My new addiction.

Please let me tell you about Pinterest.com. If you have never been there, go! It is full of amazing ideas for teachers! I just discovered it a few weeks ago, and I have already done quite a few classroom activities that I found on there. We made a 'parts of the plant' picture, some "Me on the Map" circles for Social Studies, and a cool landform and water map....that was edible! I am kind of addicted to Pinterest now. It is pretty much the coolest thing ever. So, go look at it. Now!

I will show you the plant pictures and the "Me on the Map" circles now. I'll add pictures of the edible physical maps a little later.

Parts of a Plant:

A straw for the stem and sunflower seeds in the middle of a cupcake liner flower

"Me on the Map" Activity:

MY CROOKED PLANET.

I guess they remembered that Earth is tilted on its axis..haha.

Next, I need someone to tell me how I can get this awesome necklace for less than $10,605. If you know someone who knows how to make cool globe necklaces, I will gladly substitute fake diamonds on the places I have been. I just love it....

                          heathermoorejewelry.com

Day 27
Quote of the Day: "Miss Harris, can I have a Band-aid?...because I don't want my finger to get disinfected."

Day 28
In our Reading story, the little Korean girl, Yoon, finds out that her name still has the same meaning in English. It looks different from how she wrote it in Korean, but it still means "Shining Wisdom". My kiddos wanted to know what their names meant, so I looked up the meanings and created a "Class Name Book".

I told Kamaria that her name meant "bright as the moon" or "like the moon". A few minutes later, she got super excited and said, "Now I know why the moon is always followin' me around when I go outside!"

You know I had to give it a little educational value...moon phases, continents, oceans, other bodies of water, sun rising and setting, other languages...the kids LOVE reading this book, so maybe I can trick 'em into learnin'.

Day 29
This is the day my classroom smelled like a rotting corpse. And I kept spraying air freshener all day long. As much as I love cinnamon apple febreze, when mixed with this horrid smell, it doesn’t quite do the trick. I kept looking all around, trying to figure out where it was coming from. I was scared I was going to find a dead animal or rotten food in some random place. I couldn’t figure out what it was! But whatever it was, I needed to find it. Because, if I didn’t, tomorrow would be worse. And then….when I sent my students to get their backpacks at the end of the day, a funny thing happened. One of my girls came up to me and said, “Miss Harris, my locker is making my backpack smell gross. Smell!” (..and she held it up to me. How kind!) It did smell gross. Very gross. So, I looked in her locker first. And. Nothing. So, I was a brave little teacher and unzipped the backpack, unsure of what was awaiting me. Let me interrupt myself to tell you another funny story that explains my fear at this very moment. You see, when I was student teaching, there was this little girl who was so excited to tell all of her friends what she had discovered that morning at the bus stop. She took out her backpack, reached in, and pulled out two birds. Baby birds. Dead, baby birds. Smelly, dead, baby birds. And I stood there in shock. See…teaching is never boring! Children are so unpredictable. So funny. So crazy. So odd. Well, anyway, back to my story….I reached in, pulled everything out, and…nothing! So I was so confused. Until! I noticed a sneaky side pocket. Which is where I found it…the mushy, smellyyyyy cauliflower that spent 5 whole days in a backpack. She had decided to take it home with her on the day of our veggie snack…which was Wednesday of the previous week. And, of course, she forgot about it. How her mother did not find it is beyond me. I was about to go mad sniffing around all day. Well, anyway, I put it in the trash can, the custodian emptied my trash can into a larger trash can that she rolls down the hall, and then the whole hallway smelled of nastiness.

The prior week was Labor Day week, the 4-day work week that somehow lasts longer than the 5-day work week. Every single time.
Me: "We got a little behind last week because we weren't here on Monday, so we're playing catch-up today."
Student: "Uhhhhhhh!!! Ketchup is sweet!"
I guess they have never heard about playin' catch-up before.

Student in the hallway: "Those lil' white girls in that line--are they from another country?"
Wait a minute. I'm white! Do they think I came from another country, too? Haha...probably so....nothing would surprise me now.

Student 1: "Miss Harris, he keeps sayin' the 'w' word."
Student 2: "I just said 'white'."
WHAT!??...My kids are crazyyyyyy.

