, make more, chill it, etc. And then, it came out terrible. So terrible looking AND tasting that I did not even take a picture, but dumped it in the trash and bought cookies on the way to the party. I've never felt like such a dessert failure.

If I actually focused on doing work for like an hour or two, I might actually be done and not feel like I'm spending all of my last day of vacation working. I'm going to go try that.

You're a virgin who can't drive.

Ah, vacation time. I love it. Only a few things planned between now and next Monday. Most of my plans involve alcohol, french fries, or my credit card.

Here are a few recent, random pics.

Wednesday was the last day of school before vacation. Six or seven students gave me some lovely presents, ranging from an angel ornament with a jingle ball on it (it looks great on my menorah) to a beat up, dirty polar bear stuffed animal that one of my girls must've found in her room and decided to hand to me. But one of my favorites was from a sweet girl who gave me "diamond" earrings. I have my "Oh my gosh, those are BEAUTIFUL!!" routine perfected. I'm dreading having to wear them to school one day though. It's just a guess, but I suspect my ear lobes will not react too nicely to them.



Secondly, I got a nice reminder on the day before vacation that I need to review abbreviations with my class. Either that, or at least one of my kids thinks I'm a man.



And lastly, I had the rare opportunity to not only go out for dinner and drinks last night on a Sunday, but to also stay late enough for trivia. Our team, Way Harsh Ty, placed 5th, which was really quite remarkable since we were among the smallest groups playing. We had a strong start, but sort of fell off in the second half, as you'll see from one of our answer sheets that was decidedly not turned in.



In case you're wondering, the question asked for the name of the computer virus that wrecked PCs at the beginning of 2009.

The one where I don't complain about work so much.

It's Last-Day-Of-School-Before-Vacation Eve. One of my favorite nights of the year. My gifts for the teachers who help me do battle teach in my classroom each week are all wrapped up, I have 26 freshly sharpened winter pencils ready to give to my kids, and I have not a smidge of work to do tonight.

I have a fantastic day planned tomorrow, with an all-school assembly during reading workshop, my kids' biography project presentation in our "living museum" during literacy tomorrow, and an astronomy video during writing and math. I am as giddy as, uhhh, someone about to be off until January 4th.

In some ways, I feel like I have been in school forever and ever and ever. (And ever and ever and ever). I never thought this day would come. But it also kind of amazes me that it could possibly be Christmas vacation already. That could be because we are still spending at least 2 recesses each week practicing classroom routines like lining up since we still can't manage to do it like 3rd graders. Anyway, the year always seems to zip by when we come back in January. MCAS will be a mere 3.5 months away when we come back and we'll be getting into full panic mode, making the weeks go by even more quickly.

It's practically summer, even though you wouldn't know it by the slushy/salty/icy mix covering most of my car.

The Trifecta

Winter is officially upon us.

How do I know? Afterall, it hasn't snowed more than a few inches, which quickly melted away. My ears haven't burned from coldness in the walk to my car. I have not yet fallen on ice.

I know that winter is here because I ended Halloween season this evening by tossing the remaining 2 pumpkins in the trash, thus bringing on winter. I LOOOOVE Halloween and have a hard time finishing it. I also don't like putting stuff away. Therefore, it was not all that surprising that Halloween decorations adorned the apartment during the holiday apartment last weekend (hey, we called it a "Holiday" party...we didn't say anything about a winter holiday party).

See?



If you look closely on the window sill, you can see the trifecta of holidays, merging as one massive candy/light-up-stuff/sparkly fest--the pumpkins, menorah, and candles for Christmas. And if the camera had turned just slightly left or right, you would see a nutcracker near a Halloween bowl of candy corn, a Christmas village next to rubber duckies in Halloween costumes, and of course the massive tree.

I like having pumpkins in the house; it's all outdoorsy and they hold on to the tiny last bit of summer since I watched them grow all summer. I like how the menorah looks with candles in it, and it smells like childhood when they go out each night. And the apartment always feels kind of empty when the Christmas tree finally gets kicked to the curb sometime in mid-February. Which makes me think, would it really be so bad to keep the symbols of the trifecta of holidays out all year round?

