I Survived Day 1!

To start off with.. I'm up on a SATURDAY at 8am!! I guess that's what you get when you go to bed at 9! haha. The schools around here start on a Friday every year and yesterday was that Friday... Wow! I was TIRED (and my feet hurt sooo bad - stupid heels)! lol. Third graders are a lot of fun, but also take a lot of energy. The kids are great, even though a lot of them come from "bad homes" and live with their grandparents or aunts/uncles because their parents are gone, or even in jail sometimes. I am working in a "Title 1" school which means it is very high in student poverty. Most are on free/reduced lunch and the school gets a lot of government funding end extra help throughout the year. The surrounding neighborhood is pretty poor, but the kids seem t have a big desire to learn and would rather be in school than at home.

All ready to go... apologize for the lighting!
(and a haircut is in the works for this weekend...)

Anyway, my favorite thing yesterday was the "All About Me". My mentor teacher went first and had the students sit around her on the floor while she took items out of her bag and told them she was a real person, with a life, and actually didn't sleep at school all year round! lol. I brought in pictures of my parents/bros, the dogs, my softball glove, and seashells. The shells were a huge hit! I passed around about 6 of them and let them look and feel. Sadly, most of them have never been to the ocean so it was a cool thing for them... The little things us Floridians take forgranted!

I also played the "Name Game" with them! I started with me and was "Mrs. Super S!" and did a Superman pose. Each person had to think of a word to describe them/or they liked (most ended up doing animals) .. and then an action to go along with it... and each time you had to go back and do everyone's name/action. There are 25 kids in the class so we actually didn't get to finish before we had most of them lacking interest. We also named the class goldfish... it was a tie between Goldilocks and Goldie... and Goldie won. Creative kids, huh? lol.

At the school I'm at... I'll call it "C Elem." procedures are a huge issue. We spent 3/4 of the day talking about them and practicing them and practicing them and practicing them! lol. Lunch line, hallway, bathroom, standing up, playground, etc. If it needs explaining.. we talked about it!! My teacher is great though... she has 31 years of experience and has a lot of sayings/ways to do things to keep control of the classroom and I'm definitely taking notes!

Well, next week I'm back at the university every day for "seminar", but will be back in the classroom for 6 straight weeks after! I'm supposed to be thinking of Math activities... that will be my first concentration! Happy weekend to you! I'm hoping to see a movie and get a haircut. Z is off today, but goes back tomorrow.

-Ashley