Mrs. Driftwood

signing off

2010-06-07T10:33:00.002-04:00

The baby is due to arrive any day now (any time in the next month really), and as such, my teaching days are (temporarily) over. Thus, this blog has come to its end (for now at least). Thanks for reading, and I hope you got a few smiles out of it. Kids really are the most amazing little people and I am so lucky to have a job where I get paid to spend time with them! I will certainly not be able to stay away for too long, but for the foreseeable future, there is one little person I will need to be devoting my attention to...

speaking of names

2010-05-11T09:38:00.002-04:00

The latest addition to the list of names that I've been called is "Mrs. Shermanwood". A good one.

But the most common naming ordeal these days is with the baby. Classes that are comfortable with me will often ask me first, is it a boy or a girl, and then offer name suggestions. The most recent and memorable were, if it's a boy, Hotrod, and if it's a girl, Spirit. Those came from grade twos. There have been others, but I can't remember them all...Pregnancy brain and teaching don't go together very well...

The Day I Gave Up

2010-03-30T20:05:00.000-04:00

I did spend the day in kindergarten today, so I could put together a few hilarious stories for you ("how come I can't hear the baby?"), but instead I'm going to vent. Anyone else in teaching right now will identify I'm sure.

Over the past months I have been hopeful about getting enough hours together to qualify for mat leave. I need 600 hours. That equals an average of 3 days per week. Sounds reasonable right? Not too much to ask. If I get 600 hours before the baby is born, I get 55% of my income for a year. If I get 599 hours, I get 0% of my income.

At the beginning of this year I was only taking calls from Niagara, making it a priority to make connections here and be available whenever a school here called. Then I began to realize that that really wasn't getting me enough work. So I recently started taking calls from KW as well, driving there either the night before or the morning of. It made for a lot of driving of course, but the mentality was that I needed to take whatever I could get!

The weeks have been unpredictable, going from 5 days one week, to 1 day the next. Very frustrating. I decided this week to take matters into my own hands. I was rarely getting random calls from Niagara, and often getting them from KW. So I decided I would go with Nathan to KW (he commutes 2 days a week for work) and call the "fail to fill" phone line at the board if I didn't get a call. You call this number and if they have a job that did not get filled through the usual automated system, they will call you to fill it. There have been a lot of fail to fills this year in the WRDSB. And you are basically guaranteed at least a half day of work if you call.

Here's how the Monday went:
6am: wake up and call the fail-to-fill line. Leave a message. Fingers crossed. Get ready to go.
7:15am: get in the car to go to Waterloo. Believe that you will get a call.
7:20am: get a call from the WRDSB. The school starts at 8:20am. Although Nathan is a fast driver, it would be impossible to get there in time. Turn down the offer of a full day of work. Get a promise from the woman that she will call you if she has something that starts later. Curse yourself for not knowing that schools started that earlier, for not getting up earlier and not leaving earlier.
8am: get a call from the DSBN. Roll eyes repeatedly. Turn down the offer of a full day of work. Curse yourself for not staying in Niagara.
8:05am: cry yourself to sleep in the car as you realize that world is against you and there is nothing you can do about it.
8:30am: arrive in Kitchener and spend the rest of the day bumming around feeling like the biggest waste of time in history.

Through this ridiculous experience I have realized that I am genuinely stressed out about this. I think constantly about it: am I going to work tomorrow, did I miss a call for some strange reason that is completely out of my control, is my cell phone on, should I stop in and say hi to the schools I know to remind them that I exist...and on and on and on. I am completely consumed.

As a pregnant person I read again and again that I am to avoid stress. It's not good for me (or anyone for that matter), and of course, not ideal for the baby. So, upon my husband's advice I am giving up. I am giving up on going crazy to get mat leave. I realize that having the ability to give up is a luxury - I really don't want to think about how much money I will not be getting. But I must conclude that it is not worth spending the last three months of this pregnancy as a stress ball. Sigh.

So my goal now is to enjoy the next few months (less than three to go!), and work as much as I can, but without turning into a crazy person.

Wish me luck.

baa baa black sheep

2010-03-15T11:01:00.003-04:00

One of the wonderful things about kindergarten is that you get to teach them things that you've known for your whole life, and you know they will too. I got to teach them the nursery rhyme, Baa Baa Black Sheep. Many of them already knew it, but of course the words were mashed together for many of them, and I had to clarify what a "dame" is and other little details like that. The most adorable misconception though, was one little red-head who sang,

Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?
Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.
One for the master,
One for the dame,
One for the little boy who lives down the drain.
Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?
Yes sir, yes sir, three bags full.

:)

And speaking of sheep, as frequently happens, one little kindie came up to me with a joke:

"What does a talking sheep do?"
"What?"
(with sports-announcer enthusiasm:) "Play tennis!"

?!

Lovely.

add one to the list

2010-03-06T20:23:00.001-05:00

A kid in grade four almost called me Mrs. Sherlock the other day "Sherlock Holmes on the mind I guess" she said. I was surprised I'd never heard that one before!

Good old grade one

2010-03-02T16:51:00.004-05:00

I had the pleasure of teaching grade one for three days last week. I loved it. I just love grade one! They are so cute and funny and everything that I love about kids. They have no shame, they look at you strange if you question their childish behaviour, but at the same time they trust you implicitly. It's amazing.

When talking about my grade six experiences, I mentioned that "in any grade one or two class, after two days, the kids would love me, I would love them, and they'd be crying to see me go!" Well, below are three pieces of art that I received from the grade ones on my last day with them. They were sad, and to be honest, so was I. I would have loved to just move in! (ps. the names have been erased for privacy).

This first one, I was told, is of the sky, with a sun and clouds, and also a platypus. Don't ask me why a platypus was chosen as the main character for this little story, but that's just what makes it so wonderful.

Next up we have a lovely illustration including the sun, clouds (always an important part of a good drawing), someone trapped in a hot air balloon, as well as someone eating some delicious popcorn. Wonderful.
And lastly, a simple dream getaway for me. (I can't figure out how to rotate this one - no matter what I do, it won't come out right). Don't you just love grade one?

this might be fun afterall

2010-02-03T10:44:00.002-05:00

Welcome to the world of Justin Bieber ("oh he's so....I just can't even look at him! He's just too.....siiiiigh"), Alvin and the Chipmunks ("they are sooooo cute!"), and boyhood ("It must suck to be a girl"). Grade six is full of ridiculousness. More than I expected.

One of the things I learned was that it takes time to get them on your side. After about two days I was complaining to Nathan that I don't get them, and we don't really connect, and I'm just not meant to be a junior teacher. He said "but it's only been two days!" I agreed that this was true, but, in any grade one or two class, after two days, the kids would love me, I would love them, and they'd be crying to see me go! So the sixes are a little more complex in their relationships. And I did learn (again) that if you give it time, teaching older kids really has its advantages as well. Once you do connect, you can have a lot of fun. A different kind of fun than you have with the little ones.

For example, at one point the kids were asking me (again) when Mr. Irons was going to be back. Someone said "are you going to be here forever?". I said "Yes! I'm going to be here for the rest of your life!!! Ha ha ha ha!" In unison, as if on cue, they all screamed "Nooooooooooo!!!". We all broke down laughing. It was hilarious. Someone then came up with the theory that I had poisoned Mr. Irons so that I could have this job..."I would never!" I replied mischievously. The whole thing was quite fun. I began to realize that we were getting to a more comfortable state where I could make mistakes and joke around without wondering if they think I'm an idiot. It was great.

Three week run down

2010-01-31T16:49:00.004-05:00

Well, after a week of daily occasional teaching, I feel like I'm on vacation! I got so much done this past week, and I taught for three days! How great is that! After teaching full time for the first time ever, I am loving the supply teaching gig. Not that I'd turn down an LTO or contract of course...

Anyways, let me fill you in on what's been up. This is going to be long, so I do apologize. It's partly just for my own records (if you know me you know I have a bad memory) that I'm writing this all down.

On the Monday after Christmas holidays I got a call from the school where I'd spent the Christmas season volunteering. The principal asked if I was free to teach for the rest of the week since the grade 6 teacher had pneumonia. He had come in on Monday but that was a mistake and he was not doing well. I immediately agreed to take the job. Looking back it is really a miracle that I got that phone call and was able to take that assignment - I was just in the right place at the right time.

