New day

Today was a pretty good day. After yesterday today it had to be. Because of yesterday I woke up seriously considering calling in sick, I just didn't want to go. Why don't I rant about yesterday and then can focus on the positive side to end this AWESOME BLOG on an positive note.


Yesterday was voting day at Baker Heights. Because of this, my kids came straight to my room at 7:55 instead of the usual 8:20 when school starts. They (and I) were thrown for a loop when we found out about this change that morning. Is that good??? Oh yeah, and its raining. Here's a little formula from my observations: (Kindergartners + Rain = crazy bad stuff will go down.) Anyways, I had them write in their journals, "NOT TALKING," which of course gives Arial the permission to shout cross the room, "Deandre is takling!!" Typical...


Anyways, the morning went well, we worked on some reading and I showed them what their library center should look like. My principal walked in at the PERFECT time when they were all at the rug (holy $#!%) and participating. So that was one good thing I guess. So then I bring them to P.E. Let the Day begin.


Walking to PE they are sliding on the wet cement. One of our main goals for the school is Saftey. Apparently it is very safe to have 5 year olds sliding on wet cement on their way to PE. I dind't know if you knew, but kindergarteners are very excited about things that are different, so the fact that there was water on the ground, and that it was 'new' water pretty much constitues hitting, cutting in line, stopping in the line and most importantly, "GETTING OUT OF FLIP AND ZIP!!"

Flip and zip is how they are supposed to walk in line, with one finger over their lips (they apparently can't talk with their finger when its over their mouths) and the other hand on the adjacent elbow. So they were crazy in line and I was not very happy.



Remember my 'kindergarteners + rain = crazy bad stuff will happen' equation? Well I have a few more for you: 1. Rain = no flip and zip. 2. No flip and zip = 5 year olds talking in line. 3. Talking in line = making fun of Xavier. 4. Making fun of Xavier = Xavier crying. 5. Xavier crying = Xavier leaving the line and trying to walk back to the room = Mr. Rushing running after Xavier like a fool to chastise him for leaving the line. After doing all of these equations, Mr. Rushing is tired so then decides to walk back and yell at all the students who are making fun of Xavier who then also begin to cry and try to leave the line. See where this is going? All because of the damn rain.


We're still on our way to P.E at this point in the day. Its only 9:30....Awesome. And guess what, the P.E. teacher is not here today and there is no sub for her so I get to run PE from my room, during my time off. So we walk back sliding, and yelling about the rain. For the record I was not yelling about the rain, I was yelling about how they were yelling. Is that good?.... So we had PE in my room, we did some jumping jacks and toe touches. No biggie. Then to the rest of reading which went allright. Then to lunch, which of course requires us to walk, outside, in the rain, again. Same story, I won't repeat it.



So because the voting booths are set up we (the students) could not eat in the cafeteria. Guess where we went because it was raining? Back to the room to eat our food, have recess (which it seems like the students were trying to do for the rest of the day) and finish our day. My lunch is at 11:15. School ends at 7:45...I mean 3:15. I never knew freudian slips could happen while writing. Anyways, we ate lunch in the room which was actually pretty good both behaviorally and meal-wise. It was corn dog day. I like corn dogs. I bought a lunch for 3.25. I got 2 corn dogs with my meal. The kids just got one. Thats what I get for going to college and getting into TFA....2 corndogs. I'm not going to lie, it was the best part of my day.



After lunch I needed to give an assessment. This is a 21 question reading assessment I am supposed to give to my students with my cirriculum. Apparently the Treasures cirriculum doesn't account for the fact that I'M TEACHING KINDERGARTEN.



So I pass them out. Every time I pass out papers I give 4 copies per table so one person can pass them out to everyone else in their table. Apparently this is the most important thing to do. So I have students reaching as high as they can asking me if they can pass out the papers to their table. My rule is that I never pass it out to people who ask. This may be a little counter-intuitive, but if I gave it to the ones who yelled, screamed, ran, jumped, and reached the most I would have a class full of kids who do that.........oh yeah, I still do.



Anyways, the kids who want to pass it out the most don't get to, so their mad. The ones who do get to pass it out give it to everyone, and when it comes to the kid who wanted to, (Kentriel) he decides to throw it off of his desk.



So the first part of the assessment is reading comprehension. This is where I read a story and the students answer questions about the reading. I read (yelled) the story over their talking, and repeated again, and again for those students who either didn't get it, weren't paying attentinon, or had thrown their paper off their desk. So after 10 minutes of me reading the story I read the first question.

I got through about 5 questions at this pace. 50 minutes down....this is a long time for kindergarteners to sit down, but WE HAD TO GET THROUGH THIS TEST. Daveion decides this is a good time to stand up and walk across the class to take Kentreil's pencil. Kentreil just got over the fact that he didn't get to pass out the papers, but then gets mad at Daveion and yanks the pencil back, throws his paper off his desk and starts yelling at Daveion to not take his pencil. So I finally get Daveion in his own desk by himself so it won't happen again, I turn around to address the class and Eleisha's crying, Kentreil is sitting under his table and Deandre has somehow disappeared from his seat only to re-appeared on the other side of the room making kissing faces to Karissa who begins screaming, "Leave Me Alone."

Once I get these issues taken care of I return to administering (yelling) the test questions. We have to connect the pictures from the first thing that happens to what happens next, circle the words with the beginning sound /m/, and middle sound /a/ (short a), and cross out the things that are the biggest.

So after 3 hours of administering a test to my class both they and I were exhausted. Because we start our afternoon at noon it was now 3:00, time to go. I learned the hard way not to give a test with 21 5-year-olds in one sitting.

So after yesterday I guess any day would be a good day if we're comparing days. Today was still filled with fun, it was just a little less intense.

Hope you enjoyed the long blog, I'll try and be better about getting more up for those of you who are interested.