On the news, I heard....researchers say watching Sponge Bob Square Pants is bad for your child’s brain. They say it poses a threat to your child’s attention span. Yes, that is why we have a bunch of A.D.D. children running around. Thank you, Sponge Bob. Silly little porous ocean-dweller who has an annoying voice and doesn’t know he is the wrong kind of sponge to live in salt water.

Now that all the children (and teachers like me) are A.D.D., we need yoga ball chairs. I heard a long time ago on the news that some schools were using yoga balls as chairs. It is supposed to help students with A.D.D. because they can bounce to get their energy out...instead of tapping pencils, kicking chairs, cutting erasers, and talking. So...I would like to do a pilot study to see if it really works. Who wants to donate 20 yoga balls to my classroom? No, wait...21! I want one, too!!


Funny integrated Social Studies and English:
Me: "Please make sure you capitalize Pacific Ocean because Pacific Ocean is the name of a specific ocean." haha...yeah, sometimes I crack myself up.

Day 30
Random Quote of the Day: "Miss Harris look like she's calm. And violent."

Get the urn.

Day 25
Our Reading story this week was "My Name is Yoon", a story about a little girl who moved to America and had to learn a new language. We had a discussion about America and how blessed our country is.

Question: Why do people move to America?
Answer: 'Cause we have toilets.
Random comment: We saw this boy with a box on the side of the road. He had a sign that said, "I'm hongry." My momma gave him a dollar and some chips. But he only had one tooth, so he couldn't even eat the chips.

Vocabulary word: wrinkled
Question: What is something you do to fix clothes that are wrinkled?
Answer: Get the urn.

In After-school tutoring:
Student: I might ride home with her today.
Me: Oh, are y'all related?
Student: Yes
Me: How are you related?
Student: But, not in real life. We are just play cousins.

Day 26
On this day, in English, I let my kiddos write a letter to me. I was trying to test their sentence-writin' skills, and I told them they could tell me anything they wanted me to know. Here are some examples of what I got:

 Favorite parts: "I do not hate you....I will never hate you. Never in my life I would not say I hate you." "I will never give up. I will never give up on learning."

"I like to play. Do you like to play? But not in grass. I am allergic to grass."

 "You are fun and sunny and funny." "And you like math just like us."

 "I love you. I do not like math." "I love dog and tree with apple on it."

 "You are as sweet as shugr." "Your pridey too you are the best and people love you and very hair is pridey your eye and your heart is pridy too and I love the way you dress."

"I will love to be your best student." "I will not be bad no more."



"I keyr about you like you keyr about me." "My mom love you and my dad love you too do you like ice cream?

RANDOM

Another random note said, "My mom have 3 boyfriend and some is in jell."

Miss Harris. The great roaster and sign language master.

Day 21
Okay, this may only be funny to my fellow Lincoln people (a.k.a the lovely people who work with me).

Quote: "Mr Tutsman erased my check mark." (The music teacher is Mr. Stutzman. Not Tutsman. But now I kinda wanna call him King Tut. Shhh....don't tell.)

After they finish their breakfast, my students are supposed to get their writing notebooks and start on their Morning Work. I usually have a writing prompt on the board for them to write about. Then, after they have had time to write at least 5 sentences, I let some of them share their answers aloud. This is what my smart little crazy boy said.....

I have a 100,000 dollar bill my friend is mexican his name is ernesto my girlfriend name is Sally a wite girl. (Wow. And now I am wondering what in the world the writing prompt could have been. Can we say random?)

The same kid found a Levi's zipper outside in the car rider line. He picked it up and said, "Uhhhhhh!!! It says loves!" No, not loves. Levi's.

Speaking of zippers, did you know that YKK on your zipper stands for Yoshida Kogyo Kabushibibaisha?..the world's largest zipper manufacturer. Bigger than Levi's. That's my favorite random fact. Okay, back to school....

Day 22
"Miss Harris, I studied my flash cards all night last night. In my bed." (My kids are like me. They don't sleep. How 'bout that!)

After breakfast....."Miss Harris, we gonna have cereals again this year?? Because those cereals were goooood!!"

"Miss Harris, she said her sister's in the 16th grade. Is that in high school or college?"

Day 23
"Guess what my brother said I kept sayin' in my sleep."
"What?"
"I can't wait to go to school."
(I am glad...makes me feel good, but I can assure you I don't say the same thing in my sleep.)