A funny

I tell a lot of stories that involve me being stressed at work (and before and after and on weekends) but this is a funny one.

I have a kid with hearing aids who also needs an FM system. She plugs little pieces into her hearing aids, and I wear a special thing that has a mini-microphone attached, and it amplifies my voice and blocks out other noise for her. I have to set it to a certain channel, otherwise she can't hear me.

The other day I was teaching a lesson when one of my annoying boys would not stop talking about wrestling with his reading partner. I had to stop in the middle of the lesson to speak with him, so I was wearing the FM system still. Well apparently there's a kid on the other side of my school who ALSO has an FM system to help him hear his teacher, and it's set to the same channel. So in the middle of his lesson, he raised his hand and told his teacher "I can't think because someone is talking about wrestling!"

We're working it out with the audiologist.

Back up to 27 students. Oh my.

If you've read this blog over the past two months, you know I'm having a sucky school year. The behavior problems are unbelievable. At any given moment, I have a girl sitting under her desk whistling (the fact that she even sits at a desk, while they rest of my crew sits at tables, is an indicator of big issues), a boy who is swearing at kids in Spanish, another boy who is growling but doesn't realize it because of his ADHD, and another boy who is stealing all of the magnets off of my board. And really, that's not even all of the behavior issues. On top of it, most of my kids are reading on a 2nd grade level (I teach 3rd), and I have kids who still count 10 plus 4 on their fingers.

It's no secret my class is a bit of a disaster. This class has been declared the toughest class in the school.

So why then, when a new student showed up last week, was the student put in my class? A student with autism and major autism-related behaviors? A student who really needs a one-on-one aide, but is the second student in my class who needs one? I don't even get a one-on-one aide for either of them!

Dear god I may not make it until mid-June. Anyone want to take my 27 little angels for a week or so? They're awfully cute. Please leave your name and which week you'd like in the comment section.

Homophones: 2009 Edition

My class was doing literacy work in small groups this week. One of the groups had to do work with homophones and part of their assignment was to make a list of homophone pairs.

I stopped by their table just in time to overhear one of my lower students, who had previously looked totally stumped, say "OH! I know! Like 'we' and 'wii!"



In mostly unrelated news, I finally redeemed the points I earned on my credit card and purchased a Wii. I'm all antsy waiting for it to arrive. I needed plenty of things and there were certainly much wiser ways to spend all of the points, but judging how my school year is going so far, I'm really excited about being able to punch stuff while "boxing" after school soon.


BAM

My new best friend.

I have a new friend. I love my new friend. I could not get through a day without my new friend.

My new friend is my classroom timer.

It was taking my kids forever to transition from one thing to the next. Asking them to put a book in their cubby and bring a folder back to their seat was like asking them to travel to Pluto and back. "See you next year, Ms. G!" In the morning they'd come into the classroom, walk to their cubbies to put things away and get out their materials, but then they would just stand around their cubbies and talk, yell, and push each other. I would stand by helplessly trying to herd them to their tables like sheep. Or goats. Can you herd goats?

But now--

Now I set a timer. "YOU HAVE TWO MINUTES TO PUT YOUR LITERACY FOLDER IN YOUR CUBBY AND MEET ME ON THE RUG. THE CONSEQUENCE IS DEATH BY STONING." Ok, so I'm not actually allowed to stone my students, but I do take away recess if you're not where you're supposed to be when the timer makes it's ear-piercing, incessant, beeping noise. Suddenly, my kids are zipping around the room with a purpose. The trouble-makers try to chat with my good kids, and they ignore them or tell them, "Don't talk! I don't want to miss recess!" I love it when they keep each other in line.

I'm thinking of trying out the timer trick in my own life. Could it get me to clean up my room a little faster? But what do I take away if I don't get recess?

Your faces are getting old.

I've run into a problem with my new class.

Last year, I taught the two-way language program in my school. There were two 3rd grade classes in the program, so I taught one class in English, while a Spanish teacher was teaching the same thing to the other class, but in Spanish. We stayed with each class for a week, and then swapped. I loved my kids last year. They were awesome. They were sweet. They were hardworking. They could read.

