It has been a day or two,,,okay, maybe a week,

Well I have been non stop the last week or so. My life has yet to slow down. So many things going on in the 1st grade world as well as my other life. :) Well last week was slightly interesting or should I say a new experience for me.
I am greeted Friday morning by my principal, and she had been greeted by a mother who was freaked out about an incident and not too happy with me. Her son lead her to believe that another student shoved a crayon inside his ear. He also told her that he informed me and the other student was in trouble for the incident. Here is the kicker.. Although he had an crayon in his ear I would not allow him to go to the nurse. OH ME. Guess I like for my students to suffer. Well the story got more and more interesting with very outlandish details. Now I will give him the fact he made a comment that he couldn't hear and could he go to the restroom. (this child asks to go to the bathroom every time we sit down to begin a lesson) So I told him no, he could wait till after the lesson. Never heard him say anything else about his ear again. So just like anyone else I forgot about the comment. So I am told the crayon in his ear is yellow. We are also informed that the ER could not remove the crayon Thursday night and he would go to the ENT Doctor Friday morning. Also he could possibly have to be sedated to have it removed!!! OMG..... crazy. Well since the details of the student were a little off I decided to check his desk for his yellow crayon. What do you know.. the tip is broken off of it. Yep I bet you are thinking what I was thinking. Well I have a pretty good relationship with this child's mother so I shot her an email with my apologies as well as the information on the crayon I found. I told her it could be a complete coincidence. I feel awful about the situation all weekend.... Then bright and early Monday morning I get a reply. She was not thinking it was so much of a coincidence. She told me to give her a call about it. I did it and I worked my wonderful parental skills and she was on board with my story!! :) I have yet to discuss the issue with the student. Well Monday afternoon we are doing an activity using crayons. Well he discovers that all his crayons are missing. Yea i removed every last one of them Friday afternoon. So he comes over to my desk for a little discussion. After a few lies he finally admits he did it to himself!!! Forgot to tell you he gave the name of the person "who did it" to our principal as well as to his mother. He didn't even know the poor girl. She wasn't in my classroom. So Tuesday morning i receive a hand written letter from him apologizing for the entire situation!!!

More drama...... on the playground Monday one of my students fell off the slide. He is a little guy very fragile. He was just a crying... so I sent him to the nurse to check it out! I wouldn't want him to suffer. Well dad comes and picks him up. So Tuesday he comes to school no cast or anything. In tears from the moment he walks in the door. So several teachers at different times send him back to the nurse. Dad requests for him to go back to class he will be fine. Dad knows he loves to visit Ms. Bridgette our nurse. Well Wednesday morning he shows up smiling from ear to ear. He says "Ms. Hampton look." and puts his arm in the air. Yep it was broken! Poor little guy! He got his hand cast on Wednesday. Thursday he thought the cast was so cool. Today he is not loving the cast so much!!!!

Well our days are getting better in the classroom. I am getting into a routine of things. This week was great I was out doing TPRI testing a day and a half so my week seemed to fly by!!

Kids say the funniest things:

Student: Ms. Hampton your hair is tangly.
Me: Well it is just curly.

Me: Okay change your card to yellow, you were pretending to sleep.
Student: I just didn't want to share.
Me: That is fine just answer Ms. Hampton next time.
Student: Okay, can I change back to green now.
Me: Sorry that is not how it works.
(JOURNAL SHARE TIME)

This is one I get alot..
Me: Okay why did you have to change your card?
Student: because I am bad.
Me: You are not bad, you just make bad choices sometimes.


This week we have been learning about the Constitution so my students drew and labeled U.S. Symbols. Here are few:

Go Ole ABE. 

 

The White House and George on the left

U.S. Flag and the Liberty Bell

And a few others

Well all papers are graded.. what a way to end this crazy week. 

Miss Hampton

Finally a new post...

Well it has been forever since I have posted. Last week was a little busy, well actually a lot busy. Things seemed as if they were falling apart last week around Wednesday. I just wanted to curl up in a ball and hide in a corner. Well that didn't happen, I made it through the week actually. I am still getting used to 1st graders. I think I will be saying this for several more weeks. Maybe even the entire year. Before I taught 1st, everyone said coming down from 4th I would just love 1st grade. Now the same people are saying "I don't know how you do it." LOL. People really tell you what you want to hear. :) Also the big date for 1st graders to grow up is after Christmas. I will let you know how that is in a few months. I hope their words of encouragement are true! Towards the end of the week I was feeling a little better about the situation. I finally got all of my student books for the Journey's curriculum atleast. I still do not have my student consumables for ELAR or math. And our goal is to cut back on copying. How can I do that with out those materials. CRAZY!! I am trying new things everyday! We will make it through I just know it! I have finally gotten a little bit better with my organization. If I hadn't I would be a total basket case! Well for all who care I am still at work from 7AM till about 7PM. Yep 12 hour work days. There are not enough hours in the day.. seriously!

Well I did enjoy my self this weekend. I didn't think about school until about 8:30 last night. I was able to go to Fayetteville, Little Rock, and back home. All day yesterday I work on the new apartment. I was shopped out and worn out from the entire weekend. I have decided that restful weekends are so much better! Hopefully I will be resting this coming weekend. I NEED IT!

Friday, it was an awesome day to listen to my students share their journal entries. It about gave me chills. TO see the growth even in the last few days is amazing. They are writing like crazy and expressing themselves through journal writing!! THEY LOVE JOURNAL TIME!!! We are up to 15 mins each day for this activity!!! AMAZING!!

So let's talk about today. We are working on comparing numbers and ordering numbers in math. We are using words like greater than and less than. These are tough concepts for my students. Even my students who pick up things very fast. Maybe I am the problem. I think my class needs so neat hands on activities for learning. ANY IDEAS ARE WELCOME!!! Well today during this lovely math lesson we had a walk-through. For those of you who do not know what this is it is a weekly visit from an administator, it lasts 4 minutes. It is basicly to track if we are meeting objectives and if the students are engaged. Well last week our visit consisted of 3 admins at one time. Yep your right sounds a little overwhelming. Today it was just 2 admins. Well they ask the students randomly what they are learning. Yes your right, it makes them a little nervous. Also they listen to questioning and answers given. My student today was so nervous of the thought of them he could not give an answer that made sense. Right when they walked out he answered correctly! YEp just my luck!!! Oh and by the way.. I had 2 students craying about their stomachs, one student standing because he can not stay awake and another laying her head down!!! FAIL!

Well let me fill you in on a funny..... today we had a little class meeting about homework and books. I was telling the students to handle our books with care because the are REALLY EXPENSIVE to replace and mommy's and daddy's do not want to pay money for them being ruined. Here is a reply from one of my student's....."My mom is broken. All she has is a credit card" Another child responds.."How much credit cards?" "Not very much." HAHA... Another child came up at another time and was talking about her fundrasier. She said " I sold, and she wrote on one of those paper bills." Talking about a check!!! It was too funny.

Well please give me any ideas to help my classroom get more hands on!! I am open to any suggestions!!

Miss Hampton