Almost Turkey Day break!!!

So today was better than the past two days, fortunately. The morning actually went like clockwork; the kids were attentive and relatively calm. We got ALL of our morning work done (which rarely happpens), and we did reading buddies with another class. It all went very well, and I kept telling them all how proud I was of the whole class. It was a great morning.

As usual, the afternoon was a little rockier, but it wasn't terrible. This week, instead of reading aloud to the class after lunch recess, I have them read for 15-20 minutes. It's a beautiful time to watch: 20-some students all engaged in a book. A lot of them are very into my comic book collection (consisting mostly of old Archie & Garfield books mooched from my sister), but the point is they're reading and enjoying it. Awesome.

Interesting things today: 1.) During P.E., one of my kids (we'll call him "Jack") got in a fight with another (who had been ousted from our class and placed in a self-contained setting). Jack apprarently was pushed by the other, so pushed him back. This caused the other boy to punch Jack in the face. When I came to pick my class up from P.E., Jack was in the hallway, away from the rest of the class. When I approached him to see what was going on, he exclaimed, "I'm gonna go kill that kid!" and promptly took off running toward his assailant. I sprinted after Jack(down the hall, past the library), which shocked nearby students. I caught Jack before he got to the other kid and asked him what on earth was going on. He was seething, but I actually got him to be calm enough to rethink his decision. I asked him what he needed, and he responded that he needed to see the counselor. I was so proud!! He was rational enough to realize how to better react in the situation. We ended up going to the office, where other staff members took care of the problem. Later, Jack and I talked again about the incident, and I told him that it's not OK to push or threaten other students (so he served a lunch detention), but that I was proud of him for not making things worse.

2.) Three of my girls were in tears today from P.E. Turns out they're doing physical fitness tests, which require the girls to do fewer push-ups than the boys. The P.E. teacher allegedly told the girls that they were to do fewer because the boys are stronger. This upset the girls a great deal, who came running to my classroom to tell me about it. When we reconvened as a class, I explained that there are different standards for males and females, all the way up to the military. One boy raised his hand to comment, so I called on him. "My opinion," he said, "is that women are good for being teachers and cleaning the house and that's about it." I stared at him, a deer in headlights. What the heck do I say to that?! , I wondered. By some miracle, my mentor happened to pop her head into the classroom just then, and went off at the boy about discrimination and how much trouble he could get into by saying things like that. We explained that having opinions is OK, but that there's a time and a place to share them. Heh.

3.) I tutored two of my lower students yesterday (the daughters of the angry-letter mother from a while back). I drove them home (since their mom apparently can't afford the $1.50 in gas it'd cost to drive here and back), which was no small feat. My car is a MESS. That's no exaggeration, either; neither girl had much room to sit in the car. We were laughing about how the car is "my dirty little secret." It was quite a ride. Today, one of the girls left me a note on my desk: "Homework: clean out dirty secret!!?" I love it.

4.) In math today, we were studying a 12 by 12 multiplication table and noticing patterns. They were very observant in what they saw, and we ended up talking about prime numbers. At first, one of my boys was completely uninterested and frustrated that we had to learn about prime numbers. However, once we started doing more and more examples, he became one of the most involved participants in our discovery of them. It was really awesome. For once, it seemed like someone actually learned something in the classroom!

5.) At the end of the day for Social Studies, I got a video from the library about Thanksgiving. I had the children write down at least 5 facts about the movie, showing them how to take notes during the viewing. I was so impressed; many people filled a whole page with notes, and only 3 out of 25 students wrote just the required 5 facts (everyone else did more). Another beautiful thing!

Finally, tomorrow is our school's Thanksgiving family luncheon. It shall be a disaster, I think. First, our lunch got scooted up half an hour (for some unknown reason), which makes the plans for the afternoon unclear to me. Next, I was told that we had to eat with our class and their families in the classroom, but others said we don't. Very confusing. Quite a few parents should be here tomorrow, so that's always nice. We drafted thank-you letters to them, which we'll finish up tomorrow morning. Should be good. After that, the day will most likely end in chaos.

Okee, that's about all for now. That was a really long entry... it's nice to be excited about school, though! Until later, peace.