But I hadn't realized how great it was that I got a different class each week. On Friday, a couple of them could be getting on my nerves, and I loved the fact that I kicked them out the door and wouldn't need to see them in my classroom for an entire week.

Well this year is different. Not only is the bulk of my class not sweet, not hardworking, and several cannot read, but I have to keep them until June. There is no swapping classings. And frankly, I'm getting awfully sick of seeing (some of) them day, after day, after day.

It makes me a little nervous about having children of my own one day. Are you allowed to swap out with a friend for a week?

3rd Grade Orthodontics

Today "Javier" walked into the classroom and told me that he got something new for his teeth. He didn't use the word retainer, but based on the glimpse he showed me, I assumed that's what it was. He talked funny all morning with it, and I was a little bit suspicious, but he seemed a little embarrassed by it so I didn't ask to see it. He went to gym with the class, came back, and sat through 45 minutes of literacy before he asked to leave the rug to get a paper towel to put it away since, "The dentist told me I don't need to wear it all day." When he came back to the rug and I realized he had it wrapped up in his pocket, I asked to see it. That's when he began to move a little slower and as he unwrapped it he told me, "The dentist gave me one that looks sort of like a paper clip, I don't know why..."

And sure enough, he had bent and twisted a paper clip and stuck it in his mouth.


My lecture on why you never put paper clips in your mouth (especially for 2.5 hours at school) may have included some graphic details meant as scare tactics.

On a side note, remember how yucky retainers were??

A turn toward the good?

If you're friends with me on Facebook, you may have seen the good news.

One of my students (who is also one of my most difficult behavior-wise) is moving across the country tomorrow. If you were wondering how I felt about that (or even if you weren't, I'm going to tell you anyway), I think the huge smile on my face during his last school day today would let you know how I felt. He's a smart kid, and I know that if he came to school caring about his work on the days when we take the MCAS tests this spring he would probably pass and help my class' scores. But the fact that instead of participating in class he chooses to quietly swear in Spanish at other students who walk by him, makes baby noises during lessons that cause the rest of the class to fall to pieces, and does sexually inappropriate things to fences during fire drills makes me thrilled to have said goodbye for good to him this afternoon.

My class is by no means going to be the star class starting tomorrow. I'm down to 26 students, and I have 5 that I have serious behavior concerns about. One was suspended last week for a fight. Another boy stabbed a girl with a pencil while he was with another teacher. And a girl complained to me that another boy was talking about licking genitals today at recess. (In case you need a refresher, I teach 3rd grade. These kids are 8 and 9. How they know about oral sex, I have no idea.)

But I'm hoping and praying and crossing my fingers that tomorrow is a better day than any of the last 5 weeks have been.


Most days I wish this was allowed in public schools.

Homework is not optional in the 3rd grade.

Dear 3rd graders,

Here is a list of a few things you might not have known about 3rd grade. Maybe I forgot to tell you this information during the first week of school, or maybe you never learned about this in second grade. But this is how things run up in 3rd.

1. Homework is not optional. I know you said you have to go to church after school so there wasn't possibly any time for you to do your work, but school ends at 2:20 and you probably go to bed at 8:30. Church is not 6 hours long.

2. We have math homework every night. We have reading homework every night. Please don't ask me 8 times during the day, "Do we have math homework tonight?" Yes, we do. Every day. Until June 11th.

3. You may not take a running leap as we walk down the stairs as a class, in order to jump down the last 5 steps in a single bound. Maybe you like to do that at home, but there are 6 kids in front of you in line, and if you land on one of them I'm in big trouble.

4. When someone tells a story to the class about their old school named St. Mary's, it is inappropriate to yell out, "That's like Bloody Marys!"

5. Similarly, when I'm reading a book to the class, and I get to a funny illustration with people kissing on a roller coaster, it is not ok to scream with utter disgust, "They're making out!!"

6. I spent a lot of days in our classroom this summer, carefully figuring out how to set everything up. They didn't even pay me! See that poster that you're peeling off the wall during my math lesson? It took a long time to make and put up on our walls. If you draw on it or peel it off the wall, you won't be having recess today.