"Miss Harris, is my momma gonna go to jail?...cause she gotta take me to the dentist tomorrow."
(I'm thinking maybe her mom has gone to court for truancy before. Maybe??)

In Reading, we were reading a poem. Their worksheet said...'We are different, you and I. I like peanuts in my pie. You like cake. You love to bake. We are special, you and I.' So, their job was to write another verse to the poem. They had to write 'We are different, you and I. I like ____________ in my pie.' (They came up with something different that they liked in their pie. Of course, I said, "I like chocolate in my pie." Then, they had to write 'You like _______. I love to ________. We are special, you and I.' And the words in the blanks were supposed to rhyme. So, they came up with..'You like meat. I love to eat.' I was walking around looking at what they had written, when I saw this lovely poem: I DON'T LIKE PIE. (She was mad because she had to pull a card...haha.)

Day 24
My lil' funny boy who wants to make a comment every time somebody else gets in trouble--"Ohhhh, she got roasted!!!!" (Yes, that's right...I am the great roaster. Needless to say, he got roasted, too...because he knows he is not supposed to say things like that. Not in my room.)

In Science, we are doing a little experiment with Plant A and Plant B. Plant A gets sunlight. Plant B is covered with a black box and far away from all windows. No sunlight in sight. So, they had to make their predictions about what they thought would happen to Plant B, the lonely sunless plant. Then, each week, they get to look at Plant B and record their observations. So, I wrote on the board..'Observe and write what Plant B looks like on Week 3.' I showed them how Plant B had a little spot on the end of a leaf that was changing colors. One student said, "It looks like it's gettin' burnt."

Yes. It kinda does. So, the leaves, they get burnt when they are too far away from the sun? Ummmmm, no.

And now, on to Reading....Our Reading story this week was "Meet Rosina". It's about a little girl who is deaf. It tells how she uses sign language to communicate. So...I printed off the American Sign Language Finger Spelling sheet and taught them the sign language alphabet. Afterward, we were walking down the hall to go to the bathroom when I heard, "Miss Harris, are you a sign language master?" Yes!! Not only am I the great roaster. I am also a sign language master.

So. Apparently everything in my room is hot. Leaves get burnt. People get roasted. And then, well, there's me. hahaha

A Different Toothbrush___////

Day 20

On this day, we discussed new vocabulary words and watched a slideshow with lots of questions to get everybody thinkin'.

Vocabulary word: 'cultures'
Cultures are people's way of life, the way they live, including their ideas, customs, and traditions. We talked about how people in different countries have different cultures because they eat different types of foods, they can wear different types of clothes and celebrate different holidays, etc., etc.

Question: "How can cultures be alike and different?"
Student 1: "They can wear different clothes."
Student 2: "In Jamaica, they wear these brown towel things around their waist." 
Student 3: "They have a different toothbrush."
(Yes, our cultures are different because we have different toothbrushes.)

Vocabulary word: 'talents'
Question: "What kind of talents do you have?"
Student 1: "I can beat a video game in 2 days I'm not lyin'."
Student 2: "I can drive a Nascar by myself, without nobody."
Student 3: "I can arrest robbers all by myself."
Student 4: "Cheerleading."
Student 5: "Driving (I drive my momma car). My momma put me in her lap and let me drive."
(Looks like I have a lot of talented kiddos.)

Question: "What kind of instrument do you want to play?"
Student 1: "tuba"
Student 2: "piano"
Student 3: "trombone"
Student 4: "guitar"
Student 5: "microphone"
(No, not saxophone. I want ta play the microphone.)

Question: "What kind of science fair project would you like to do?"
Student 1: "Make pudding into somebody's face."
Student 2: "I would like to make a taser."
Student 3: "Spring shoes that make me jump to the moon."
Student 4: "I would like to cut open a frog and play with its guts and stuff."
(Yes, my kids are sweet and lovely. Not violent and gross. Not at all.)

Today in Math, I let them use part-part-whole mats and dry erase markers. I had collected all of the dry erase markers at the beginning of the year so we would have them when we needed them, and they would still work. So, I was about to pass out the markers, and I saw one student take 2 out of her desk. I said, "I should already have all dry erase markers." Then, I started to take hers up, and she said, "No, Miss Harris!!! They're not dry!"
(:0) hahaha...she was right.)