At the end of the week, Mr. Irons, the teacher, called in to ask if I'd be alright to make up lessons for Monday, since he had an appointment on that day. I said sure. It's not too tough to improvise for one day. I went back on Monday and at the end of the day tried to leave everything neat and organized and presentable for Mr. Irons. I was glad, in some ways, to be done, as it had been a tough week dealing with behaviour and homework and all that jazz (which you would expect as a supply in a grade six class).

Tuesday morning, 8:15am I get a call from the principal. Turns out Jim (Mr. Irons), came in to school that morning planning to teach. He was looking so bad that the principal promptly sent him back home. So she called to see if I was available. Again, I said, of course (again, another right place, right time thing). I got there as soon as I could and picked up where I had left off. I ended up being there for the rest of that week as well. It was a really tough week since it was so day-by-day. I was never sure when Jim would be back, so I couldn't plan properly, or get a good system set up for managing behaviour issues. The principal was very helpful and took a lot of responsibility for managing the kids too, which was good.

Friday afternoon as I cleaned up again, and set things out for Jim, I was informed that he'd be off for yet another week. Alright! So, I had to switch gears and really get into planning. I spoke with him that afternoon to get a few things cleared up about what was going on, and then spent the weekend planning.

The third week was by far the best. I started off on Monday morning with a note to the students saying that I was looking forward to spending another week getting to know them, but I was not looking forward to another week of warnings, lectures and trips to the office. I think they really took me seriously. We also set up a system of consequences for behaviour which really helped. By the end of the week we were getting along and making some real progress.

Of course just as we're starting to connect, Mr. Irons is ready to come back. So last Monday he returned (the kids were thrilled) and I was back to daily supply teaching. I was happy to be done (teaching full time is A LOT of work) and of course so thrilled to have had that opportunity.

One of the many benefits of that placement was that I have now been promoted to the number one supply at the school. I get called first (I'm pretty sure) whenever there is anyone off at the school. It's wonderful. Another benefit is that since the job lasted for longer than 10 days, it counts as an LTO (long term occasional). This means a few things. One, that I got paid at my actual pay scale rather than the daily rate, and two, that I now have an LTO in the DSBN to put on my resume. Oh, and I asked the principal if I could put her down as a reference and she immediately, without hesitation, said “absolutely”. So this is a really big step.

Anyways, there's the rundown of what I've been up to lately. Sorry for the boring narrative, but at least it gives you an idea.

I promise I'll post more fun stuff soon.

what?! full time!!

2010-01-20T21:17:00.002-05:00

Remember that "four day stint" I mentioned? It has now turned into a 3 week (at least) LTO. I am thrilled to say that this is my third week of teaching full time (for the first time ever), and it's going great. I am, however, super busy, so I'm afraid I don't actually have time to post on here. But the stories are piling up (I'm trying to at least jot them down so I can remember them). I know I've always said kindies are the best, but somehow these grade sixes have been really amusing as well. Stay tuned for more posts once this is all over. I'm not sure when the teacher will be back, but I'm predicting next week...we'll see...

post Christmas happiness

2010-01-05T16:32:00.001-05:00

So, the last time we spoke I believe my script for the school play was just going out to teachers. Much has happened since then! The teachers flipped because the songs I had assigned to them (classic Christmas songs with the words re-written) were way too hard. Apparently. I was frustrated, but arranged to put up a sign-up sheet for the teachers so that they could have me into their classes to teach their class the songs. Though time consuming, this worked to my advantage as almost every teacher got to see me "in action", as they say, teaching in their class. And best of all (yes, I'm letting this all go to my head), they were all so thankful that I came in and claimed that they certainly couldn't have done this without me... Although not entirely true, these comments did make me feel good :)

In the meantime, the choir was working on their songs, and things were going well with that. A few kids were dropping out, but I was still left with about 30 kids in the choir.

So the last rehearsal day came - the day before the concert. We had rehearsed many times before without a hitch. The only difference this time was that the school would be watching (rather than pulling classes from their rooms for their performances). The choir sang their first song well, and then everything exploded. Their second song was a disaster! Needless to say I was so embarrassed in front of the teachers, and called for an emergency choir practice the next morning before our afternoon performance. I was terrified! What would I possibly do if they messed up the song?!? In front of all those people!

After a good lecture during our impromptu practice the two performances went perfectly. I nearly broke down into tears after the second song, I was so relieved that they hadn't botched it. I was also happy when the principal thanked me for everything I had done, and I even got flowers! It was a fantastic experience.

I certainly learned a lot through this experience. Working with kids comes pretty naturally, but working with other teachers isn't always easy. When I assume something is going to be simple and it turns out to be impossible from another persons' perspective, I've really got to put my flexibility into action...

Anyways, after all that was done, I was anticipating a slow few weeks to start off the new year. Then, yesterday, I got a call from the very school where I had devoted my pre-Christmas months, asking if I wanted to come in for the rest of the week!! I was beyond thrilled.

So today I started a 4 day stint in their grade 6 class. I started the morning with a note on the board explaining that I was going to be here for the week, since Mr. Irons had pneumonia. One trouble making student didn't believe me.

"Mr. Irons doesn't have pneumonia!"

"Yes, he does"

"No he doesn't! He's not going to be away for the week! He's coming back tomorrow. He's just at something for his daughter - he told me yesterday".

"No, he has pneumonia"

"You're lying!"

"Why would I lie about this?"

"Because, maybe you're one of those joker teachers, who likes to play jokes on us. Mean ones"

"No, I am not one of those joker teachers. This is not a mean joke. It's true".

Again I ask, where do kids come up with this stuff? Ridiculous.

It's so good to be back!

how many days 'till Christmas?

2009-11-18T11:15:00.000-05:00

I normally like to stick to the December 1st rule for Christmas stuff. No decorating, no music, no nothing until December. This year I was forced to break that rule. Last post I mentioned the Christmas program I'm doing. Well I'm right in the thick of it, and it is a LOT of work. Being myself, I never seem to choose the easy way out. Rather than beg, borrow and steal as I was told to do, I decided to start from scratch and create the entire thing myself. So I wrote the play (all rhyming in the style of "T'was the Night Before Christmas") and then took regular old Christmas songs, and re-wrote the words to fit. I thought this was all fine and dandy (though admittedly, a lot of work) until the question of accompaniment came up. Since there weren't any piano players banging down my door to help, I decided to scour the internet for background tracks - the songs without words. This proved to be a very difficult task as most of them were karaoke style with the most cheesy, fake instruments you can imagine. After hours of searching (thank goodness for iTunes) I did manage to find suitable versions for each one. I am now officially sick of Christmas music (and it's not even December!).

So yesterday the whole thing (script, songs, music) went out to the teachers. This will be the moment of truth! I hope they like it. Of course it's all in their hands from now on, since they have to get their classes together to perform. Fingers are crossed!

The last part of my job is the choir. We had our first practice last week, which went really well. A LOT of kids came out and were really well behaved. This afternoon is our second practice where we'll actually do some singing. I'm nervous, but I think it's going to be tons of fun! I sure hope at least a few of them can carry a tune!! Eek...

In other news, as of yesterday I have handed in all of the required paper work to be officially added to the Occasional Teachers (supply teachers) List! I'm finally going to be payed for doing what I do! Yay. So, now all I have to do is sit by the phone and wait for it to ring! If only it were that easy... Needless to say I'm very glad I've been spending these past couple months volunteering - I feel like I've got at least a few good connections made to teachers/principals who will call me when they need someone...

I'm back

2009-09-30T11:08:00.004-04:00

Well, moving is done, the renos are done (for now), the thesis is done, and it's September. There's no better place to be than in a classroom. So I walked down the street to the closest school and asked what I could do. The principal sent me to a grade two classroom where I have been working with students on reading. It's great.

After two weeks of this, I had the crazy idea (put into my head through repeated encouragement from my mom) of finding out about the school's music program to see if I could help out with this year's Christmas concert (if you're trying to get into teaching, you know that you do anything to make yourself an appealing hire). So I spontaneously stopped in at the principal's office.

"Do you have a choir here? I was thinking I might be able to help out with the Christmas program."
"No. Two summers ago the music teacher, who had been doing the music program here for 18 years, left. We had a beautiful music program. They were supposed to send me a new music teacher but I never got one. So now we have no music - no singing, no nothing."
"Wow... Okay... Well then, what I was wondering was - "
"Yes, I would like a choir."