7. And on the same note, you'll be losing recess if you spent the entire lesson pinching the boy next to you. This isn't kindergarten.

8. Please, please, please be nice to your teacher. There are 27 of you. That's a lot. Your teacher is tired.

Three more days

I went to the beach 3 times and the pool once in the past 7 days. That can only mean one thing--summer's just about done and I'm in a panic to get in as much time in the water as I can.

The past week or two I've actually been getting kind of excited for school to start. I like having a little more of a regular routine, even if that routine starts at 5 each morning. I also got my classroom set up early (it's done!) and it was so much easier than last year. I was getting anxious to get kids in there already and see if my second year in 3rd grade is any easier than my first.

But then last night I went to an "end of summer party" at a coworkers house, and naturally we started talking about horrible kid stories. Someone would say a name of the kid, and nearly two thirds of the time I follwed up with, "Oh man, she's in my class." I've got an interesting mix. I knew I would have a really low class since I'm getting half of the sped kids and half of the ELL kids in the grade. But it turns out I've got at least two who aren't reading at all yet. I know what to do with first graders who can't read, but I'm not entirely sure what to do with 3rd graders who can't read. I have one that stuck her tongue in an outlet last year (I told my dad about this one and he's nicknamed her "Sparky," which is probably how I'll refer to her here). I have another who, in first grade, asked to go to the bathroom but ended up at the 7-eleven a few blocks from school. I have two kids who had "accidents" of the number 2 variety last year. I've got a bunch who are barely adding and subtracting. I've got another girl about who I've been warned can be a real bitch, and that she's bigger than me.

It's going to be interesting. I've got 3 days left.

The Living's Easy-ish

Ah, here it is. Summer vacation.

It doesn't really feel like it's summer vacation. I wore jeans and a sweatshirt today. And yesterday. And probably the day before. And for about 75% of this month. It's cold and cloudy and rainy and I hate it. Tomorrow is July and I still haven't been in the pool or to the beach.

But it also doesn't feel like summer because I'm not really working, which is surprisingly a very unsettling feeling. The past few summers I was either taking classes and doing some kind of teaching internship, or I taught summer school. While it wasn't exactly the same as during the regular year, it still felt like regular old work to me.

This year was the first year that I could maybe squeeze by financially during the summer without needing to have a full time summer school position. Oh, and I was totally stressed and lazy and unmotivated this spring to apply for any sort of summer school job. And after working the hardest I've ever worked over the past 10 months, did I REALLY want to spend the only 2 month break still writing lesson plans?!

The past few weeks I put together a few days of regular babysitting. The idea of wearing a t-shirt and flip flops and spending my day with the under 7 crowd, putting on sun screen and playing "ice cream store" and reading books sounded perfect. Today that's exactly what I did. (For the record, I played "ice cream store" for a total of close to 2 hours today...I ate a whole lot of imaginary rainbow slushes and the three year old special: Rockety Trout ice cream sundae.")

I'm just not really sure what to do on the days I'm not working. It's weird. Even though it's nice not having any kind of schedule, I feel like I should be doing something. I went up to the roof to read before dinner last night and I had an unsettling feeling in my stomach, like maybe I had literacy tests to correct or a math lesson to plan.

I'm sure I'll get used to this.

Probably sometime mid-August.

Just about when I have to get back into it all over again.


P.S.: My mom and I ran a race this weekend! Naturally, I rewarded myself with a snickers bar and 1/5 of the cookie dough from the batch I baked.

Laundry list

In the past 36 hours I have...

-Given somewhere around 50 hugs. Some students didn't give hugs, but others went for seconds.

-Used a "firm voice" to tell my students their behavior was completely ridiculous and unacceptable for the last day of school.

-Canceled one of the fun games I had planned yesterday for the last day because my students were behaving so unacceptably.

-Gave my students a pencil, and eraser, an envelope, and my home address so they can write me a letter this summer and don't forget everything about letter writing that I taught them this year.

-Told two students, "No, you cannot visit my house this summer now that you have my address. But you can write me a letter! And you can visit my classroom when you're in 4th grade!"

