Cities and Snacks

I have two good ones to share with you today.



Story One: Cities in a Line

One of my little girls almost always comes in to our room in the morning and says, "There is a boy on my bus who loves me."

I always say, "Well, you're not old enough for that, so please go move your lunch tag so I can tell the office what you'll be having for lunch today."

Friday morning she came in and said, "There is a boy on my bus who is in fifth grade who knows all his cities...IN A LINE!"

I immediately thought, okay, quick--connect fifth grade + cities + line..."Oh, he can say all his capital cities in order!"

"Yes," she said. "I really wish I could say my cities in a line."

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Story Two: Snack

I had a sub Friday afternoon. We were talking about how silly kids are whether or not they're trying to be and she said that she subbed Thursday for another first grade room and this is what happened:

"One of the kids in this class said to me, 'I'm hungry! We need our snack.'"

She told him he'd have to write one sentence first and then he could have his snack. She walked around the room and finally make it back to him and he had written his sentence that read:

AND HE WAS HUNGRY!

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Separating Lunch Tags

I have two little girls in my room who are such great friends that during learning time they aren't allowed to sit together. Each day they beg, "Please, please can we sit together?" And each time, after no more than 30 seconds, it's over. "C and T, please separate."

Also as a general management procedure in my room, I have lunch tags. When the kids come in in the morning, the very first thing they do is move their lunch tag to either "School lunch" or "Packed lunch." At the end of each day I have my helper of the day move the tags back up to be ready for the next morning.

At the end of the day today I asked my helper to move the tags back up to their starting positions.

A couple of minutes later he came to me and said, "Just so you know, I separated C and T because their tags can't be together up there. They're such good friends."


Oh my goodness...I cracked up! He didn't really know why it was so funny.

"If you were the president..."

My day, in a nutshell, has been more than interesting. I don't have the time or energy right now to type all of it, but I'll give you this lunch story.

Before that, however, I'd like to say just for the record that my famous kid we often refer to as J here on this blog spent MOST of his day sticking out his tongue and spitting--at nothing.

Kids said, "J is making noise." My standard reply: "Honey, you know he makes lots of noises."

"Okay."



At our school, our precious first graders each have to learn their own individual lunch number. It's like a PIN number for kiddos. Only they don't get to pick the number to make it easier like grownups (you all know your PIN number is your birth year! Just kidding). Let me tell you, in our school, the beginning of the year is CRAZY with trying to teach these kids their lunch numbers. It's a big, hairy deal. We spend weeks writing lunch numbers on cards, hands, tags. We spend much time practicing typing on a pretend copy of a keyboard. It's still hard hard hard.



We'll call the star of this story D.

She looks over at me today at lunch as says, "Mrs. Overman, what would you do if you were the president?"

I think for a minute...then, "Well, I guess I'd get more money for schools so kids could learn better."

D thinks. Sits. Spins the cogs in her brain. Says, "If I were the president, I'd make sure kids didn't have to learn lunch numbers to eat at school every day. I'd get up there and tell them how hard it was to learn my lunch number when I was a kid just to get food at lunch and I'd tell them they'd never have to do that again!"

Ever think about what stresses kids out? Here it is!

Football

I have a few boys who are wild about football. They play it every recess and really work like a team. There's one little guy in particular who is kind of the self-proclaimed coach and all the kids listen to his orders. Often I hear things coming from him like, "You go there, you--over there, and the rest of you--get him!"

It's quite interesting.

So yesterday a few of my girls decided they'd like to play football for the first time (I think EVER). After a down a couple of them gave up to watch, but three stayed to play. Two of the remaining girls were basically asking "How high?" when told to jump, if you know what I mean. The other little girl--T, we'll call her--not such a fan of having a "coach".

Within five minutes she came crying to me:

T: "THOSE BOYS ARE STEPPING ON MY FEET!"

Me: "Well, they're playing football. That's what happens."

T: "I don't like it at all!!!!"

Me: "Then maybe you should play elsewhere."

