Chapter 10: Potty Break

It has been a very busy, crazy 2 weeks since my last post...

1st grade has been learning:
-adjectives (what kind?, which one?, how many?)
-how to add & subtract 10 using your brain
-addition
-subtraction
-potty training is a necessity


Mr. Bojangles is 'Movin' On Up' in the world.  He got a new home!  I ordered him a "Live Frog Habitat" with some of my classroom money, and it is awesome!  Mr. BoBo absolutely loves it!  I'll have a picture update for you to see it soon.  It has little plants, hills, a sleeping cave, and lots of swimming room.  He is toadally cool now!  The coolest part is that now the kids get to watch him eat the crickets!  Their response to seeing him eat a cricket for the first time was, "Ew, Mih Lemon, that so nasty..."

Prepare yourself - these next few stories are a bit graphic...
3 of the 4 First Grade classes go to recess together everyday at 12:00noon.  All of the students know the rules and boundaries of the playground.  I looked around to see one little girl run around the side of the school.  I thought she was playing "Hide and Seek", so I told one of my students to run around there and tell her to come back to where we could see her.  My student came back and couldn't hardly talk because of the shock and laughter on her face.  I asked her what happened, and she replied "Mih Lemon, I can't tell you what had happened."  After a few seconds of me trying to get some information out of her, she said "That girl was ova there taking a pee."  ..................................
Oh my!  What do you say to that?  AH!
Sure enough, a few moments later, the little girl came walking around the corner with her pants unzipped.  Her teacher asked her what she was doing, and the little girl replied, "I had to use it real bad, and I couldn't make it to the bathroom."

After recess, later in the day, a little boy in another 1st grade class decided he wanted to show a little girl his "middle spot" (which is what they refer to their privates as).  While sitting at the table, he unzipped his pants, pulled his "middle spot" out, turned it to the side, and tee-teed on the floor.  On. Purpose.
He knew good and well what he was doing!  Thankfully, he was not in my class, because I would have had a nervous breakdown...

The very next day, after I had laughed about other teacher's having to deal with bathroom incidents, it happened to me.  I had 2 students wet themselves in the same day.  Yay me.
One little girl was sitting at my reading table and got this "Oh NO" look on her face.  When I asked her what was wrong, she said, "I'm peeing.  I didn't know I needed to go."  I was in such shock I didn't know what to do.  (in her defense, she has started taking a new dosage of medicine, so she was not able to control her bladder)
Then, after recess, my class was in line at the restroom and the little girl who was literally next to walk in looked at me and said "I can't hold it."  I hurried her into the bathroom so she could make it in time.  (she never once told me she needed to go, and that it was an emergency)  As she was walking into the bathroom, I saw it.....She tee-teed standing right in the doorway of the bathroom.
Lucky me - 2 in one day!

Hopefully we have gotten over our bathroom issues, and no more accidents will happen.  Let's keep our fingers crossed.

Here are some 1st Grade funnies:
One of my reading groups is learning about dinosaurs and fossils.  In the story there is a section about a scientist.  The scientist is studying dinosaur fossils, so I asked the students if they were scientists what they would want to study...
"cats
grass
dinosaurs
doctors"

We have been learning about plants and how to classify them.  I asked the kids to tell about some of the plants they have growing at their houses.  One little girl said, "I have a pineapple tree in my backyard."
"WOW!  Pineapple tree?!  I love pineapple!  Will you bring me one?!" - me
"mmhmm, I'll bring you one tomorrow."
The next morning she comes to school and is so excited to bring me my "pineapple."
She reached in her backpack, and with a very proud smile, she pulled out a pine cone.  :)
(we learned that pineapple trees don't grow in Mississippi)

We made bracelets out of pipe cleaners and beads that had letters on them.  I told the students to get a bead for each of their initials.  (MKL would be mine)
Some students have more than one middle name, so they were allowed to get as many beads as they needed. However, some students didn't even know their middle names.  Before they could make their bracelets, I had to walk around and make sure they had the letters in the right order.  I also wanted them to tell me their full names.  One little boy, the one we call "grandpa" had the letters (JDW).  I asked him what "D" stood for, and he said "Dawoosie; that's what my momma call me sometimes."  We then had a mini-lesson on the difference between a 'nickname' and a 'middle name'.

