BFFs, yogurt discussions, and candy bar prayers

The main thing I love about my job is, of course, the kids. This is why I write. You can't make this stuff up. 

(I know some of you saw my Facebook post about this, so sorry for the repetitiveness.) The class was completing a Bible worksheet about David and Jonathan, and I decided we should answer some of the questions together. One of the questions was, "What did David and Jonathan promise each other?" The answer I wrote on the board for them to copy was, "They and their descendants would always be friends." Later, when I was grading the papers, I read this one boy's answer and burst out laughing: "BFF and descendants BFF." I would expect something like that from some of the girls, but because it was a boy made it that much funnier to me. 

One day during break time I overheard one of the boys saying, "I wonder why I'm always surrounded by girls." 

I was telling my class about a little boy I know who needed brain surgery. One girl raised her hand and asked, "Was it Ben Carson who did his surgery?" 

For language class, we finished a chapter on action verbs, and the students have been completing different activities to reinforce their knowledge. At least, that was my plan. As one of the girls was leading the class in Simon Says, I reminded her to use action verbs. She looked at me and asked, "What are verbs?" 

In science class, we've been discussing characteristics of living things and the difference between living and nonliving things. Today I overheard this conversation at lunch:

"Yogurt is a living thing!"
"No, it's not! Why isn't it moving?"
"Wouldn't it be funny if it was moving around in the trash can?"
"No, it's alive inside the yogurt."
"That's weird."
"Who told you that?"
"You should ask Miss Weaver." 

(I was not about to jump in and offer my limited knowledge about live cultures.)

"YouTube would tell you!"
...
"Miss Weaver?" 

But by far my favorite part of the week was listening to my students pray. This year our school collected candy bars to give to inmates in a local prison for a Christmas project.

We spent some time praying this week during the times that the chaplain would be handing out the candy bars. These were some of the prayers that made me get all teary eyed: 

"Let them know that someone loves them, even if they've been bad. None of us are perfect."
"Help them to know You love them no matter if they're good or bad."
"Tell them that we love them." 

Today when they heard that the candy bars were successfully handed out and that the men were amazed that someone cared enough to buy them something, the students excitedly exclaimed, "Our prayers worked!" 

Best job ever

Teaching is hard work. Some days it's hard to feel successful, and it's hard to know what you really accomplished. But then there are days when I sit there and look at all my students engaged and working hard, and when I listen to the student whose reading has improved so much since August. And my heart is filled with joy because I have the privilege of being part of all of it. And then there are those extra special perks. Days like yesterday, when a student delivers warm chocolate chip cookies, baked fresh that morning by her mother. And I think, This is the best job ever! 

I just finished reading Ramona the Pest to my class. When we got to the part where Ramona was banned from the Kindergarten until she could stop pulling Susan's "boing, boing" curls, one of my girls asked me, "Would you ever do that to us?" I just laughed and said, "No!" I didn't explain to her that I couldn't, if I wanted to. :)

In math one day, we were practicing using timelines, so we made a timeline with events from my life. I asked them how many years they think we should put on the timeline. One of them thought 100 years.

They've also been practicing writing numbers using words, which means I see some interesting spelling, such as "9inedy" and "ate hundred" and "aty."

One morning this week, I looked across the classroom and saw a bunch of girls gathered around one of the boys. (This is not typical behavior for third graders.) Then I realized they were all looking at a picture of his brand new baby brother. And of course then I had to join them! (When I say I love newborns, they look at me strangely, as if they can't imagine me with any other people besides third graders.)

I entered the bathroom a couple of days ago, and overheard two girls who were in the stalls.
"I started at the bottom and went to the top."
I assumed I missed the beginning of the conversation.
Long pause.
Same girl: "I got 100."
...
Girl number 2: "Oh! You're counting them! ...1,2,3,4,5..."
And I realized (as I was leaving the bathroom and they continued counting), that they were counting the tiles on the bathroom floor. Maybe I should have checked in with their teacher to see how long they were missing from class. :)

Best job ever.

