Monday, October 17, 2011

Box Tops for Education. They are surrounded by dotted lines. That is where you cut.

Remember the little girl I told you about? The one who asked how to spell D.S. on the first day of school? Well, apparently, I am not the greatest teacher in the world. Or, she forgot......

During my first year of teaching, I was getting my students to write sentences using their vocabulary words. One student raised his hand and asked, "Miss Harris, how do you spell fintoo?" I asked him to repeat the word because I didn't understand what he was saying. Then, I had him use it in a sentence because I still didn't understand what he was saying. He said, "Like, we fintoo go to Wal-Mart." Fixing to! Got it! We fixin' to go to Wal-Mart. Well, apparently, my students this year think fintoo is a word, too.


Day 31
This is the day we FINALLY received our math packs…Day 31 of school! Math packs are the new math books, so we were without math books for 31 days. When will they start ordering our books before school begins? WHEN? 
Random question of the day: “Miss Harris, how many bananas have you eaten today?”
Ummm….How many bananas should a person eat in one day?
First of all, I hate bananas. They are mushy. Second of all, I’m allergic to fruit. And the only good thing about being allergic to fruit is you always have an excuse not to eat bananas. So, no bananas. I have not eaten any bananas today. I have not eaten any bananas this year. Or last year. Or the year before that.
But I did eat strawberries! And they didn’t kill me! Thank you, Benadryl. I love you.

Student: “Miss Harris, my birthday is coming up."
Me: “When is it?”
Student: “January 2004th.”
When one student said, “He has luna foil in his mouth,” she pointed to the child who had a whole bag of Hershey’s kisses in his desk yesterday. So, I knew that was where the luna (aluminum) foil came from. From the kisses. So, I checked his desk and told him to pull out his pockets. He then pulled a whole jump rope out of one pocket. No kisses to be found, though. Guess he ate ‘em. I would have, too…but, I just really don’t think a jump rope will fit in my pocket.

Student: "There’s a p on your back"......"It was hair, but you made a p with it."
Yes, I shed. Quite a bit. Blame it on the hypothyroidism.

One student was sitting in her seat with her hand raised. So, I called on her.
Me: Do you have a question?
Student: Yes.
Me: What?
Student: I’m bleedin’.
Me: That’s not a question. Do you have a question?
Student: Yes.
Me: What?
Student: I’m bleedin’.
This continued for a few minutes until the whole class was laughing, and we learned one thing. Well, two.  1. Picking scabs causes bleeding. 2. We must continue studying sentence types.

We were reading "Miss Daisy is Crazy" when we got to my favorite part. It is talking about the school nurse, Mrs. Cooney. "She says she's the school nurse, but personally I think she's a spy."
 


I was standing outside with the tutoring kids when one of them noticed my bird necklace. The top part has a bird. The bottom part has a birdcage. So, the student speculated about the birdcage. "I think a little bitty bird could probably fit in there." So, now I want a pet bird the size of a ladybug.

At our school, we collect Box Tops for Education. This year, we sent home collection sheets so the kids could glue the Box Tops right on the sheet. This is what it is supposed to look like when they turn it in:

Well, one of the parents didn't quite understand what Box Tops for Education were. One of the teachers brought me this, and we had a good laugh. This parent cut out pieces from the tops of the boxes and glued them on the sheet. They are pieces from the brands that actually have Box Tops for Education, too!



At midnight on this night, the Kleenex Field Trips contest ended. The top 100 schools with the most supporters won $5000 for field trips. We were in 55th place, so we were one of the winning schools! Thank you to Elizabeth Jones from http://myteachersmarket.blogspot.com/ for posting this contest. 
Here is the story of how I found it......
On Nightline one night, they had a story about this lady who just entered contests all day everyday. She didn't have a job. She just entered contests. She had won 5 washer and dryer sets and a million dollars in cash and prizes. I decided I would enter contests. Maybe I could quit my job as a teacher and just enter contests. ;0) Well, maybe. So, I got online and searched for contests. Then, I thought...hey, if I enter teacher contests, I'll have a better chance at winning. Why? Because, what teachers have time to enter contests? We are too busy doing other things. So, if I make time to do it, I will be one of the few. So, I searched for teacher contests. I found this Kleenex contest and I thought we might actually have a chance at winning since 100 schools would win, not just one or five or ten. And so, we began to beg and plead and annoy people for a few weeks...and it paid off! We won!
Day 32

Day after we won the Kleenex Field Trips contest:
Student entering classroom: I’m glad this mornin’!
Me: Why?
Student: Because we goin’ on a field trip today!
Me: Not today!

Another student: We wonnn! Are we goin’ today or tomorrow??
(Yes. If only we didn't have to plan ahead and get permission and send notes home and hire a bus driver. We could just hop on the bus and go. That would be wonderful.)
Day 33

I had a student who was acting up, so I filled out a referral form and wrote him up. I told our guidance counselor all about it and handed her the referral form. She then said, "Okay, well, next time, don’t write yourself up." I was very confused....until she pointed to the form. Instead of putting the child's name, I had written my name. It appears that I display inappropriate behavior and use inappropriate language. Whoops.

My students are creative. They use keychains to make their earrings more classy. When I'm not looking.