Excuse Me, But That Book Is MINE!

One very important lesson getting older has taught me is that if you don’t ask for something, you don’t get it…Duh! 

This wisdom has carried over into my classroom in terms of Back-to-School Night Wish Lists.  A few years ago I started hearing about teachers putting up wish lists at Back-to-School Night, but I was always too embarrassed to be that bold.  (I never want to be just one more person asking for one more thing from a parent.)  But…

As I watched other teachers get many of the items they asked for, and as I watched their classrooms fill up with really cool stuff, I thought, ‘Don’t be so stupid, just ask, if they don’t want to get it they won’t, but there’s truly no harm in asking.’  So…

I started asking for book sets to be used for reading groups (this means I need six copies of each book).  Not a small donation, mind you, but not a bank breaker for most folks, either.  What I have found is that many parents want to donate items like this and are glad to have something very specific to look for.  In any given year I might get five families who donate a set of books…over time that adds up, and I now have quite a nice library of reading group books thanks to these generous parents.  Anyway…

One of my dads very happily said he’d donate six copies of a Ready Freddy title I had on my list.  GREAT!  He ordered them, they arrived, and he sent his son to school with them.  His son was beyond thrilled!  In fact, he was so thrilled that he started giving them away!  With sheer pride on his face he said, “Look teacher, here’s the books…and look teacher…I already gave one to Johnny.”  He started looking around like, ‘Who else can I give one to?’  At this point, Johnny had already put the book in his backpack!  And I was left standing there thinking, ‘NO, NO, NO!  Those are MY books!  Somebody stop him!  NOW!’

I look at him with my most charming smile and very gently explain to him that those books are for the class and that they are to be used during reading group time (and that they are mine, mine, mine).  Luckily for me he’s one of those happy go lucky kids…he looked at me like, 'Oh, okay' and marched right back over to Johnny and told him he had to give the book back.  I must say Johnny looked a little stunned, but the most important thing here is that I got MY book back!  Whew!  I was worried I might have to tackle poor Johnny for it!  But…

As the saying goes…all’s well that ends well.

Fantasy vs. Reality

Fantasy:  Bang-up sex with your husband followed by lovingly drifting off to dream land together in a perfect spoon of satisfied bliss.

Reality:  Bang-up sex with your husband followed by quick showers and him returning to the living room to continue watching Monday Night Football and you busting out the ironing board to get ready for work the next day. 

I know, I know…TMI, over-share, and all that jazz.  Just keepin' it real folks, just keepin' it real!

Gotta' Love...

Gotta’ love the kid who sits down at his desk at the beginning of the day, whips out a pair of sunglasses (from where, you don’t know, they just magically appear), puts them on his face, looks around at the rest of the kids like, ‘Oh, yeah, let the record show that we have just established that I am the coolest cat in the room,’ then looks at you like, ‘What?  You got a problem?  Go ahead, lady, do your thing…I’ve got my sunglasses on and I am ready to learn!’

Gotta’ love the kid who, in the middle of an art lesson, decides his front shirt pocket is the perfect storage place for his scissors and glue stick…and then looks around at everyone like, ‘How clever am I?  All the rest of you losers store your supplies in your baskets…big babies…I’ve got mine in my shirt…suckers!’

Gotta’ love the kid who, at the beginning of a lesson in which he gets to use a pen, takes the pen, clips it to his T-shirt collar, and says, “Look everyone, I’m a dentist!” and then laughs hysterically, and then says over and over, “I’m a dentist” (ha, ha, ha, ha), “I’m a dentist” (ha, ha, ha ha), “I’m a dentist” (ha, ha, ha, ha).  A pen clipped to T-shirt equals a dentist?  Really?  If you say so, kid. 

And my all-time favorite…Gotta’ love the kid who calls you over while on the playground at recess…looks at you all serious like…and with all the sincerity a 6-year old can muster says, oh so earnestly, “I’ve been thinking about this for a while now, and I’ve finally figured out who my favorite teacher is.”  I smile all big like, and just as I’m about to say, “Thank you,” I realize the name that came out of his mouth was not mine!  Ouch!  I must confess that one hurt just a little bit. 

Gotta’ love…working with kids!

A Tree Grows in…a 6-Year Old's Pocket?