Incredible kids

My students find ways all the time to brighten my days. I received a hand-written letter, a whoopie pie, and pictures all in one day!

Last week we had three half days so that we could have parent-teacher conferences in the afternoons. On Wednesday, I reminded the students that Thursday would be a full day. And they cheered. They cheered about having a full day of school. How blessed am I to be teaching these incredible kids? 

As incredible as they are, I don't think I'm quite ready to travel across the Atlantic with all of them. We've been learning about Ancient Rome in social studies, and I mentioned that someday I would love to go to Rome and see the Colosseum. They wanted to go too, so naturally they concluded that we should take a class field trip to Italy. A few days later, we learned about Pompeii, and when someone said that they would like to visit it, I said, "Sure, we'll just go there after our field trip to the Colosseum." I have to remember that not all third graders pick up on sarcasm, because some of them were so confused. "Wait, what? Our field trip to the Colosseum?" 

I explained to one of the students that when there is a problem like 5 + m = 12, you have to find the missing number that m stands for. "Does m stand for mystery?" she wondered. That would make a lot of sense. 

On a science worksheet, one of the questions was, "Are you warm-blooded or cold-blooded? How do you know?" From past experience, I told the students they couldn't say something like, "Because the book says so," or "My teacher told me." But one student wrote, "I know because I am smart."

At break time one day, I heard a group of boys chanting, "Do it! Do it! Do it!" Of course anytime there is a group of boys chanting "Do it!" there are automatically red flags. So I stared at them, waiting to see what it was, but then they started whispering, "The teacher's looking." You better believe it. So it is still a mystery. Probably for the best. 

Things I love about my students

The last day of the first quarter (I know, already!) seems like a good time to reflect on all the things I love about my students. Even on the hard and challenging days, there is always something to love.

• I love when students are excited about their spelling test scores because yesterday they got 13 wrong and today they only got three wrong. 
• I love that they say, "She has eyes in the back of her head." 
• I love that they served so well without complaining on our recent service trip. I love that a few minutes after beginning the work, one girl exclaimed, "I never want to leave!" 
• I love that when the disinfectant wipes are extra wet from being on the bottom of the canister, they call them "juicy." 
• I love that if I need to step out of the room for a minute or two, I know they're in good hands with my mini-teachers. 
• I love that they like to color. 
• I love that they love Ramona Quimby books as much as I do. 
• I love that since I made this poster they ask if they can make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
  

• I love that they have so much to praise the Lord about (me too!).
  

A t-rex in language class

I told you about the girl with a tissue box on her desk. Today I noticed one of the girls has a whole bottle of hand sanitizer on her desk. Maybe that's a good idea. (Those of you who know me know I do love my hand sanitizer!)

One day we made brownies as an introduction to writing "how-to" paragraphs. They were too warm to eat right after they came out of the oven, so we ate them after we came back from our time in the library. The next week, we were getting ready to go to the library and one boy said to me, "Every time I think about the library, I think about brownies!" (Yes, that would be nice if we could have brownies every Tuesday.)

The funniest story I have from the last couple weeks is when we learned about a thesaurus. I wrote the word thesaurus on the board and asked if anyone knew what is was. One girl guessed a dinosaur. I said, "No, but that's a good guess, because it has the same ending as a lot of dinosaur names, like...stegosaurus..." I'm not very good at remembering dinosaur names, so they helped me by calling some more out... One girl called out, "T-rex!" which didn't really fit, but I ignored it and kept going. We discussed what a thesaurus is and how we use it to make our writing better, and then I asked them, "What is the difference between a dictionary and a thesaurus?" This girl raised her hand and said, "Well, a t-rex has more words..." So I had to clarify that a thesaurus is not actually called a t-rex.

Tissues, pencils, and erasers (oh my!)