Holy Smokes. What have I gotten myself into. I am working together with the drama teacher to put together a Christmas concert. "Whatever you want to do is fine with me" the principal said. This is more than a little intimidating since I have never lead a choir of any kind, nevermind coordinated an entire school Christmas program...But, this just might be my ticket in. If I can impress the principal with this, who knows what could happen.

Now, this is where I put into practice one of the key lessons you learn in teacher's college - BEG, BORROW AND STEAL. Where can I find a fantastic little Christmas (I should say "holiday") program that is all set up and ready to go? Hmmm...

And, no post is complete without at least a little story from the kiddies. So, our new word for today is "reaser" (pronounced ree-acer). This is a little thing on the end of your pencil that reases things. You can also get magic reasers from Disney. They put magic on them so that with just one stroke your pencil marks are reased. Amazing.

furnaces, skeletons and real life mysteries

2009-06-23T09:40:00.001-04:00

Now that we've moved, I haven't been teaching at all. I miss it. I went in to visit my old school the other day to collect some of my things and was reminded of a few stories I still had kicking around.

I was in a kindergarten class while they were eating lunch. One boy put up his hand and asked, "Can I go get my hot furnace?" by which of course he meant thermos. Very cute.

Also in kindergarten, the teacher was talking to the kids at the carpet. One particularly rambunctious boy was having some trouble sitting still. "I need to see your listening ears!" said the teacher. "Show me that you're listening with your whole body" she said. "And my skeleton?" he asked. "Yes, your whole body". :)

I love kindies for their wonderful stories!

Grade twos are also amazingly funny. My teaching partner told me this one about one of the students I used to teach.

"Mrs. Spright! Mrs. Spright! Me and Alex are solving a real life mystery!!"
"Oh! What is it?"
"Are there aliens."
"Really!"
"And we already have some real life evidence!"
"And what is that?"
"We found some circles!"
"Wow!"
"Yes, Alex found some bigger ones and I found some smaller ones. Alex says that he thinks his circles are from the mother ship."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, and he says mine are from the father ship."

He he he. Sometimes teachers have to work so hard at their "yes, I'm taking you seriously" face...It's so hard not to laugh!

But really, their logic astounds me. Thermos - furnace. Sound the same, and do almost the same thing. If I need to show you my listening body, my skeleton must be listening too. Obviously. And if there's a mother ship, there has to be a father ship right?

Oh kids. I miss you!

back to the supply world

2009-04-06T09:05:00.002-04:00

As I mentioned earlier, I have been back to my old little school a few times since my LTO ended. And it has been great. All the teachers are glad to see me, I get to peak in on my old class, and it's so easy since I know all the school's routines and where everything is, and all that jazz.

So I was in a grade one class for two days, because the teacher had tonsillitis and strep throat at the same time (eek). I got there and understandably a few of the kids were confused. "Are you going to be our teacher today?" they asked. I told them yes and they were happy. I was obviously familiar, but in some ways they thought I belonged somewhere else... One student asked, "What grade do you really teach?" "I did teach grade two, right down the hall, but now I'm just a supply teacher," I answered. "So is it going to be hard today?" "No, no no," I said, trying to sound reassuring, "I'm not going to teach you grade two stuff! That would be too hard! Don't worry, we're just going to do what you normally do". "Oh," she said, sounding relieved. The poor thing thought that since I was a grade two teacher I was going to teach them grade two stuff! So cute!

Since they were learning how to do procedural writing (the steps for how to do something), the teacher had set up an activity where they had to take the steps for a task that they knew about, and put them in the right order. One of the kids said, in the tone of voice you'd expect from a teenager, not a six year old, "Soooo, we have to be able to read all this?" "Yes," I said, trying not to laugh at his smart alec comment. How do kids come up with this stuff?

God's Kingdom

2009-03-18T17:26:00.006-04:00

Everywhere I look, kids continue to amaze me. I read this book called "Amazing Grace" written by Jonathan Kozol about kids living in a place called Mott Haven, a ghetto in New York City. It is a sobering, depressing read, but necessarily so.

This is what a 12 year old (grade 6 or 7) wrote in response to the question, what is heaven like? I found it really challenging, amusing at times, and even enlightening. As children usually tend to be...

God's Kingdom

God will be there. He'll be happy that we arrived.
People shall come hand-in-hand. It will be bright, not dim and glooming like on earth. All friendly animals will be there, but no mean ones.
As for television, forget it! If you want vision, you can use your eyes to see the people that you love. No one will look at you from the outside. People will see you from the inside. All the people from the street will be there. My uncle will be there and he will be healed. You won't see him buying drugs, because there won't be money. Mr. Mongo will be there too. You might see him happy for a change.
The prophets will be there in heaven. There will be no guns or drugs or IRS. You won't have to pay taxes. You'll recognize all the children who have died when they were little. Jesus will be good to them and play with them. At night he'll come and visit at your house.
God will be fond of you.
How will you know that you are there? Something will tell you, "This is it! Eureka!" If you still feel lonely in your heart, or bitterness, you'll know that you're not there.

The author adds:
...on the back there is a picture of a bird with flapping wings. From the mouth of the bird...he has drawn a line to a bubble, as in a cartoon. Inside the bubble he has written in big letters: "NEVER MORE!"
...he is just a 13 year old, in many ways mysterious and even mystical and still a fairly normal kid and not a "child prophet"...but a thoughtful person nonetheless who has been forced by life to think more often about death than are most children of his age.

2009-03-17T17:25:00.002-04:00

A few stories about the last week.

We were having a little class discussion (class discussions are the best times, when you just get to sit and talk with the kids and find out what's really going on in their little minds), about air pollution. I was teaching them about fuel, and how using less is better and how planes use a LOT of fuel (yes, I'm brainwashing them). Of course just at the mention of the word "plane" a million hands shoot into the air, eager to tell their plane stories. After dealing with those, I talked about how you can drive your car almost anywhere in Canada, but if you want to go somewhere like China (I have two international students in my class, one of which was adopted from China), you have to take a plane because there's an ocean between us and China.

I asked them, "How do you think people traveled across the ocean before we had planes?" One suggested helicopters. Another, submarines. I explained that they did use submarines a long time ago, but not for traveling long distances, and that if we didn't have planes, we didn't have helicopters either. Of course a few of the kids knew this whole discussion was silly, because the answer was obviously boats. They used boats. "Oh!" said one kid upon discovering the idea of boats, "like a ferry!" This brought on another avalanche of stories, this time about ferries, and how they are scary when there's an 18 wheeler on board... I explained that the boats that go across the ocean are MUCH bigger than a ferry, and how it would take WEEKS to make the trip. This was totally beyond them. The whole discussion was very entertaining, and if I may say so, I think they did learn a thing or two.

So, through out the year I have implemented a system of noodle jars. This is where each table group (4 or 5 desks pushed together) has a jar, and their goal is to fill it with noodles first. They get noodles added when they are behaving well, and removed when they are not. When the jar is full, they get to have a "noodle party". Of course when I explained this system to them, they knew they were supposed to be excited about having a "noodle party" (because of the tone of my voice), but they obviously weren't quite sure what it was. The obvious response was "You'll see!!" (with the appropriate voice again), which, as far as I know, they have not realized means "your guess is as good as mine!" It's shocking how much we teachers make up as we go along.

Anyway, it just so happened that they were nearing the top of their noodle jars by the time it was my last week there. So I was especially generous with the noodles and all of the jars were declared full on my second last day. We were to have the so-called "noodle-goodbye party" the next day. So we prepared by painting our noodles. I dumped the jars into trays, squeezed out the paint and away we went. The pictures above depict this colourful and exciting event (no pictures of kids though, sadly, I'm trying to be responsible here). They LOVED the fact that I suggested they put the noodles on the tips of their fingers to get the best control. And that they got to paint as many as they wanted, however they wanted. And, since it was my second last day and I had forgotten about the stress of report cards and all that jazz, I was in a fantastic mood. I put on our favourite cd and we had a ball. I'll never forget it.

In the midst of all this, my teaching partner snuck in (which is normal) and suddenly clapped her hands to get the students' attention (which is not normal when I'm teaching). She then presented to me a book of writing that the students had done for me about why they think I'm such a great teacher and what they're going to miss about me. Working VERY hard not to cry, I graciously accepted the very thoughtful and meaningful gift. Sigh.