Before leaving school on Friday, the same little boy looked at me with the sweetest eyes and the most precious smile and said, "Mih Lemon, I wuv you."
That is why I am a teacher.  :)

We are starting our 8th week of school on Monday.
2 weeks until Fall Break
7 weeks until Thanksgiving
10 weeks until Christmas

Time is flying by!

Chapter 9: Accident Report

1st grade has been a little stressful these past two weeks...

Even though this week was a 4 day week because of the Labor Day holiday, it was the most stressful yet.

On Tuesday I had a student get injured while on the playground.  She was playing with a group of kids on the slide, and someone fell on her arm.  She came to me and said her arm hurt and had some tears, of course.  I asked her to move her arm and I gently touched it to see if I felt anything odd.  She moved her arm and everything seemed fine.  I had her sit beside me for a few minutes to make sure she was going to be alright, and then asked her if her arm felt ok.  She said yes, so I asked her if she wanted to go back out on the playground and play.  She said yes, and that was the end of it.....so I thought.

The next morning when I got to school I found out that the little girl had to go to the emergency room for x-rays on her arm, and ultimately have 2 pins put into her elbow.

I was sick at myself all day because I somehow felt responsible.  I did not fill out an accident report or notify a parent of the accident - it completely slipped my mind.  However, in my defense, I asked the little girl a few times throughout the day if she was ok and she kept saying, "yes ma'am."

Let's face it - accident's happen.  I now know to call or notify a parent if a student complains of a headache, stomachache, or even sneezes too hard.  Better safe than sorry, right?

This week (and the week before) in 1st grade we learned:

-adverbs (how, when, where)

-addition

-subtraction

-how to write a sentence composed of a noun, verb, and adverb

-basic idea of classifying animals

-accidents happen

Here are a few 1st grade funnies:

One of our journal topics for this week was "A Pig at a Party."  The kids had to write the sentence "My birthday is ______."  Then they had to illustrate a picture of a pig at their birthday party.  

One student decided to draw a pig boo-booing all over her paper...

She had to re-do her entire journal entry (and I kept the boo-boo picture for myself).

I had a note from a parent on her child's progress report to please call her regarding a test grade.  This parent is wonderful - always stays involved with homework and is very supportive.  I received the note on Wednesday, and honestly, I have no free time during the day, so I forgot to call her on Wednesday. And I forgot to call her on Thursday.  So I made it my priority to call her on Friday.  When I apologized for it taking me a few days to call her, she said "It's ok, he said he kept reminding you to call me, but that you would probably forget anyway; you were probably on the phone with that little girl's parent who drew the pig boo-booing on her paper..."

*I use inventive spelling in my classroom - meaning I tell the students to write the sounds they hear when sounding out a word.  The only time I correct their spelling is when they write in their journals.  If they misspell a word, I write it correctly underneath their word and tell them that if they saw that word in a book or on paper that's how it would be spelled.* (you need to know that for these stories!)

I decided to do some cute crafty ideas for Grandparent's Day.  I had a "Super Grandparent" ribbon for the kids to color.  They made their own "Happy Grandparent's Day" cards with construction paper (where they were allowed to write or draw anything they wanted).  And I painted their handprints on a sweet little poem.

Some things the cards said: "You all way giv me ane thing I wont.", "I will nevr furgit you.", "You mak me smil."

Also, the handpaint was obviously not a good idea...one little boy decided to go in the bathroom, and instead of washing his hands like I instructed him to do, he decided to put blue handprints all over the wall....Yay.

Don't worry, he paid the consequences - he had to clean the walls, change his face on the behavior chart, and was no longer allowed to be the 'leader' for the day.

We teach Health on Fridays.  We have been talking about healthy foods for a few weeks now, and this week we had the students create "Healthy Menus."

I put the students into groups and gave each group a poster board.  One group was Breakfast, another group was Lunch, and the last group was Dinner.  They had to talk together about healthy foods for their meal, and each student had to write at least one food on their poster.  They did a really great job with this project - but here's why I can't hang the posters in the hallway:
Breakfast

eg  (egg)

biskit  (biscuit)

bakin  (bacon)

semwich  (sandwich)

sirel  (cereal)

soushit ................... (sausage)

Even though I have been stressed, I still love going to work every day.

Next week is our 6th week of school - my, how time flies!