T: "I want to play, but I don't like that J is bossing everybody around."

Me: "Honey, the other kids don't seem to mind. He's helping them. If you don't like it, play something else."

T: "BUT I WANT TO PLAY FOOTBALL! J is my friend and when I go to his house and he's too bossy, I get to smack him! I can't do that at school anymore!"

Me: "You got that right, sister."


Whoa.

Our Presidents

Today was Constitution Day at school. We did a lot of talking about the Constitution and some presidents, as well as basic political knowledge such as The White House, money, etc. This stuff is hard for adults to keep track of, and even HARDER for little ones to keep track of, particularly when your brain is always thinking RECESSRECESSRECESS.

But, as you know, I tend to digress sometimes.

Today we talked about our current president as well as the only one the kids could really recognize: George Washington; which, may I add, is pretty impressive when you're six.

Shortly after talking about both George Bush and George Washington, I showed a picture on our PowerPoint presentation from the internet of George Bush.

"Who is this?" I asked.

"George Bushington!"



Upon reflection of my lesson, I have determined these names haven't quite sunk in just yet.

Worms

In case you haven't been reading my blog a lot lately, I'll fill you in on my student J.

Top three things to know about J:

1. He's a little...uhhh...out there. Not really with the group most of the time, although very intelligent.
2. He has lots--LOTS--of theories, most of which are from his dad.
3. Those theories often are not only inaccurate, out there, and somewhat based in a very mixed-up truth, they are HILARIOUS.

In sum, J lives in his own bubble. Don't try to pop in, and please, please don't try to pop him out of it.

This kid is just a riot.


Today he didn't say ANYTHING to me the entire day until lunch. He looks right at me and says,

"Did you know that worms are pepperoni? That's what my dad said. But the pepperoni is a little bigger when the worms get more stuff in them."


I think my exact words again were, "What?!?"

Cupcake Wrappers

I'm going to do my best to get this story right.

One of my colleagues has a student who's a bit quirky. Today the teacher he had last year told his current teacher:


"By the way, if you're having cupcakes today, just know he'll probably eat the wrapper too."


Oh my goodness...we were CRACKING UP.

My colleague said it was just so funny because this other teacher came in and said it like it was a normal, everyday occurrence.

What a racket.



Only in first grade.

And probably kindergarten.

Two Voices

Today at lunch one teacher was speaking Spanish to her students because there are lots of new English language learners in her class. One of my kids overheard her and said,

"Wow! She has two voices. Spanish and English!"

Power Line Trees

Got some more info today about J's world (I posted about this kid and all his theories on life awhile back).

J: "I know how they get power lines."

Me: "How's that?"

J: "They find trees that are already in the telephone pole shape and they cut them down and then they add the wires later."


Awesome. That would make the power companies' jobs so much easier if that were really true.

My Job

I was asked a question today that none of my students have ever asked before.

To give you some background, this kid's dad works third shift and his mom works second, so basically, someone is always working at his house...no parent is ever really home at the same time.

Back to the question he asked. We'll call him B.

B: "What's your job, Mrs. Overman?"

Me: "Honey, this is my job. I teach you. Just like this."

B: "No, I mean what do you do at night?"

Me: "Well, I grade papers, do dishes, walk my dogs, work out, eat dinner...normal stuff."

B: "NO! WHERE DO YOU WORK?"



Seriously, I couldn't get this kid to understand that teaching is my only job.

Labor Day

During our Math Meeting time Friday we changed the calendar from August to September. I don't usually do this, but I wanted to kinda get a jump-start for the week and I wanted to talk about Labor Day since it would be the first day we wouldn't be at school since we started.

So we talked about Labor Day.

"We don't come to school on Monday because it's a holiday. What holiday is it?" I asked.

I get a couple of answers:

"Easter!"

"Halloween!"


Okay...no...I steered them a bit:

"Monday is Labor Day. Does anyone know what Labor Day is for?"

One little girl knew for sure:

"You can't wear white on Labor Day."


Awesome.