I have a dream...

Last week we learned about Martin Luther King Jr. We listened to a clip of his speech and discussed his dream. On Friday I had the students write about what some of their dreams are. I was so excited to read what they wrote. I was not disappointed.   I have students who want to be doctors, horse trainers, cowgirls, teachers (yes!), baseball players, and car racers. I have students who want to learn how to drive, want to have children, and want to work at a store. Here are some highlights for you:

I have a dream...

• ...to become really strong.

• ...to be able to fly.  

• I want to be famous.

• I want to be liked. 

• One day I want to make a cake on my own. 

• One day I want to learn children. 

• One day I hope that I will be an archaeologist in Egypt. 

• I want to swim with the dolphins. 

• My dream is to become a doctor... I'm going to go to college but first I'll get a job before I become a doctor to pay the money for college. 

• I am going to become the president's bodyguard. 

• When I become policeman I want to have two other policemen along and stroll the streets of Ephrata. 

Some dreams are simple. Some are brave. Some seem hard. But I pray that that won't stop these boys and girls as they grow into men and women. After all, Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream was hard.

All of these dreams are good, and all of them make me smile. What is your dream? (It's never too late to dream, you know!)

Patience, please

I'm afraid that my blog posts may give you the impression that everything is always wonderful in Miss Weaver's third grade classroom. As much as I wish I was the perfect teacher, there are many times when I struggle with impatience (among other things). So today I'm going to share a few of those with you.

My patience is tested when I have to constantly remind students to stop talking during class. However, this may be partly my fault for arranging them in groups. So I told them that next month we're going back to rows! One boy responded by saying, "I don't talk to anyone."
I said, "Yes, that's because I moved your group apart because I had to remind you every day to stop talking!"
To which another student replied, "Not every day. You didn't have to tell him on Saturday and Sunday."
"Yes, that's true," I smiled.

Sometimes I don't have patience for typical 8-year-old boy behavior. Like when I read a Did You Know devotional which said that, "A cow burps (and worse, releases gas) all day long." The sound effects and the giggling took a lot of time to quiet down.

It was hard for me to be patient today when we were reviewing science vocabulary, and I asked for examples of physical properties. About five students in a row gave answers like, "eyes," "smelling," and "sight" no matter how many times I said, "Not the senses, but the properties." I finally gave up and gave my own examples.

I was not patient when in language class I asked, "What part of a sentence do you think a subject pronoun comes in, the subject or the predicate?" and half of the class answered, "Predicate?"

And telling time is definitely a subject to test a teacher's patience! Some students have been writing times like 1:64. And then today we learned A.M. and P.M. One student's answer on the board was 10:32 P.A.

However, one simple little note like this one that I got from a student this morning make all of these frustrating moments so worth it.

And once more I resolve to be more patient tomorrow than I was today.

Yay, school!

I know I sound like a broken record, but I can't believe we're halfway through the year already! This year is just going so fast! Hopefully for the students, too. I know at least one of them in enjoying the year. One day I let one of my boys know that his mom was coming to pick him early for an appointment, and he was disappointed, "because I want to stay here!" Later, his mom told me he'd been praying that we wouldn't have any delays or snow days because he wanted to come to school! Music to a teacher's ears. :) Last week another boy told me he can't wait for January 15, and he hopes it doesn't snow that day! I couldn't think of anything special going on, so I asked why. "Because we're having pizza for lunch!" Oh yes, good reason.

To celebrate all this wintry weather, we made my favorite kind of snowmen on Friday. The kind that you make from the warm, cozy classroom.

One boy accidentally made his snowman "float" and he didn't know how to fix it. I was just about ready to suggest he make the snow a little higher or make his snowman a little bigger. But someone else suggested he give the snowman legs. That works too. :)