In my class, we use privacy folders during tests. So, they put 2 folders on the corners of their desk to prevent lil' curious eyes from awanderin'. No cheating allowed! But...they are not supposed to write on the privacy folders. Ever. But. 2nd graders sometimes do things they aren't supposed to. Yes they do. And this is what I found on a folder....

I thought it said, "Miss Harris thin." But, if you look closely, there's a k, too, so I don't know if they're telling me I'm thin or telling me to think. Hmm...well, they got me to think. But...don't think I'm going to keep being thin if I keep eating this rainbow chip icing. It is amazing!!! By the spoonfuls.....

Where does all my time go? Lesson plans and grading papers. And as I was grading papers, this is what I found. They were supposed to just rewrite the sentences with a capital letter at the beginning and a punctuation mark at the end. Instead, I had a couple of people who decided to have a conversation with their worksheet. Cracked me up..... 

worksheet: my lunch is in my backpack

girl: what else is in your backpack

worksheet: what did you bring for lunch

girl: chicken

worksheet: do you want to sit with me at lunchtime

girl: yes teacher

worksheet: my new teacher is nice

girl: yep girl

worksheet: what did you bring for lunch

girl: A apple?

worksheet: do you want to sit with me at lunchtime

girl: Yes i do?

worksheet: my new teacher is nice

girl: She is nice?

(I like how she capitalized and used her punctuation marks. And I like how every sentence is a question. Yeah...she's not sure what she brought for lunch, not sure if she wants to sit with me, and not sure if I'm nice. Is she nice? Really? She is nice?????)



K...one more thing. I am not a morning person. Night owl? Yes. I could stay up as late as a 'possum. But...I need help waking up in the morning. I always hit the snooze button and don't get up 'til 7:00. Which is not good. Anyway, I have decided I think I need to make an investment in this wonderful contraption............

Clocky,

the alarm clock that runs away after you hit the snooze button. It jumps off your nightstand, rolls around your room and finds a place to hide before it goes off again. So you HAVE to get up to turn it off. I think I need this.

Baconnnnnnnnnnnnn!

Okay, this has absolutely nothing to do with teaching, but I just think it is the greatest thing ever. Probably because bacon is my favorite thing ever. Well, after Nutella. And double chocolate Milano cookies. Matt sent me this picture. And I laughed.

What's supper??

Day 13...continued....
"Miss Harris, she said Mr. Taylor ain't real."

Day 14
Setting: Students are entering the classroom (first thing in the morning)
Student: I feel like crawlin'.
Me: Why?
Him: Cause my feet tired.
WAIT A MINUTE! Who is the one who's on their feet all day, me or you? Yeah, that's me. So, I guess I need ta start crawlin'.

On the previous day, I taught my kids the short vowel song. "Where is short a? Where is short a? Here I am. Here I am. I am in the hat rack, Cracker Jacks and fat cats, a, a, a. a, a, a" (here you say the sound...not a, but the short a sound, as in hat). Then, it goes on with short e, i, o, and u, too. The kids loved it. Anyway, I made copies for them to take home so they could practice the song, and I guess at least one of them did.....
"Miss Harris, my cat got sad when I was singin' the song. She ran to my brother."

Lil boy: Miss Harris, she called me a little boy.
Me: Well, you are a little boy, aren't you?
Lil boy: Yes.

Funny girl: I know what a, e, i, o, and u mean.
Me: What?
Girl: Sometimes y.

On Wednesdays and Fridays, we get a fruit or veggie snack in the afternoon. Day 14's fruit snack = apples.
Me: These apples are cut into halves. Each person gets 2 halves. 2 halves make up one what?
Class: One whole!
Lil crazy boy: Miss Harris, can you staple my apples together??

Me: If I plant an apple seed in the ground, what will it grow into??
Student: An apple! (just one.)

In my classroom, the desks are divided into groups. I have the North, South, East, West, and the equator. Each day, students work together as a group to try to earn points. The group with the most points at the end of the day gets an extra ticket for their ticket bank.

Student: I have an idea about instead of North, South, West, East, and equator-what we can do instead of that. It can be teachers against students.
Me: But, there's only one teacher.
Student: But, that's okay, it will still be fair.
Me: Well, when would I get points?
Student: Any time we are talking or acting up, you get a point. Any time we are doing what we are supposed to, we get a point.
(Why do I have a feeling I would win??? EVERY DAY.)

                              The North is at the front of the room.
                        The equator is the line of desks in the middle.

