Back to School!

Last week was an unexpected break for our school system due to SNOW!! Lots of snow!! Its been a long time since I have seen that much snow and it stick around for as long as it did! We had about 4-6 inches depending on where you live and where you measured the snow :) It was absolutely beautiful and I, along with family and friends enjoyed playing in the snow and slowing life down just a little! I was lazy the whole week so going back to school Tuesday (Monday was MLK day) was a little rough or at lest tiring. With weekends included we were out of school 10 days and had only been back to school after Christmas break for 4 days! My students however weren't tired at all unlike me, I think they were very excited to be out of their houses and around friends again! No tears (me or the students LOL) so Tuesday was a successful day!

Our topic of study for January is Winter. Obviously since it is winter we talk about snow and other things that go along with it. Little did we know they would actually get to experience so much snow! It has made discussing the winter season a lot of fun!! Typically we don't get snow or a lot of snow here, so to get the students to really experience snow we use fake snow. There is this stuff called Insta-Snow. It is this white powdering substance that when mixed with water it turns to snow immediately!! Pretty amazing if you ask me since, but when we did this activity today the kids were not too overly thrilled. Who would be with a bowl of snow when you just had a yard full of snow last week :) They still thought the activity was cool though. They first at to look at the powder and guess what they thought it was, then they felt it and smelled it to make guesses as well. Overall great activity, and I think they will enjoy it more once they get to play with during free centers.


So as bad as I hate it, I do have to get on to my students occasionally. I know it is for their own good so they will know how to act in a classroom next year. And my expectations are high for them no matter how they are because I want to help them to become their best! Truth be told, they have me wrapped around their little fingers! After I get on to them, I just want to go hug them and say I'm sorry I really hate being that way! I just love kids especially my students so much and I want to spoil them as well as teach them! I want them to look back fondly over their years in school and remember their teacher because she was nice, loving, kind, and helped them to become better students. I love my job and can't imagine doing anything else!!


Now great funny stories yet to tell, but these two were just kinda funny moments that happened today!

* This little girl, we will call her 18, is a very smart girl and very literal. She is always telling tall tales and cracking me up. Usually her stories consist of something she has heard another student say or something we have done or talked about in class. Today though, while mixing the snow and talking about how we CAN'T eat this snow and that it is NOT real snow (remember they are only 4 lol). I was trying to explain that is was like real snow but was not real snow. She looks at me and says so it's "Snowish" I loved that she said that because I am guilty of adding -ish to words especially if I can't think of the correct word or a better word to describe something. Too cute I thought!

*The second story is about another little girl, we will her 17, you may get lots of stories about 17. She is always up to something and keeping us entertained even when she is in trouble its something entertaining such as in this story. Every morning we sing certain songs. They don't have to sing if they don't want to but they are supposed to sit quietly. 17 never sits quietly partially because she is a very young 4 and partially because she just loves to talk. Today we were singing our weather song (after we had a little class meeting about following rules and expected behaviors throughout the day) and while I was singing she looks up at me and just starts talking I have no idea about what. I give her that teacher eye (yes we all have them) and started to sing louder in hopes she would stop talking. I should have known better lol she just started talking louder so I could hear her over my singing. After asking her to stop talking, I had to laugh because her reaction was just to obvious and I should have seen it coming.