In some ways it feels like we've been in school for a long time, but in other ways it's hard to believe that we already have three weeks completed! I was happy to overhear this conversation at the end of the day today:

"I can't believe it's the end of the day already!"

"I know! School days go so fast." 

Nothing too eventful has happened - just the everyday routine of a third grade classroom.

Much to my chagrin, I've called four of my students by their siblings' names. One time I didn't even realize it until they looked at me confused and said, "Who's that?" 

We've been averaging using a box of tissues a day. This doesn't seem like a good sign for the upcoming cold season. I guess maybe that's why one of the girls decided she should have her own box of tissues at her desk. One day in the middle of Bible class, this same girl got out of her seat, went to her backpack and began hanging a trash bag on the side of her desk. I'm glad she feels at home in our classroom, but I'm not quite sure that we have enough room for every student to set up individual tissue boxes and trash cans. 

It seems like having sharp pencils ready to go is always a battle (as I'm sure any teacher will tell you). One day I noticed one of the boys writing with a tiny little stub which he could hardly hold. I let is slide, but later when he had poor handwriting I suggested he use a bigger pencil. He paused, pulled out this huge pencil, and said, "This is the only bigger one I have."

One of the first days of school I noticed that this same boy had little pieces of erasers in his desk, and I told him he needed to throw them away or put them in his backpack. He looked at me so earnestly and said, "But I'm going to use them!" I relented. A week or so later, I happened to see the inside of his desk. I didn't realize he had quite so many pieces! But to his credit, they have not been making a mess, so he can continue to use them. :)

I'm happy to report that my students also have a sense of humor. One day one of the boys forgot to sign back into the classroom after going to the bathroom, and when another student pointed it out to him he replied, "I thought I would relax in the bathroom for a couple of hours." 

During reading class one day, I asked the class how many letters are in the alphabet. Of course they all chorused, "Twenty-six!" I continued the lesson when one boy raised his hand. I called on him and he said, "Actually, there are only 25 letters in the alphabet, because the angel said, 'Noel.'"

And my humor today came from (of course) a language worksheet. We've been practicing combining two sentences into one. The two sentences were:

Bob ate bear meat. Jim ate bear meat.

So one student wrote:

Bob ate bear meat and Jim. 

Maybe it's because I'm tired, but I'm still giggling about that one. 

One week down

As I reflect on the first week of a new school year, the first thought that comes to mind is, It's only been a week?!  From what I've heard, I think it's safe to say all the teachers are feeling the same way. However, when I asked my students this morning if it has seemed like a long week to them, a few timidly, partially raised their hands, and the rest looked at me with baffled expressions. So I think that's a good sign that it didn't seem long to them. And although it's been exhausting, I am thrilled to spend my days with all these new little people. I'm really enjoying getting to know them. In fact, in some cases I'm having flashbacks to six years ago. Two of the girls are sisters of girls I had in my first year class (who are now 8th graders!), and I have to stop myself from calling them by the wrong names.

There have been a few special memories from the week which make me smile.

On the first day of school, one girl signed out a dictionary from our classroom library to take home. The next day one of the boys did the same. I didn't realize dictionaries are popular reading material in third grade.

I had the students fill out a sheet telling me their favorites. One boy's favorite food is "shuger." (Mine too!) Another boy's favorite sports team is "Fightin' Phils."

On another paper, I had them tell me about their summer, and they were able to draw a picture themselves. Here are a few samples of my little artists:

And my favorite:

I can relate. For her mother's sake, I have to say that she has never come to school looking like that!

As always, I love to read my third graders' writing. Today they were supposed to write a sentence about cows. Most sentences were something along the lines of:
Cows eat grass. 
Cows are black and white. 

But a few students were more creative:
Cows and bulls are different because bulls are boys and cows are girls. 
I saw a cow giving birth coming home from church. 

I'm looking forward to lots of good times and stories in third grade this year!