WestEast

                                                         South
               
Day 15
We have breakfast in the classrooms. So, as soon as students arrive and put their things away, they get their breakfast. French toast for breakfast on this day. After eating all of it, one student said, "At first, I thought it was chicken." Chicken. Cause french toast looks just like chicken. And they taste the same, too. Yeah.

Morning Work: Write 3 interesting sentences about a car that can fly.
Student: But, a car CAN'T fly.
Me: I know...you have to use your imagination.
Student: Well, my imagination is that it can't fly. That's what it's gonna be.

(I think it's time to watch Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. For sure.)


A wedding from a kid's point of view:
Student: I went to a wedding last night.
Me: You did?! Was it fun?
Her: Yes it was funnnn! I got some bubbles!!!!

Reading story for the week: "Fighting the Fire". It's all about firefighters. So, we watched a slideshow about firemen. The slideshow asked the question, "How do firefighters work as a team?" Students got a chance to talk to a partner about it. And this is what I heard a few seconds later..."Nuh-uh! They are not super heroes!"

Day 16
This is the day one said, "I hate you" to me. Sad day. But he hasn't said it since and never will again. At least I think not.

Day 17

We have 17 cents in the piggy bank. 17 cents for day 17.

Today, students made vocabulary booklets and used each of their vocabulary words in a sentence. Vocabulary word: heat. One student wrote: "The heat was very hot. I had fell out. Cause it was too hot."
And another said, "Can I color my picture when I'm done? 'Cause the tree is on fire."

Here are some more vocabulary sentences....

Flames are little pieces of fire.

Heat is like fire, but it has no flame.

I'm telling on you, too. I don't like this.

This just amazes me. I don't understand dyslexia, but I have quite a few dyslexic kids this year. This is crazy to me, though...how a mind could see this way. It is a whole sentence backwards. The heat make it hot in her. (The heat makes it hot in here.)

Coming into the classroom from the hall...one student asks me, "May I be excused?" "Why?" "I have to fart. I have to poot." Okay. Well, then. Yes, go. Please.

Random quote of the day: "I like the blood from the deers. It's good."

Day 18
Boy student gets upset because someone called him a girl. Student who called him a girl gets in trouble. 2 minutes later, we walk down the hall, I tell the girls to step out of line, and guess who also steps out. Same boy, yes.

This week in Math, we've been talking about addition and subtraction. We have been writing number sentences to go along with story problems, and the children have to look for clue words to decide whether to add or subtract. In their workbooks, there was a random story problem about a bunch of mice. So, I came up with my own crazy story problem. This is what I wrote on the board.

As soon as I wrote the first part.....
One student asked, "What's supper?"
So, I asked the class, "What's supper?"
And this is what I heard first: "Cat food!"
Then someone said, "Fish!"
And finally...."Dinner." Yay. Someone knows. Supper is dinner. Not cat food. Hey...at least they are using their context clues. All 3 answers make sense in the story. 4 of them go to the kitchen to eat cat food. 4 of them go to the kitchen to eat fish. 4 of them go to the kitchen to eat dinner. Haha....wait...the wrong answers sound better than the right answer. Oh no.

Day 19
We have Ice Cream Fridays at our school. Students with good behavior can purchase popsicles or ice cream as a reward on Friday. So...it's Friday, and I get excuses. "Miss Harris, I couldn't bring my dollar for ice cream cause my daddy was at a softball game and I was up all night until 10:00." All night until 10:00. I wish I was only up 'til 10:00.

Discussing writing the greeting of a letter--
Me: If I want to write a letter to Santa Claus, what do I write first?
Student: Dear Santa
Me: Do I write a capital or lowercase s (for Santa)?
Student: medium-sized!
Me: What do I put after Santa? (wanting her to say 'a comma')
Student: Claus

When my kids won't sit still in their seat, I just let them stand. Today, I had a child who got upset and kept kicking his chair during a test. So...I took his chair away. I told him if he decided to kick his desk, he would be taking his test without a desk in a minute. He did not kick his desk. No he didn't.

I checked my students' Reading Logs to see who had been reading each night. I gave stickers to the ones who had read the most books and kept track of it in their Reading Log. After handing one of the girls her sticker, she said, "I read Dr. Phil, too." I shoulda said, "Today is gonna be a changing day in your life." But I didn't.