Pledgaleetions

Day 8:
After going over the sound -tion makes at the end of a word (shun), I asked for more examples of words with -tion at the end. Someone said 'cooperation'. Another student said 'station'. Then, one of them said 'pledgaleetions'. (Yes, pledgaleetions, like...I pledgaleetions to the flag.) This reminds me of my childhood bedtime prayers....back when I thought nowalaymee was one word. Nowalaymee down to sleep, I pray, thee, Lord, my soul to keep. Kids. Crazy, crazy kids.

My students get 25 minutes for lunch. 25 minutes from the time they walk into the cafeteria until they leave, so definitely not 25 minutes of eating time. It takes a little while to get through the line. So, they have 20 minutes if they are lucky. And by the time I get them through the line with freshly Germ-Xed hands, walk to my room, do whatever needs to be done and make it back to the teacher's lounge, get my food, and sit down, I'm super lucky if I have 10 good minutes. Often, I scarf down my ham and cheese sandwich in 5. I used to just skip lunch and eat peanut butter crackers during my planning period, but now that I can eat super duper fast, I like to give myself those sweet 5 minutes. I just have to remember not to talk too much. Because...the sandwich cannot disappear in 2 minutes. Gotta have 5. Anyway, when exiting the lunch room on this particular day, one student came up to me and said, "Miss Harris, I missed you." Missed me? Missed me? I just saw you 2 seconds ago. That's what I was thinkin'. But, at the same time, isn't that sweet? She missed me. For those 5 minutes I was gone, she missed me. Haha...yes, I feel loved.

One student was absent the day before, so I had her stay behind and do make-up work for the first half of P.E. time. She said, "Miss Harris, here go your birthday present. I've had for years. I want you to have it." As she was saying this, she slowly unwrapped a red dry erase marker from a piece of crumpled notebook paper. Best birthday present ever. And it wasn't even my birthday. Who else gets random gifts from sweet children one month before their actual b-day?? Oh, and while we're at it, who else gets at least 10 notes per day telling you how great you are? "You are the best teacher ever." "I love you, Miss Harris." Nobody but a teacher. Yes, my job has its perks. And my kids are pretty lovely. When they want to be.

:0)

I don't know if you know this, but 2nd graders have a 2 second attention span. For real. Like, for real for real. They want to spin pencils, talk, cut up paper, tear apart erasers, talk, kill crayons, break their pencil leads, write notes, talk, lean back in their chairs, tap their rulers on their desks, glue their hands together, flip through pages in books, and talk. Fidgety, fidgety, fidgety. All day long. K, so I see that students are not paying attention, and I say, "Your eyes need to be glued on me. If I'm over here, your eyes are over here. If I'm over here, (moved to other side of room), your eyes should be here. Your eyes are glued on me." One student then reaches her hand into her desk, pulls out her glue, removes the cap, and tries to glue her silly eye balls. Yeah, I shoulda seen that one coming.  For sure.