At our "noodle-goodbye party" on Friday afternoon, we made our painted noodles into necklaces. Many noodles ended up crushed on the floor, and there was a significant amount of frustration with keeping the noodles on the string until I could come over to tie it for them. But overall, the noodle party was a success.

After finishing our necklaces I opened a few gifts. I told them I would gladly open them after school but of course they insisted I open them in front of the class. Those two who had given me their gifts earlier, were sure to mention that so as not to miss out on the glory of giving me a present. They are so sweet and adorable. I read them one of my favourite stories Scaredy Squirrel, and reminded them of the moral of the story, that it's okay to take risks. We talked about the message I had put in each of their cards, "What makes you different is what makes you special" which we had learned a while back in a unit we were doing on making connections. I blabbed on and on about how each of them is special and if we were all the same we wouldn't be special...and on and on. They humoured me by listening and appearing to care ;)

Of course all this time I am continuing to fight the tears and trying to keep on smiling and laughing. And then, to make matters so much worse, I told the kids to come up and get their cards, and give me a hug. Well, then the fight was on. The tears were insisting and the smiles were starting to waver. One little girl sitting right at my feet said "I think I'm going to cry!" "So am I!" I responded, with a forced laugh.

I did manage to keep it all under control, realizing that if I cried, our entire class would be a giant ball of snot and tears and weepy 7 year olds. But on the way home from school that night I ended up having to pull over because my makeup was getting in my eyes and I couldn't see through the tears.

Sigh. Yes, it was a hard day. I couldn't have asked for a better school, class, teaching partner... and the list goes on. I am regrettably aware, however, of the fact that I am now doomed to find every experience following this one, sadly disappointing...

Ah well, such is life. And on the bright side, I am scheduled to be a supply teacher in my very own class on the Wednesday after March break. Yay!

the end is near and so is spring

2009-03-09T13:10:00.005-04:00

So this is my last week of teaching grade two! I can't believe that it's already March break and I'm writing report cards and packing up my stuff. Most people ask if I'm excited to be done work, looking forward to getting back to my thesis and a few other things that have been put off...the truth is, I'm not! I'm actually sad about leaving my little kids and my classroom and my school. As I usually do, I have gotten too sentimentally attached to all of these things and it doesn't feel right to let someone else come and take my place...I don't want anyone else teaching my class! It just feels like a bit of a rip to have to leave in the middle of everything...

But, such is life, and in reality it is a good thing. The timing has worked out perfectly. I can take some time to get my brain out of grade two and into my masters thesis, and then pack up and move! Wow.

Besides crying about being done my LTO, I also wanted to post a little story. It's not about my grade twos, but about a 3 year old that I happen to know. She is the most wonderful little girl you can imagine, and two nights ago during the thunder storm her mom said to her "it's a thunder storm! That means spring is coming!" In her adorable three year old voice she asked, "Where? Where is spring?"

Her parents later filled in a bit of background explaining that, after telling her that spring is "just around the corner", she continually asked "what corner?" and while riding the car would ask "this corner? Is spring here?"

How sweet!

So, it's back to the world substitute teaching: shorter days, the ability to say "no thanks!", and nothing to do in the evenings...Truth be told, I can't complain about that!

measurement

2009-02-08T11:20:00.004-05:00

We are just beginning our measurement unit in grade two. In grade one they do measurement, but they only learn to use non-standard units. That is, they measure things using blocks, or their feet, or little plastic counters or whatever. They learn to say the unit when they state the measurement of something, such as "the pencil is 9 cubes long".

So, I started them off by telling them that our custodian wants to put a carpet going up the wheel chair ramp so it isn't so slippery. How long should the carpet be? I ask them. So off they go, whispering in the hall, measuring the wheel chair ramp. We meet back at the carpet in our room to discuss the findings. I ask each group how they measured it. Some lined up rulers, others used blocks and a few groups used their feet. "We used our feet to measure the wheel chair ramp and we figured out that the wheel chair ramp is 41 millimeters long." Of course I tried to hold back my giggle. "Millimeters?" I said. "But I thought you used your feet to measure it," I say. "Yes, we did, but we decided it was millimeters."

Hilarious. So they obviously have a bit of learning to do about the meaning of a few standard units. And that your foot is not a millimeter long. And that the wheel chair ramp is most certainly not 41 millimeters long...

Here comes Valentine's! Watch out!

2009-02-04T09:46:00.004-05:00

As of yesterday morning, the legend is growing by the minute.

I was silly enough to give into the temptation to go into the dollar store and buy some Valentine's decorations. As exceedingly simple as it would have been to make them myself, I spent a few bucks on some cheesy window stickers and some hanging shiny hearts.

I came in yesterday morning and put them up around the door. The hanging hearts are very light and move whenever someone walks by, which has a really nice effect. And I'm quite proud (although somewhat disappointed) to be the only with with decorations up...

So as the day went on, the legend came together. At first I only overheard it being talked about and then got the low down.

If you touch a pink heart - no, a red heart - no, it doesn't matter what colour it is! , you will fall in love. With the closest person around. Even if you are a teacher. Even if you are already in love with someone else. And you will stay in love with that person until Valentine's - no, until the end of February - no, until next Valentine's day! And if you touch a heart twice, you will stay in love until the Valentine's day after that!! Currently there are about four girls who are officially in love in our class. Clearly they are not being careful enough around the hearts! Oh, and there is no way to get out of being in love.

Aren't they amazing? How do kids come up with this stuff? And almost instantaneously! It makes me want to buy more decorations just to see what else they could come up with!

a new name, a brilliant idea and an indoor recess

2009-01-21T10:25:00.004-05:00

First, the new name. I thought it should be added to this blog that I was called "Mrs. Sherkoch" (pronounced sure-coke) the other day. My teaching partner was away and I was in for her (on a day I don't normally teach) and so the poor confused students decided to call me a combined version of our two names...

Second, the brilliant idea. Whenever I need the kids to stop what they're doing, I count down. Rather than asking them to stop immediately, this gives them a chance to finish up. One time, I was counting down and they obviously didn't want to stop what they were working on. One smarty-pants said "I know guys! We can slow her down if we put up our hands and ask lots of questions!" Ha ha. It's true. If someone asks me a question I usually lose track of the count, or at the very least there is a long pause between numbers. Good thinking.

Lastly, the indoor recess. You might not know that when the temperature gets below a certain level, the kids stay inside for recess. This, I believe, is a board policy. Last week was awfully cold and therefore awfully crazy. Indoor recess is never fun - it only leads to way too much unused energy in the classroom. One of these days I had outdoor duty for first break. I knew the temperature was low, and asked the principal what the plan was. She said they would go out for 10 minutes of recess and then come in for the second 10 minutes and spend it in the gym. Apparently this is what we do for indoor recess - the entire school is in the gym. Sounds crazy, I thought, but okay. I hadn't yet experienced an indoor recess.

So after 10 minutes outside the bell rang and I told the students to line up as usual. Suddenly, a bunch of students started moving towards the other door and everyone started going in. Since that door was closer to the gym, I assumed there was a teacher there directing them in, so I didn't argue. Soon, the entire school was attempting to cram into one door. I made my way over to the door and decided to wait and let the other teacher direct the mob. Since nothing seemed to be happening, I slowly started wading my way through the students, into the tiny lobby and towards the gym. No one seemed to actually be going anywhere, although mysteriously there were less and less people outside. The mob was compressing - a process accompanied by lots of screaming, yelling, pushing and shoving. I used my unnaturally loud (and now useful) clap to get their attention. Since I had again assumed there was a teacher at the gym not letting them in for some reason, I told them they needed to be quiet and patient and stop all this nonsense. They did. But we kept waiting.

It slowly occurred to me that there were no other teachers anywhere to be seen. No one had let them in these doors, and no one was directing them to the gym. It was just two little students, trying to do the right thing, who were preventing everyone from going into the gym. They were waiting for me to let them in! Of course this was unbeknownst to me, and I had, in the mean time, been waiting around, deferring to a non-existent other teacher! So eventually I made my way through the masses to the gym and let them all in. And in they poured. Before long, it was me and a gym full of 180 crazy kids (give or take), bundled from head to toe sitting on the floor or wandering aimlessly with nothing to do. A recipe for disaster. I made a quick dash to the staff room and asked "Sooooo, in the gym, do they all just sit on the floor? Are they supposed to do anything?" Confirmed, everything was the way it was supposed to be. This was it.

