Tuesday, March 29, 2011

~ Define "Reading" ~

I'm beginning to think it's inevitable. During our half hour of silent reading, I look up from my book/stack of papers/student I'm talking to and notice M (or C or A or whoever) is sitting at their desk, with their book closed on top, staring into space, writing notes, or making faces at their friend across the room.

My first response is a throat clear. Occasionally the delinquent reader will jump a bit, make eye contact with me, and go back to their book. I don't have to interuppt what I'm doing, which is especially important if I'm talking to another student about their book.

However. The throat clear rarely works, epecially the week before spring break. So I go to response two. I say their name softly. The student glances up, and we have this little exchange:
"A., reading, please."
Student holds up their closed book with a look stating that their teacher is obviously among the most ignorant people in the universe for asking them to read when they clearly have a book within sight already.
"Ok, now open and read, please."
Loooooong sigh. Student flops book onto desk, opens it, and at least pretends to read.

In some rare cases, this still doesn't work. Which forces this resourceful teacher to pull out all the stops. In a move borrowed from Jim Fay's "Love & Logic," I pat the student on the shoulder and quietly say, "I can see you don't really want to read right now. That's fine. You can make up your reading time later today." Occasionally, the student is silly enough to take me up on it. They quickly find that, shockingly, we're just so busy with learning and such during the day, the only time left to finish thier reading requirement is during recess or lunch. After the first month or so of school, they all know what "make up your time later" really means. Problem solved. For now.....

Thursday, March 24, 2011

~ Overheard ~

Walking the hall today. Student is packing things up at her locker. Teacher is standing next to her, saying "....and no more food in your desk at all. Especially not chicken fingers. That's just gross!"

Monday, March 21, 2011

~Reason #238 ~

Reason #238 why I am so glad to be back in 5th grade this year: Math is so much more entertaining.

It is fraction time in 5th grade, and today we wrote fraction stories to demonstrate the fraction 2/3. This assignment had two requirements:
1. The answer must be 2/3
2. It must have a picture that makes sense with the story.

After five minutes of raised hands asking, "Can we....?" with me replying, "Is your answer 2/3? Does your picture make sense? Then yes you can do it, " these are some of the stories I got:

* A blueberry popsicle was cut into three pieces. Two senior citizens each ate one piece and put the rest back in the freezer.

* A cucumber was cut into three pieces. I threw two of them at my brother. What fraction did I throw at my brother?

* A pizza was cut into three pieces. I gave one piece to my dog and threw one at my brother.


* A square was chopped into three pieces. A friend and I are eating a piece each.

* I had three slices of cake. I threw one at my teacher and a hobo grabbed one and ate it. What fraction of the cake did I lose?

Gotta love that fifth grade humor!

Thursday, March 17, 2011

~St. Patrick's Day: A Teacher's Perspective ~

"If you're
not wearing green,
please grab
a few green stickers
from the table
and put them
on your shirt.
EVERYONE - hear this:
There will be no
pinching,
poking,
or in any other way
putting
your
hands
on another person
who is not wearing green.
If you pinch,
poke,
or in any other way
put
your
hands
on another person...
bad things will happen."

Monday, March 14, 2011

~ Trying to keep a straight face ~

You remember your elementary school music programs, right? You had the kids who loved music and were pretty good at it, who were loving every minute, the kids who loved music and were no good at it, but were still having a good time, and the kids who really could care less about music, and were only having a good time because they had a half a dozen kids within easy "bothering" reach on the bleachers.

We recently had our 5th grade music program, and it's always been interesting to be on the other side of the bleachers.

During one of my earlier years of teaching, we had no auditorium in our building, which meant our programs were at the high school a few blocks away. During this program, because there wasn't a lot of room on stage, some classes had to leave the stage and wait in a nearby classroom while the other classes were performing, then go back on stage. One parent got wind of this and decided to tag along while we were in the hallway, giving her already hyper daughter Snickers bars and Mountain Dew in between songs. Needless to say, this concert did not go well.

Thankfully, we now have our own auditorium, with a stage big enough to accomodate everyone. At our dress rehearsal for the program, in between chuckling over my enthusiastic (and rythmically challenged) clapper whose short stature put him right in the front row and giving death glares to the kid in the back row giving devil horns to the kid in front of him, I spotted D in the back row.

His face was twisted and puckered, tongue protruding, and his eyes crossed as he tried to watch where his tongue was going. I tried to give him the death glare but failed. I wanted to giggle instead.

I tried again. No such luck. And he knew it, too, the little stinker.

The song began and D's facial gymnastics came to a halt. I asked him later what he'd been doing. "I was bored. I was trying to get my tongue to touch my nose." I tried not to laugh as I told him, for his mother's sake, not to try that at the actual program. He tried not to laugh when he asked me why not and I told him so he didn't look stupid in front of all the parents.

Sharing the story with his mother later that week, she just shook her head and said, "It could have been so much worse..."

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

~Homophones, oh homophones!~

We've been working (and working, and working) on homophones this week. Words that sound the same but are spelled differently.

In a possible sign that I've been reading too many fantasy books lately, I completely missed a homophone this morning.

B: Mrs. N, my ancestors on my mom's side came from the ferry.

Me: The what? Did you say the fairy?

B: Yeah, the ferry.

Me: Oh, like the Ellis Island ferry? Like a boat?

B, looking at me strangely: Yeah, like I said, the ferry.