The other day I’m in the middle of a lesson and I hear a very loud, very exaggerated sniff.  I look in the general direction of the snorfel and see a student sniffing grass…hey, it’s First Grade, folks, it’s not that kind of grass…it’s playground grass, people, I’m talking about real, live grass (or, at least it was live until my student picked it).  Anyway…

As I look over I notice his hand is moving from below is nose to below his seat partner’s…he takes his handful of grass, shoves it under his seat partner’s nose, and says, “Hey, get a whiff of this.”  His seat partner looks at him like, “What the heck?” then he looks at me like, “Do something…please!”  I give the student “sharing” the grass “the look” and I point to the trash can…and this is where it gets good…

Remember, he’s 6, and he’s a bit on the short side…so imagine a pint-sized 6-year old standing up…and as he stands up, what appears to be a tree starts to unfurl from his pocket.  I really wish I had the words to explain this, but…he stands up and there is literally a branch, with foliage and everything, bursting out of his pocket…truly, I don’t even know how he was able to sit down…I can’t even sit with my cell phone in my pocket, and this kid’s got branches, and leaves, and everything! 

The funniest part is that this whole little 10-second exchange does not faze him one bit.  He sees my look, sees where I am pointing, shrugs his shoulders, stands up all casual like, and heads for the trash can.  Of course, by the time he gets to the trash can, half of his “pocket tree” is now all over the floor.  I swear, it’s been days and I’m still finding parts of that tree around the room.

I can just my notes the first time I have a sub:  Make sure you check so-and-so’s pocket when he comes in from the playground…for trees!  

Who Gets in Trouble?

Here’s a little something I call, “Who gets in trouble?”

As you know, I teach First Grade, which means I spend my days with 6-year olds.  Now, technically, they’re 5, 6, and 7, and in their presence I would never, ever generalize and call them all 6; nope, whenever I talk about their age in front of them, believe me I am very sure to use their exact age, down to the month and day!  (Remember when being 5½ was so very important?)

But since we’re all grown ups here, and since we long ago stopped caring about being 5½, let’s just keep it simple and call them all 6-year olds.  So…

Last week, after the last recess, the 6-year olds piled into the classroom and returned to their seats.  They settled themselves pretty quickly and quietly (it was a hot day and we were all drained by the heat).  We were about to begin our final lesson for the day when one of the 6-year olds raised his hand, pointed to the 6-year old in front of him, and said, “She kicked me in the nuts.” 

A little taken aback by the use of his frank language, but always one to capture a teachable moment when I can, I said, “Oh, I’m so sorry, but just so I understand correctly, what you are telling me is that someone kicked you in your private parts?”

His response, “Yeah, the private parts called my nuts.  She kicked me there.”

So lucky readers, here’s my question:  Who gets in trouble?  The boy for saying nuts…twice?!  Or the girl for kicking him in the, um, nuts?

And you think teaching is easy…you try making these types of split-second, life altering decisions and then tell me how easy it is!

And The Eyes Have It...

So the other day I accidentally only wore one contact.  I know what you’re thinking, How does a person accidentally only wear one contact?  I mean, you only have two contacts in the first place, right?  So, that’s like, what, a 50% accuracy rate on doing something as simple as putting in contacts?  I mean, how pathetic, right?

Unfortunately, stuff like this happens to me all the time.  Like the time I went to put my keys in my running shorts only to discover I had my shorts on backwards.  Or the day, just this week, when I felt something was a little off all day long and it wasn’t until I got home and changed that I discovered my skirt was on sideways.  Oh, yes folks, wearing one contact on accident is right up my alley.

In my meager defense, let me just say that when I went to put in my contacts that morning I noticed my left contact was torn so I went to replace it.  I evidently became so distracted by the two extra steps it took to replace the contact that I completely forgot to put my other contact in.

So I go about my day and I’m noticing that, well I’ll be, I’m actually seeing better than I have in a long time.  I mean, I can, like, totally see distance and close up.  I can see things going on far away and I can read the words on my iPhone.  Normally, I can wear my contacts and see far away and wear reading glasses for close up, or I can go without the contacts and read close up but wear glasses for distance viewing…but never both at the same time…until now.  Oh my gosh, a miracle has occurred! 