Since we had wasted so much time coming in, we really only had about 5 minutes to spend in the gym. Then everyone went back to class and back to normal. But for a while there, things were pretty ridiculous. Can I just say that had there been an emergency of any kind, we would all have died. As it was, little people were nearly being trampled, there was screaming and yelling and pushing of all kinds...It was a complete debacle. Let's hope it doesn't happen again.

back to the "real" world

2009-01-11T15:42:00.006-05:00

Well, after a long and lovely Christmas break, I've successfully handled one week back to school. Before the break, my teaching partner and I shuffled things around a bit. So I am now teaching all of math (rather than half), art, drama/dance, gym, and computers. To be honest, I am thrilled about these new arrangements, since I LOVE art. However, with this shuffling, our schedule has also been rearranged, resulting in a full block (80 minutes) of math each day that I teach. If you have ever spent more than 10 minutes with a 7 year old, you know that that's about as long as you can get them to focus on one thing. So 80 minutes of math is slightly over the top. Thus, I must re-work my planning to include a wide range and variety of activities that are actually math, but don't usually seem like math. The key to working with little kids is tricking them into learning by disguising the learning as just having fun. That's the real challenge.

Anyways, things are going pretty well, and everyone has been really flexible. And I am getting better at two things: a) not having 40 minutes of extra time at the end of my math lesson, b) making up random math activities for the kids to do when I have 40 minutes of extra time at the end of my math lesson... :)

Here are two stories from this week. The day before school started someone asked me if I missed my students. I confidently said no - I had really enjoyed the two weeks off. But, as it turns out, I missed them more than I thought once I actually saw them again.

On Tuesday I went around the room and asked the kids what their favourite part of Christmas was. After hearing about Wii after Wii after iPod after Xbox, one girl, an absolute darling and an only child, said her favourite thing was getting her new kitten, Frost. I was pleased to see that some parents have the wear-with-all to buy something other than expensive, eye-popping, electronics. Later, the french teacher was asking the kids what they had done over the holidays. She asked them whether or not they had played with their families. The same girl asked "Does your cat count as your family?" She's so cute.

Later that day two students came up to me while we were working on art and looked like they had something very important to tell me.

Chris: "Mrs. Sherwood?"
me: "Yes?"
Chris: "James, Ashley, David and me are going to the centre of the earth".
me: "Really?"
Chris: "Yes, when we get older we are going to go to the centre of the earth because it's what we all want to be - I want to be a paleantologist, and Ashley wants to be an archeologist, and - "
David: "But the annoying thing is that I have to carry all the supplies. Because once you go down there you can't get anything, so we have to bring everything we need."
Ashley: "Like big chunks of meat."
me: "Why do you need big chunks of meat?"
David: "Well we don't know what's down there. There might be meat-eating animals so we will just throw huge chunks of meat at them when they try to get us."
me: "I see, that sounds like a good strategy."
Ashley: "And there's hot lava down there."
me: "Mmmhmm....Alright well, I think we've done enough planning for that, and now it's time to get back to work..."

Afterwords I overheard Chris telling another student that he had wanted to tell his dad about this plan but he didn't because he knew his dad wouldn't believe him. I suppose I ought to count myself lucky as one of the trusted few who get to hear about about these wonderfully ambitious, future plans...

Their creativity and curiousity never ceases to amaze me.

beans without butter

2008-12-31T15:51:00.003-05:00

So we've been working on "making connections". This is where we read a story and the kids make a connection to something in the book we've read - most of the time the book reminds them of something from their own experience. So we read a book about a kid whose mom gets a job and how things change around the house - dad starts to do the cooking, the kids have to pick up a few extra chores, there isn't as much time with mom as there was before, and mom and dad sometimes fight. Here was one of my students connections:

This story reminds me of when I had to eat beans without butter. When I ate lunch at school. When I had to yell at my kitten.

Random and totally adorable.

You may remember the clever little joker I have in my class (remember the dungeon?). She's always coming up with an interesting play on words, and often her wit is lost on the other kids. This time they were getting ready to go outside on the should-have-been-a-snow-day right before the holidays. I over-heard her repeating over and over (until I laughed out-loud from across the room), "It's snow fair that we have to go outside! It's SNOW fair!". Where does she come up with this stuff?

middle name

2008-12-10T15:25:00.003-05:00

Again, a story from the staff room. For some reason the class was talking about middle names. One boy, Ben, was asked what his middle name is. "Jamin", he said. "Jamin?" the teacher asked, thinking this was a strange name for a conservative white family to give their child. "Yes, Ben Jamin Rogers." Of course, at this point she clued in (as I'm sure you already have) to the fact that his name is just Benjamin. But he doesn't realize this of course. This was enough for a good laugh in the staff room.

teacher dreams

2008-11-13T07:46:00.000-05:00

Apparently every teacher has dreams about things going horribly wrong in their classroom. I did last night. It was my second day and for some reason another teacher was in my classroom. For some reason this other teacher was Robert Downey Jr. He had taken some time to look at what I had done on my first day, and in front of the entire class, he COMPLETELY humiliated me. He asked me WHAT I could POSSIBLY have been THINKING. You do NOT do THIS and you do NOT do THAT. And I don't know WHAT teacher in their RIGHT MIND would EVER read THIS to THIS kid....and on and on, you get the idea. At first I tried to defend myself but I couldn't. And soon the students were completely on his side, laughing at me. They were laughing at his sarcastic remarks about how stupid I was! It was horrible. Finally I just walked out of the room in a crying rage. He came out after me (apparently there was another teacher in the room to watch the kids). In the loudest whisper I could muster, and trying not to cry, I said, Well, is this what you wanted? To scare me away? Yesterday was my first day as a real teacher. That was my first time reading that book and my first time meeting those kids....He was apparently shocked and didn't know it was my first day. I asked him to come with me to the office. At which point I told someone about how he tore me apart in front of the class and how he was insulting and slandering me. Aren't those strong words? they asked. No, and here's my teaching partner (from real life) to verify what happened (because mysteriously she was there too). I was crying hysterically at this point.

Apparently Nathan rolled over, because I woke up crying, hardly able to breath.

So there you go. Maybe it does happen to everyone. At the very least I guess we should learn from our dreams. So, a word to the wise: if you are a teacher, and you see Robert Downey Jr, don't let him near your classroom.

computers and snakes and showers

2008-11-08T20:26:00.000-05:00

So on Friday we had a PD day. In their planners on Thursday, I had the kids write "PD day tomorrow. Yay!" I went around to check their planners and one boy said to me, very pointedly, "I didn't write 'yay'". "Oh," I said, concerned, "Aren't you excited about the PD day tomorrow?" "No," he replied. "Why?" I asked. "Because we have to miss computers." I just laughed. Oh computers. He would rather not have a PD day than miss computers. Amazing.

A while ago, I heard this story in the staff room, coming from the kindergarten teacher.

Andrew came in from recess and had some very exciting news to tell me. "I caught a flow snake!" He said. Admittedly, he looked a little confused and tried it again, when I asked him to repeat himself. "A flow snake! I caught a flow snake". I still wasn't sure what he was talking about. "What kind of snake?" "A flow snake". Obviously asking him this was getting me nowhere. I tried a different angle. "How did you catch it?" I asked. "On my tongue" he said. At first I was a little unnerved, but suddenly realized what he meant. "Oooooh, you caught a SNOW FLAKE!" He lit up. "Yes, yes! A snow flake! I caught a snow flake!!" Have I mentioned that I love the kindies?

As you might imagine, Halloween is an exciting time in grade two. Of course all the candy makes everyone unnaturally crazy, but the costumes are fun too. I did learn something this year, that I hadn't really thought about. As you might know, I LOVE dressing up. Always have, always will. I can remember spending hours at Value Village searching for the right shirt, or the right skirt...painting my face, sewing this that and the other thing. I would (and still do) spend hours getting ready for Halloween. Even if it's just to hand out candy.

