My Class - September 2008 Well, here are my kids! There are 6 boys and 4 girls and they are a handful! I should have been more thankful of my class last year! Compared to these guys, last year was a dream class! Now don't get me wrong, they aren't bad kids, just really loud and active! I would say there is the one who is ADHD and is really giving me a hard time during certain parts of our day, and there are a couple that just don' t like to listen. We are working on it but man, what a group! I have a few, however, that are my helpers, they help put things away and are always wanting to please! Kind of how my sisters and I were at that age! Well, maybe not all of us! But most of the time things are going smoothly, but for one, listening and cleaning up toys is the worst part of the day and it just doesn't happen. Nothing seems to work either! I am getting to the point where everyone else is getting a treat for clean up except this kid! But we are moving forward.... not always a lot of help from those higher up. The director came in today when I called, but too late to see the worst of it. So... maybe another day! But they are all sweet kids, they are mostly kind to each other and some are pretty sensitive! Not a mean bone in their bodies so I guess I should count myself lucky after all!

We are Starting to "Become"!
Yeah, I know, it sounds like something from a science fiction movie! I have always been a bit negative about the moms that enroll their children in a million activities, they never have time to relax at home! I have found that my kids did best doing stuff at home like I did as a kid. My mom never sent us off to summer camp, nor did we have 5 or 6 extra curricular activities after school! Well, we have been skating on the edge of "doing things" for a while and this year Kaleigh decided she wanted to try dance. So we signed her up for a dance class. Just 4 weeks, once a week. Just to try it out. Cole is still in swimming lessons (not his choice, but hey we live in California!), and since Kaleigh had said she didn't want to do lessons anymore that was fine. Then Kaleigh decided she would like to swim, but not on a swim team. Well at the swim school they go to they have Pre-competitive swimming (just basically polishing up your strokes and your stamina) and she was encouraged by her old swim teacher to join. Kaleigh loves swimming so she asked if she could. I said sure! I loved swimming too and she is a natural! So then we found out that Cole's swim lessons are Mondays, Kaleigh would be swimming Mondays and Wednesdays. Ok so now Kaleigh has MWF activites! Plus she is also in Girl Scouts which starts this Sunday! Ok, that is more than we have ever had before! Cole is still just in swimming, but has showed an interest in Baseball, which will begin in January (I think). So the kids are finally coming up with some things that they would like to do, and I am happy, although it does mean we are "becoming" more like the other families (not a bad thing, as long as we don't overdo it. For example Kaleigh wanted to get into Choir too but I think that was because her two best friends were doing it. That would have been every TU/TH afternoon. I said no. Too much and not enough time for school work.
There is enough of that to give me a headache!

Oopsie!

Well, you learn something new every day! I found out um...yesterday, that unless you have a current TB test, you can't even go into your classroom! So my TB test expired in July (I did one 4 years ago) and I waited until the last minute to do it (needles ick), and then when I DID do it, I totally forgot about going in after two days for them to check it! Grrrr....I mean it was my fault no question and you do not know how I am beating myself up about that! But then I was told...again, yesterday, that it is illegal for me to work as a teacher without the current test on record. Well, no one told me how urgent it was....I know I know, duh on my part but still you think they would have been a little more on top of things! Anyway, so here I am, on a Friday sitting here while someone else teaches my second day of school....sigh....I think I need to get some serious help with my memory! I did invest in a small day planner, and yes, I have tried that before and I do well for the first few months then I don't do anymore. Well, I think I may have to try a little harder, seeing as how bad my memory has gotten! For some reason faces, names and places are no problem, but it is the appointment dates and times that I seem to have trouble with. Especially now that Kaleigh is taking Jazz, Cole has swim lessons and so on. So those of you who read my blog are my witnesses! I will keep my day planner up to date!!! I am even using it to try and put together a budget! Tina used to do this....she would write down everything she bought, which store, how much, etc. So that is my plan as well. I am going to try to remember at the beginning of each week, to write down all the things that are neccessary for that week and any other dates that need to be put in my calendar. I will do this on Sunday when I have a quiet moment to myself. Ok, that being said, I now need to go shopping to get Kaleigh her poptarts that I forgot to get when I was at the store yesterday!!!

The Challenge....part 2

So, first day of school was yesterday. 9 of the kids in my class are great! They get along ok, they are pretty much a really neat group of kids. The tenth child is sweet but not so easy to handle. I will call him Bud. Bud doesn't like to sit for crafts, he will get up and go to the toys. I pulled him aside and really talked to him. I told him we would get along great, but he really needs to listen and obey his teacher. He is very flighty too, almost ran out of the room at the beginning of the day. Luckily mom was still there and she brought him back into the room. Once the kids were all there, I closed the door. He pretty much refused to do the "ME" picture, where the kids just do the best they can to draw a picture of themselves. Usually, I end up with quite a few scribbles and some pretty good stick figures. He did nothing. Then when we were coming back from the playground he wanted to be first so he pushed ahead and shoved a little girl down. She was ok, but I had to talk to him again. This is definitely a case where it would be beneficial to have an aide. We don't do that at our school however, so I wonder why a parent would even want them at our school. It does make it difficult to teach the whole class, when there is one that is so disruptive. The other parents expect a lot due to the fact they are paying quite a bit for this school. It isn't fair to them to have less than 100% quality teaching. I am going to be documenting all the problems for the mom and for my director. Mom was kind enough to pull him out of school last year, maybe she can do it again! He just won't get the individualized attention he needs and the others need to be able to learn! If he stays I will have to learn to let him wander a bit, because no matter how or how many times I tell him, he doesn't listen. I don't think he can do some of the things like sitting and looking at a book. He is too antsy. Ah well....
If you all have any thoughts on the matter feel free to comment.