-Got my class' results for our No Child Left Behind state testing for the reading portion. Found out my class did awesome, at least relatively speaking. The scores would probably be horrifying for an affluent, English-speaking district, but in my district the scores were pretty good. My students were great, and they worked their butts off (not counting our miserable day yesterday).

-Emptied out every single cabinet/closet/bookshelf in my classroom.

-Put the contents from every single cabinet/closet/bookshelf into boxes.



-Moved said boxes to my new classroom. Built up muscle. Do you know how heavy math textbooks are?



-Unpacked the boxes and then repacked their contents into new cabinets/closets/bookshelves in my new classroom.

-Decided my new classroom has a much nicer view outside than my old classroom.

-Received a dozen red roses from student G., a dozen white roses from E., and assortment of flowers from K., and gorgeous peonies (my new fave flower recently) from my very sweet roommate.








-Received a whoopie pie (also from very sweet roommate) that looked like cookie monster eating a cookie. I would have taken a picture, but I have since destroyed it with a fork and my mouth.



-Got a round of applause from some of my school's students at the teacher appreciation luncheon today, and a trophy from the parents. It's spending the summer in my desk so I don't forget to put it in a prominent place on my desk next year!

-Ate some really, really yummy Central and South American food made by parents at the luncheon and decided I need someone from that region to adopt me and cook for me. I looove pupusas and tamales!


-Finished being a first year teacher. Thank god.

Sugar Overload

Yesterday I had a giant bag of Skittles and a some lollipops next to me while I did work. I ate so many of both that my teeth started to hurt. The good news is that today I have no desire to have any more Skittles. But that's probably also because I ate all of the red and purple ones.

That's all.

I love to play. I think that's probably why I still babysit on occasion and I have a bin of toys in my bedroom. It's no different at school. Third grade isn't really very fun, like I remember it when I was 8, long before the days of No Child Left Behind. In fact, I have specific intructions that our last day of school on Monday needs to be academic. I'm not there to babysit them and play a movie and color, so I'm told.

So when a fun day comes along, it's a ton of fun for my students, and for me too. Today we had field day, which is really just Field 90 Minutes. When you're nine, that feels like a long time though. I played along for a lot of the games and had a blast, and my kids thought it was so funny. One told me that she didn't know old people could jump rope. She had the nerve to say that she thought old people start getting really weak bones and joints. I've written her report card already, but tomorrow I'll get on the computer and make a few adjustments.

Then, on top of an already fun morning, this afternoon was the annual student-teacher basketball game. My kids that were playing have been trash talking me for the past few days, but they were SO excited that I was going to play. They loved seeing their teachers and principal in gym clothes and running around the gym. I did a little trash talking myself right before I stole the ball from one of my top math students. I definitely don't remember getting to do anything like that when I was little. I wish they would have the game more than just once a year next year. There were 50 students who were at school until 4, getting exercise, connecting to their teachers in another way, and not just plopped in front of a totally inappropriate tv show (Family Guy? Not meant for 9 year olds.).

The best part? The teachers beat the students, 44-41. And Ms. G. scored 8 points.

Directions for making your friends get totally pissed off at each other

Directions for making your friends get totally pissed off at each other:

Ingredients:
5-10 friends
beer, preferably cheep
deck of cards
attitude

Procedure:
1) Get bored "just drinking."
2) Decide to play a drinking game from college.
3) Choose "Asshole"
4) Spend 15 minutes trying to remember the rules. Then realize that 6 different colleges are represented and everyone played with different rules.
5) Quickly decide which rules to follow and begin playing.
6) Get angry with each other because someone can't remember the rules.
7) Get angry with each other because someone else misinterpreted the rules.
8) Get angry with each other because it's no fun being the asshole.
9) Get angrier still, because it's no fun being the asshole 4 times in a row.
10) Make an asshole hat out of beer box for the asshole in an attempt to lighten the mood.
11) Cut eye flap in the box so the asshole can see when they deal cards.
12) Feel shocked when the asshole doesn't think it's funny.
13) Remember that there's a reason that people in their late 20s don't play drinking games. Get cab and go home.

Guess what I did Saturday night?