Altoids

I have a child in my class who had his tonsils and altoids out...

Assessments

For the past couple of weeks I have been assessing my children morning and afternoon and will continue into next week-hopefully finishing by Wednesday when the bell rings and the first quarter ends. I know my children are tired of this and I certainly am. Every day, pretty much all day long, I am calling children to my table and asking them question after question asking them to do task after task. It will be nice to be able to start teaching again.

The Simple Things

Today was a really good day (again!) in kindergarten. First thing this morning we made apple pizzas. The children flattened a biscuit and we added apples on top. They LOVED them. I didn't have to coax any of them into trying it. Some ate them so quickly I wondered if they even chewed. So much for the leftovers to offer to anyone else in the school-the children ate them all and asked when we could make them again.

Rules

It was a great day in kindergarten today. Some children finally learned that if they follow the rules they don't get in trouble. Well...they at least learned it for today.

Good Things

This wasn't the best week. Tough times at school and sick girls at home. So here are some of the good things:

• T talked to me. This child has pretty much been silent all year. When you ask him a question he makes tiny grunting sounds-like a baby. Not only did he talk to me, he raised his hand at group time to contribute.
• We got a new student. There is a lot of paper junk that has to be done with a new student that just makes it a real pain but this is a sweet child. He has had some trouble in his short life and is still sweet. And he is the only one in the class that laughed when I said something about the flying monkeys coming out of the coat closet-the rest of them just looked at me-scared of when it might happen.
• We have done something this week that I have never done before. My class and I have been reading my Principal's husband's blog about his bike ride across NC and have been tracking him on a map. They have looked forward to reading this blog everyday. Just proves that children can learn and have fun at the same time.
• I was able to clean my desk off after school. For some reason this year the papers just keep piling up and I have been doing this every afternoon-except for this week. I finally found the bottom of the pile.
• The teacher down the hall showed me great writing from one of my students last year. A mom of one of my students from last year told me about her son reading to her and how great he was doing. A student from last year had two good days-and I know he is with the right teacher this year.
• Picture day is over, at least for the fall, and no one had ketchup on their shirt.
• Starbucks this morning.
• Michael called me tonight.

Hope everyone has a good weekend.