Welcome to Pre-K Adventures

My journey to teaching Pre-K starts here. I am 25 (almost 26 on the 26th, which I think is very cool which is why I think I am teaching Pre-K because little things like that amaze me LOL). This is my first year of being an official teacher!!! I graduated with my Bachelor's degree in Education in 2008, but the economy went south that year so yay me lol anyway no job equaled subbing. So for the next school I was a substitute teacher at several school includig the one I am teaching at now. Again not much hiring going on in the school system so the next school year (09-10) I was a sub again but I was able to do three long term sub jobs at the same school where I student taught. I was pretty much there all year and got many of those first year teaching experiences under my belt including Open House, Curriculum Night, early release days for weather, and many more! It was a great learning experience with a great group of people to work with. So I went again thinking that I would not be teaching full time in the fall, but that all changed on July 12th when a phone call from a local day care came offering me a position as their Pre-K lead teacher!!! I jumped at the chance and started working the week of pre-planning! I couldn't have asked for a better beginning to my first year of teaching, the kids were amazing and I was loving every minute of it! Even though Pre-K was a whole new world for me as far as teaching goes so I felt like I was learning right along with them at least until I started going to my trainings. Everything was going along just fine! Life was great! I was teaching, dating a great guy, preparing for a week at Disney, and didn't think it could get any better. I love it when the Lord shows how he can out do your expectations. I got an email on Friday, September 10th from a family friend who works in the office of the school asking if I would want to interview for a Pre-K position they would have starting in October! My first thought was seriously?!? I have waited for this opportunity (yes, just an interview . . I was desperate!) for two years and it comes now when I have a job!! Anyway so I discussed it and analyzed with everyone in my life and decided that while if I did get the job I would miss my class terribly, but I couldn't pass up an opportunity like this. So I interviewed with the principal on Wednesday, September 15th. I felt like the interview went very well but I had no idea whether I would get it or not because there were still others that had to be interviewed. So off to Disney World we went the following Saturday tyring to patiently await the phone he said would come the beginning of the week. I say trying to wait patiently because I anxious very anxious just ask the other 20 people who were in Disney with me!! So, Wednesday, September 22, 2010 we (all 20 of us) were sitting in the food court area (or as we refered to it that week as the break room) when my cell phone rang. I knew it who it was immediately (and so did everyone else since I walked outside to answer). It was the principal offering me the position!!!! I immediately accepted feeling like I have never felt before, I think my heart nearly came out of my chest LOL. I walked back in to everyone looking at me anxiously awaiting for me to tell them. I yelled "I got the job!!!" and then they all clapped and cheered along me. I'm sure the others in there thought we were all crazy but we kinda are so it's ok. Talk about dreams coming true in Disney, boy do they! So that is my story till now. I have been teaching Pre-K since August and started at my current location in the middle of October. It's going great and I love it!!! I actually love going to work each morning and miss their smiling faces when we have breaks such as this week. Three snow days in a row in Georgia! I don't remember missing this many days of school in a row since the Blizzard of '93 which some people have compared this snow to but this is nothing LOL but it has been lots of fun and I can't wait to hear all their stories about what they have done while out of school. Which leads to me to explain why I am starting this blog. My students do and say some of the most funny things and I never want to forget them so I thought I would blog about them. Don't worry I am not going to name any students, I am going to call them by a number which only I will know so its all private.

To start out I will just name a few of the stories that stick out so far as I am sure there will be many more to come. Now some of these may be things the kids did or said in conversation with me or other students and some may be things that they got in trouble for but they are four so somethings they do are still funny even if they shouldn't do it :)

*A little background for this story, kids at this age are still learning even the smallest of things including which finger they should use to point. So this little boy was using his middle finger to point to his name and the little girl next to him says "Him's flicking a bird, him's flicking a bird!" Now I immediately want to laugh out loud because one the four year old little girl is saying flicking a bird which is just hilarious because she knows exactly what it means and two because the expression on her face is pure shock and terror that he is doing this. I, of course, explain to her that he is not "flicking a bird" but just using a differnt finger to point.

*I had a little boy on the playground go stand by the fence and pee off into the grass. I asked him why he would do that, and his response was "There was a hole there for my pee pee." Well of course! Why not then! LOL

*I had a little girl put marbles in her underwear, now to most this may seem digusting but at the moment I was so mad that she done this and was refusing to take them out. I made her take them out and put them in my hand (don't worry I went and washed them with soap and water immediately afterwards and used sanitizer). The bad part was that she didn't hand them all to me so I heard them later as she was walking around later so we got those out and my parapro told her grandma when she got picked up from school. Come to find out she still had some in there when she got home. I tell you these gets are determined when they put their mind to something. LOL I could hardly get on the little girl because really I wanted to laugh. It was just so comical to me for some reason. Never could get her to tell me why she did it, but she did bring me new marbles after Christmas break, and the ones she put in her underwear went in the trashcan!

Well, those are just some that really stick out in my mind right now. I hope to have many more stories to share as the year goes on. And I know there are more that have happened that I just can't remember right now :(

Have a great day!!