Anyways, this is not the case for everyone. Even in grade two. We had some spare time between nutrition break and the costume parade. I thought it might be fun for everyone to go around and talk about what they were dressed up as, and why they chose to be that. The overwhelming response to the second question was, "because my mom bought this for me". Shockin'! Admittedly, there were a few other answers. There was "I'm Hannah Montana. I dressed as her because I love Hannah Montana. She's the best pop star in the world!" (grade two!!) And then there was, "I really wanted to be a skull but I couldn't, so now I'm wearing my cousin's old costume from last year." And one of my favourites "I'm dressed up as a skull. I wanted to be a skull because he said he was going to be a skull, but...". Hilarious. But most of them were something to the tune of "I'm this because my mom wanted me to be it." Turns out Halloween exists for the adults who love to live vicariously through their kids, not for the kids themselves.

This became undeniably obvious during the costume parade. The best costume in the school (although we didn't have a contest), was a kindie. He was a little adorable boy, and he was dressed up as a shower. Yes, a shower. He had a little harness to wear, with three dowels coming out of it, which held up a curtain rod, with a shower curtain (trimmed so he wouldn't trip on it) and a shower head with strings of little blue beads hanging from it. Amazing. It was a wonderful and creative and funny costume. But the truth is, no kindergarten child would think to themselves, "I want to be a shower for Halloween". Spiderman yes, Superman yes, the latest greatest "pop star" (unfortunately) yes. But a shower? No. Some people's parents...

dungeons, x-rays, extinction and other strange things

2008-10-22T22:11:00.000-04:00

A few quick stories, and a few points of frustration:

As it is now, the part about teaching that I like the least, is getting dressed in the morning. I adore "casual Fridays" or as I call them "jean day". I really don't have enough formal clothing and really prefer to be comfortable, especially when around kids!

Also, although it is true that I am now a primary teacher, and am becoming more and more teachery as the days go by ("now Jeff, it's Kathy's turn to talk"), it is beyond me why everything I bring into my classroom needs to be cute. "Buy this adorable apple-shaped timer to easily keep track of minutes in games and activites!" Give me a break. I don't want a cute timer, I just want one that works and isn't going to have it's adorable little leaf handle break off. In case you haven't noticed, there are boys in my class. They may be little but they certainly aren't into cute. Not to mention the fact that I'm not a child! Can't I have things on my desk that I think are cool, or funky? Sigh...I think I might be a little too cynical. Already! I think a contributing factor to this point of frustration is the excessive use of comic sans. I'm doing my best to stick with Century Gothic.

Ah well, such is life. On to the stories.

I made a bin for the kids to put their finished work in that says "DONE!" on the side. So I am always saying things like, "when you're finished your worksheet, put it in the done bin". Well, one little darling, who has the best sense of humour, came up to me, with this very mischievious look on her face and said, "When we're done, are we supposed to put our sheet in the dungeon??" At first I thought she was just asking me where to put her work. And I was a little annoyed, since I'd just told them. But she repeated herself, "In the DUNGEON???" I laughed hysterically. She is hilarious.

As is inevitable, the students wanted to find out how old I am. They had guesses everywhere from 30 to 50. When they finally figured out my real age, one of them exclaimed "Wow, you're young for a grown-up!" :)

Some kids are just random. Sitting beside a kid during nutrition break (aka lunch, but we have it twice a day instead of once), we were talking about x-rays. He told me that he'd had an x-ray once, of his head no less. Yes, it happened while he was inside his mom. They needed to make sure that his head was okay because his brother was always sitting on it! (Ah ha, you have a twin! I said.) And now, he still asks his brother to sit on his head. Only now his head is on the kitchen floor! Random!!

I'm not sure if this is appropriate for bloggerland, but, they were coming in from recess and one boy came up to me and informed me that another student in our class was upset because he fell and scraped his balls. The boy telling me didn't laugh; in fact he didn't really seem to think there was anything strange about what he was telling me. Alright, I said.

We were talking about how humans can harm animals, and I wanted to tell them a bit about pollution, and how wasting paper can lead to animals losing their habitats etc. etc. I asked if anyone knew what extinct meant. One very sweet girl put up her hand. "Extinct is when an animal disappears, but you can still see the bones, and then someone hides the bones". Excellent.

Truly, there is no end of amusement...

Week One

2008-10-13T12:02:00.003-04:00

Well, after one week with the grade twos I have a few short stories to tell.

1. I often say "excusé moi" instead of "excuse me". I said this to a student and the student said in an offended tone of voice, "This isn't french class!!"

2. My teaching partner always gives the kids a high five at the end of the day as they walk out of the classroom. I decided I should do something different, so I tried pound it, instead of high five. Do you know what I mean? When you just knock fists with someone? So I told the kids to do this. Well, my assumption that they knew what I was talking about was clearly wrong. Most of them wound up and punched my knuckles as hard as they possibly could. They we quite red by the end of it. I'll have to work on that...

3. One of the great things about teaching grade two is that they get excited about almost everything. As long as your excited, and use exciting words, they get totally into it. So a lot of mornings we play this game called Sparkle, where the kids sit in a circle and spell their spelling words, each students saying one letter. When the word is spelled, the next person says "sparkle" and the student after them is out. Anyways, they love playing this game. So I decided to spice it up, since they knew their spelling words pretty well already, and add in some other words from around the classroom. I told them this and they were thrilled. So I called out the usual words for them to spell and then threw in "October". In unison they all said "Oooooh!!!" and spelled it. I called out "math". "Aaaaaaaah!!" they cried. "Routine". "Yaaaaaaa!". They were hilarious. And all just about a little spelling game. Amazing.

So it begins. Of course there is a LOT to think about, but I'm having a good time, and the class is wonderful.

Ready or not, here I come!

2008-09-25T09:55:00.000-04:00

I have a job!! Everything happened so fast on Wednesday and I'm definitely still in shock.

I get a phone call from the principal of a school where a good friend of mine works. Let's call her Daisy. I had been a supply there many times last year and apparently made a good impression on the principal. So she phones me up and says they have a "potential" LTO coming up at the school, and would I like to come in for an interview. Shocked, I say of course! She says we'll have the interview at 6pm. No problem. But could I also come in now just so she can ask me some questions. I say of course! And by the way, she says, since nothing is for sure, she can't really tell me any details except that it's .5 (half time). Wonderful, I say, since I'm doing my masters part time anyways.

What luck, I'm thinking, to be able to work at the same school as Daisy! We've been friends for over five years, and went to teachers' college together! This would be amazing!

So I rush around like a crazy person trying to get myself looking presentable and to pull together a cover letter and resume package. I finally head over to the school and meet the principal there. The secretary looked at me as if I was from another planet when I asked if the principal was there. "Is she expecting you?" she asked. "Yes" I said. "I can wait but please tell her I'm here"...

The principal asks me some interview-ish questions, but as she said "this is turning out to be a very informal interview", since the phone was ringing off the hook, and people were knocking at the door...So in the course of this conversation I manage to find out a few more details. The position is to teach grade two, and I'm sharing the class with none other than Daisy!! What are the chances!!! My shock level goes up several degrees. I also find out that she is not interviewing anyone else for the position, and as long as I don't say anything too crazy at the formal interview, I'll be hired. Holy crap!!

So I go home from there and try to eat some food and not go crazy. I eventually make my way to the formal interview after trying to review some of the important buzz words like "backwards by design" and "constructivism" and "diagnostic assessment". There are two other principals in the room (along with my principal-to-be) and things are very formal. One principal asks me the questions and the others write down my answers. No one really responds to anything I say, unless I try to be funny and then they smile. At the end I'm about to leave and I say, "oh yeah, did you want a copy of my resume and cover letter?" The principal had told me to bring them. "Naw", they say. Well, I'll take that as a good sign, I think. They obviously aren't really deciding whether or not to hire me if they don't even want to see my resume.

About an hour later I get a phone call from the principal telling me that she just has to finalize this with HR, but I have the job. I thank her profusely and that's it! I have the job! Of course Nathan has been hearing about all this as it happens, and he is also really excited. And also in shock.

So there you go. I feel really undeserving since I clearly got this job on the basis of who I knew, not really on the basis of any skill or talent I might have. Which just goes to show that it really is who you know. But I certainly can't complain. I get to work at a super easy school, with one of my very good friends as a teaching partner. It's amazing.

So now it's off to planning, planning and more planning. Stay tuned for more exciting stories from the world of HOME ROOM teaching! Yay!

Beasties

2008-09-15T09:09:00.004-04:00

Well, the school year has officially begun, and as expected, I still haven't heard from a school. I'm not surprised though, in terms of supply teaching, since no good teacher would take a day off during the first two weeks of the school year...