As my day progresses and I suddenly, and miraculously, have great vision, I’m staring to wonder what’s really going on, and the thought that I maybe, kinda, sorta forgot to put in both contacts comes to mind.  So I did what any normal person shopping in the shoe department at Macy’s would do in a similar circumstance.  I close one eye and look at something in the distance…I close the other eye and look at look at something close up…eyes open, eyes close…look in the distance, look close up…when I hear, “Mom, what are you doing?”  (No wonder my daughter never wants to go anywhere with me!)

I explain to her my eye “situation” and my hypothesis that I think I am wearing only one contact and then I ask her, “Can you tell if I have a contact in each eye?”  She chuckles, rolls her eyes, and gets in my face.  So now, instead of one crazy person in the shoe department of Macy’s, there are two.  She is, literally, looking at my eyeballs, and I am, literally, standing there as wide-eyed and as still as I possibly can.  (No wonder we couldn’t get any service that day!)

“Well,” she says.  “I can see your contact in your left eye, but I can’t see anything in your right.”   So now I’m feeling like the guy who discovered the Post-it note.  I mean, I didn’t mean to wear only one contact, but now that I am I have, like, the best vision ever.  Bye, bye reading glasses!

When I get home, I excitedly tell my husband about my new discovery.

Me:  “Hey, honey, did you know that if you only wear one contact you can see, like, totally normal?”

Him (looking at me all righteous-like behind his reading glasses):  “Of course I knew that.  They say if you wear the contact for your weaker eye then you don’t have to wear anything in your stronger eye.”

Me:  “Nuh uh.  There’s no way you could have known that because I just discovered it!”

Him:  “Jane, um, everyone knows that!”

Me:  “Nuh uh.  I didn’t know about until today…when I discovered it…for the first time ever…today!”

Him:  Exasperated sigh…

Me:  “Well, I think you should try it.  But if you end up liking it I think you should pay me or something since I discovered it.”

Him:  “Whatever…”

So…if you wear contacts and you’ve never tried the one contact thing, accidentally or on purpose, you really should!  I'll even let you pay me later…

And so it Begins...

School is back in session and we are off to a great start…well, most of us are anyway.  This year’s group is pretty similar to every year’s group in that there are those who are ready for school and ready to work, and there are those who are well, um, not!

My group this year also has that one kid that you take one look at and know that he (or she…in my case it’s a he) is going to give you a run for your money.  The instant this kid walked into the room I knew I was in for it…mind you, he’s not a “bad” kid or anything like that, but let’s just say he’s one of those kids with, “Here comes trouble” written all over his face.  But he’s mine and I’ll figure out something to love about him.  Like, maybe, his journal entry today…

At the beginning of First Grade I keep journal writing simple and I basically ask for just one sentence...you know, your basic, “I can…I like…Today I am going to…” sentences…anything that makes them feel successful and that makes them feel like they are “writers” is pretty much fine with me.

He finishes up his journal and I go over to his desk to have him read it to me.  I can clearly see that he’s written “I can poop” but I want him to read it to me because, well, listening to the kids read what they have written is one of the highlights of my day and, well, listening to him read, “I can poop” is just too rich to pass up.  I point to the first word, which is the universal teacher sign for, “Hey kid, read this to me.”  He looks at what he’s written, he looks and me, and he says, “I should probably erase that, huh?” and before I can even respond he starts to erase it.  Bummer, too, because sharing it with his parents at conferences would have been hilarious!  I point to his next sentence and he reads, “I can have fun in the bathroom.”  Oh my, I can tell already his journal is going to keep me in stitches…the trick, though, is going to be to not let him know it! 

Same kid, fast forward to later in the day…I’m in the middle of a math lesson, and let’s just be honest here, it’s the first week of school and the kids are tired.  Heck, we’re all tired.  But most of them are really and truly trying very hard to hang in there with me.  Except this kid…I look over and he’s pretty much headless!  Imagine looking at a child sitting in a chair and all you see is arms in the air, a shirt pulled over his head, and a wriggling body.  Now what am I supposed to do?  I can’t give him “the look” because all I see is a collared shirt and the top of his head!  So I did what any veteran teacher would do…I looked at this headless, wriggling body, laughed out loud in my head, and proceeded with my lesson…I mean, really, why interrupt someone having so much fun?!  Oh, and, um, let’s see…was this before or after I spotted him making a butt crack with his belly button?!  Can you say, “Not ready for First Grade?” 

It’s going to be an interesting year folks, that’s for sure!