Thus, I have no stories to share yet. However, many of my good friends are teaching and one, who teaches jk/sk gym, has been gracious enough to share with me a lovely kindie story. Here it is, and I quote:

I take them outside today and of course it so happens that the big blue truck that empties the big blue dumpster arrives just as I have finally gotten their attention (which is difficult to get from 4-year-olds).

So, as often occurs in teaching, I abandon trying to get their attention and encourage them to leave the circle that they are in and to come huddle at the side of the school to watch the garbage truck.

No sooner have they gathered around me, do I feel a tug on my shorts. A little boy looks up at me with fear in his eyes and ultimate concern for my well being and says, "Don't go too close to the big blue bin, there's beasties in there!".

Beasties. I'm racking my brain. What have this poor child's parents been telling him lives in the dumpster?

"Beasties?" I ask, stalling for time.

"Yeah, you know, beasties, they sting you."

"OHHHHHHHHH. Do you mean bees, honey?"

"Yeah. Beasties. The little bugs that sting you."

Lesson learned. Watch out for beasties by the big blue bin.

back to school?

2008-08-19T18:08:00.000-04:00

Shockingly, it's already August 19th. Yesterday the second posting of LTO jobs came out. There were a grand total of 21 jobs posted, to 14 of them I was eligible to apply. Out of those, I applied to 5. This is because I'm not done my thesis and will need to continue that until Christmas (at the latest!!), and thus cannot work full time. So I only applied to part-time jobs. Yes, I know I'm a failure, but really, it's been summer. And not just any summer. A 6-camping-trips-4-weddings-18-thousand-other-events summer. Hence, very little thesis work has been done...

Nevertheless, five more applications are out, and again we wait. Fingers crossed.

And just so you know, if nothing happens with this, there are always more posts. Individual jobs will arise from time to time as classrooms get shuffled around, people get pregnant or families move, and these get posted throughout the year. Two of my teaching friends got jobs in March last year. So all hope should not be lost...

Also, (and lastly) I'm still on the supply list. So if nothing else, new stories should begin to abound in the not-so-distant future. Until then, keep fit and have fun.

mid-summer update

2008-08-04T22:14:00.002-04:00

So, the first LTO posting has come and gone, and I don't have a job. I have concluded that most of the jobs posted in that round were actually already designated for someone, but had to be posted because of technicalities and the rules. Which is helpful to keep in mind, since it means that my not getting a job doesn't necessarily mean I suck. But it's also annoying, since it just makes you wonder how it is that you become one of those designated people...

Another LTO posting is coming up on August 18th. The ETFO* website (etfo is the elementary teachers' federation of ontario - the union), says this:

the next posting for LTO positions, if there are any positions to be posted, will be August 18th, 2008

Which sounds terribly hopeful, I know. But truth be told, I was expecting no or very few postings to begin with, and there were over a hundred last time, so I should know enough to expect exaggerated pessimism from these people.

Anyways, just wanted to keep y'all in the loop. Stay tuned for my next report...if there is anything to report ;)

*it is interesting to note that here in the Waterloo board we say etfo as a word - as in ettfoe - whereas in the niagara board (as far as I can tell) they say e.t.f.o. - as in the four letter names. strange. this is only one of the many differences...there they say "split class" when talking about one class that has two grades in it. here, if we say "split" we'll be guaranteed not to get the job. the proper word is "combined"...what a game this all is...

applications and other things

2008-06-26T13:40:00.000-04:00

Well folks, today is the last day of school. I'm at home, not working on my thesis like I should be. I decided to put up one last post before the summer break.

First of all, I have applied to a grand total of 38 LTO positions for the fall. LTO stands for long term occasional, and means filling in temporarily for a teacher who's on leave - maternity or otherwise. The jobs are all over the place - including a couple that I would absolutely love, ranging from teaching music to the old-order menno school I was at in the fall (see post), to teaching grade two down the hall from the worst class in the school, with all kinds of stuff in between. If I get a job, I'll let you, bloggerland, know.

Second of all, a while back we were watching the Halifax comedy show and one of the comedians was talking about smoking pot, and how it's best not to do it before school cause you'll get found out, and so on. But then he said "kindergarten is the only grade where you could smoke pot before class and not get caught". I thought this was hilarious and completely true. Some kindies are so out of it, it really does make you wonder...

And speaking of the worst class in the school, here's another story from them. I was on lunch duty, walking around from classroom to classroom. I come in and there they are, tossing an orange around their desks. I'm about to tell them to stop, when one kid stands up just as another kid is throwing him the orange. He doesn't notice and sits down at the exact moment that the orange lands on his chair. He sits right on it, squishing its juice all over the place. I break down laughing my head off along with the rest of the class. Of course I never did manage to get them in trouble for throwing food...

And lastly, I had the good fortune of supply teaching in a class where there was a student teacher. He did all the work and I was just there to satisfy the rules. The grade ones were sitting down to hear "Stella, Queen of the Snow" (which is a great book by the way) and here's what happened:

teacher: "this book was made in the year 2000"
kid: "I wasn't even born!"
other kids: "wow"
problem-child James: "Mr. Smith"
teacher: "Yes James"
James: "no one was born when dinosaurs were alive"
teacher: "okay James"

Talk about random. Hence the above comment about pot-smoking kindies...

So hope you all have a wonderful summer. See you in September!!

in trouble with the principal

2008-05-21T16:23:00.005-04:00

I don't usually do posts like this, but today I will. It will be thoughtful, not really very funny, and possibly boring. But my thoughts will be written down, and you'll know a bit of the other side of supply teaching.

Yes, I was sent to the office today. I was in the class across from "the worst class in the school". It was grade five and they were horrible. The day started off rough, and knowing that the vp and principal encouraged me to make use of them, I called the vp into our class. She gave them a little lecture and they calmed down. After the break I made a deal with them, involving losing and earning gym time. That was incredibly effective and they were as good as gold for those 30 minutes. After second break things just fell apart. We watched a Bill Nye video (for those of you who think that was just a part of your childhood, think again. Teachers love Bill Nye the Science Guy!!), and then were supposed to be doing math. It was a disaster. I sent one kid to the office and then had the principal come in and she stayed for the last 20 minutes of the day. I was really disappointed because I thought the kids were going to be able to hold it together. No such luck.

So, as she was leaving the classroom, she asked me to come to her office before I leave. Yikes. So I did, and I was in trouble. She told me that we'd had this conversation before (which we had) - I need to be more strict. And it's so weird because I never thought I'd have this problem. I have never had trouble telling kids what to do or to be quiet or anything. I always thought I was on the strict side. I think of working at a summer camp where it was good-cop bad-cop and I was always the bad cop. Obviously not bad enough. And I don't mean to say she was being mean or unreasonable. She's completely right. I have issues with classroom management. I am "hesitant" to draw the line and not let kids cross it. To say something and then follow through with it. And I never knew.

I think it has a lot to do with the whole being friends with the kids thing. Which again, I never thought I'd have a problem with. But seriously, when a kid comes up to me after school in tears, because he might miss track and field tomorrow because I might tell the principal he was bad, it breaks my heart. I live for the moments when I walk into a school and kids see me and light up, saying "Hey! What's up? How are you? Are you in our class today? Yessss!". It just makes me feel so good. But really, if I aim for that, if I try to give them the "you should know better than that, smarten up, come on" look after telling them to stop, instead of the "STOP THAT" yell with a trip to the office, they aren't going to like me any better. As the principal said, some of the regular supply teachers she has in are the most strict people you've ever met and the kids love them. And the behaviour kids especially. Which I know. It's not like I haven't always told people how much kids need boundaries and actually like them, and feel safe and comfortable when they know the rules, bla bla bla...

So, right now I am going online to order "The First 100 Days of School" and "Secrets of Discipline". I'm not 100% convinced that they are going to help me out, since I feel like I know what I need to do and I'm just not doing it. But at the very least, I will be able to say to the principal the next time I'm in that I've ordered the books she recommended, so she knows I'm taking this seriously. And so that in an interview when they ask me about my weaknesses, I can say classroom management. And when they ask me what I've done about it, I can say I've read these books...

Sigh. It's a bit tough when you think you're "a natural" and then you get in trouble with the principal.

But, on the bright side of all this, I am really encouraged by the fact that she took 20 minutes at the end of her day to talk to me about this, to let me ask her some questions, to recommend some books to me. To me this says that I'm not a write-off. That she is investing in making me a better teacher, because she thinks I have potential. So it can't be all bad.

So, next time it's no more Mrs. Nicewood. You look at me wrong and you are heading straight to the office. No ifs ands or buts.

Good luck with that.

kindies - part two

2008-04-30T17:44:00.001-04:00

Here are two more little stories that came out of those few kindergarten days I had.

They both took place during "activity time". In kindergarten, as I'm sure you can remember, there is lots of time to play. And there are lots of different little stations you can go to play in. Places like the sand box, the painting, the blocks, and the play-house. So, at activity time, the kids are all scattered about the room, doing their own thing, and my job is essentially to make sure they aren't pulling each other's hair out, or stuffing things up each other's noses or anything like that. So I walk past a few little boys building things with the blocks. As they drive their little toy trucks around the construction site they've created, one starts to sing, "I believe I can fly", and the others join in. "I believe I can touch the sky" they sing together. Not Barney, or Fred Penner or Raffi - these four year old boys are singing R Kelly. Hilarious. Adorable. It sounds a bit like Alvin and the Chipmunks.

So I continue on my way, and come to the play-house. There are, not surprisingly, two little girls playing there. I overhear them and stop to listen. Of course they notice me and come over to explain what's going on.

"Our husbands are always late," the one tiny girl says. "Every day. Every day they are late for supper. They come home late from work."

"Oh no!" I respond, going along with it of course.

"Yes. So now they are fired. " I interpret this to mean they can no longer be their husbands because the wives are firing them. Which was very funny.

Clearly the other little girl is similarly confused, "We're going to get fired!" she cries.

But, to clear it up, the other one continues, "They're fired," she says again, "we called their bosses".

"Oh!" I say, very amused, but trying not to make it too obvious that I'm laughing at them. Two little miniature wives, so upset about their husbands constantly being late for supper that they call their husbands' bosses and get them fired so they won't be late any more!! So funny. How do their little brains come up with this stuff?

kindies - part one

2008-04-14T16:56:00.004-04:00

So I've been to three kindergarten classes in the past three weeks, and yes, as promised, they have provided material for the blog. Todays events were short but sweet.

When the kids first come in, during attendance, apparently the teacher always says hello to each child, and they are supposed to say hello back in a creative way. So I tried it. Many didn't say anything, and barely looked up at me when all the other kids pointed to them to let me know they were here. Others said a shy but cute "hello". One pointed to his elbow and said "I have a boo-boo on my elbow hello". No pause. Just as if it all went together like any other normal sentence. Still one other said, with a karate chop, "hie-yah! hello". These were all really amusing. Luckily I had a co-op student in the room (who tipped me off about this little routine) who I could laugh with about their funny responses. But let's not forget the several kids who said "bow-chicka-bow-wow hello". Yes, they are in kindergarten. Obviously this is a thing for them. They think it's pretty funny and I really can't argue. Hilarious.

During the course of the day, it became clear that a lot of kids would rather just call me teacher, or shout "excuse me!" than saying my name. I never thought of it as an exceptionally difficult name to remember, or say or anything, but maybe that's the problem. Anyways, one little girl ventured an attempt, and called me Mrs. Happywood. I actually got her to repeat it so I could be sure. Mrs. Happywood! Isn't that great?

As much as I can't honestly say "I love the kindies", because they are so stinkin' picky about everything being done the right way, in the right order, with the right song and dance to go along with it, no one can deny that they are adorably hilarious.

"kids' view of the world"

2008-03-31T09:23:00.002-04:00

I have been so busy lately that I haven't been supply teaching as much as before. Which means I haven't been generating much material for my blog. So I was at chapters the other day, and found these two books. One's called "kids' view of the world" and the other is called "kids' view of God". They were five bucks each. So I bought them. And they will supply funny (although perhaps not as meaningful) material for my blog until something worth while happens to me again in real life. This afternoon I'm supplying in another jk/sk class, so we'll see what happens...

In the mean time, enjoy.

Growing Up

"growing up scares me because all the girls are going to want to kiss me"
- sage, age 5

"When I grow up I want to be famous - then you'll get a lot of attention and slaves who do everything for you"
- amelia, age 8

"I can't wait to grow up so I can do dangerous things like cooking"
- grace, age 5

If I can't get an A, no one can!

2008-03-09T22:35:00.000-04:00

Admittedly, this story didn't happen to me. Hopefully I get it right. Thanks Kaitlyn!

So a couple times a year there comes a time when teachers have the pleasure of doing parent-teacher interviews. You probably remember how much your teachers and parents loved this event. Yeah right.

This time, a parent had already been complaining about her daughter's less-than-satisfactory marks. Anticipating a difficult customer, the teacher had prepared a clear and thorough presentation of the student's work, explaining the teacher's justification for her actions in a gentle but firm way. The interview went surprisingly well, with the parent taking it all in and asking only a few questions. When the teacher was done, the parent paused, and then responded. "Okay but...Remember the "Special Me" project they had to do at the beginning of the year? I -uh- she worked really hard on that. And I - she put a lot of thought into it and made sure to underline all the words...I, I mean, she..." Finally she gave up. "Fine, I'm just going to say it. I did that project! and I think I deserved to get an A on it! I've got a degree! If I can't get an A on a grade five project, who the heck can?"

A pause. Trying not to laugh/cry/let her mouth hang open for too long, the teacher calmly explained that the students were marked on their confidence, volume, etc. in their presentation, so that's why she didn't get an A...

Of course all calmness went out the window after the parent left...Did that just happen? Did you hear what I just heard? All that time she was complaining about her daughter's marks, all she really cared about was that stupid project that she didn't get a good mark on?! Good grief.

Some people's parents.

mixed feelings

2008-03-06T21:14:00.006-05:00

Funny and sad.

The funny part: It was one of my first supply days and I was called in to a French immersion class. Yes, just anyone can get assigned to just anything. Of course I took French until grade ten but I certainly can't speak it now beyond saying my name and asking to go to the washroom. So I introduced myself to the grade twos and informed them that I didn't know how to speak French. I told them they could speak French to me if they wanted, but I wouldn't be speaking French to them today. They cheered.

The sad part: Later on that day, a little boy came up to me and told me his parents were getting separated. He wasn't sad, per se, but he was confused for sure. Sigh. Life is tough for little kids.

"the worst class in the school"

2008-02-29T09:03:00.003-05:00

I have finally gotten a call from my favourite school. It's the one I volunteered at before teacher's college, and it's super multicultural, which I really love. So I'm pumped. I arrive sufficiently early, and someone who I don't know, but who turns out to be the vice-principal, takes me to my classroom. It's the one I volunteered in. Perfect! I tell her how thrilled I am to be here, and how much I love this school, and how she should call me any time. She explains that she's looking for "regulars" and is thrilled to meet me. Amazing! The day is off to a wonderful start. She pauses for a moment. "Now, I know you'll be fine..." she says gently, "but I just wanted to warn you that this is a really tough class." "Okay..." "So don't hesitate at all to call us if you need any help. We are behind you and will come to support you if you need it. Don't feel bad if you need to call us." I laugh, perhaps a bit nervously. "Okay."

The bell rings and the kids start streaming in. I'm standing outside the classroom happily greeting them, answering some pleasant and some rude "who are you?"s, and just generally psyching myself up for a tough day. Taking it as more of a challenge than as a threat...I can handle it.

"Hi, I'm the principal". She has found me in the hall, and has come to give me the low down. "Oh hi, I'm Rosilee Sherwood." "Hi. I just wanted to warn you that you have a really difficult class." "Oh thanks. I heard that." "So just don't hesitate at all to call us down if you need to. I can sit in your classroom for the whole day if you need me to. We will not look down on you if you call for help. We will look down on you if you come to us at the end of the day and tell us how horrible they were but you didn't ask for help." gulp. "And please send students to the office. I will be really surprised if you don't send anyone to the office. You have to be really firm with them or they'll walk all over you. Okay?". double gulp. "Okay." "I can't punish them tomorrow for something they did today. It doesn't help anyone to write a horrible letter to the teacher telling him about how bad they were but not doing anything about it." "Okay." smile "Okay. Have a good day." smile "Thanks."

I walk into the classroom still optimistic. The overwhelming message is "you can't handle this", and my response is "yes I can". So, the day begins. My first tactic is taking away gym. I hold that over their heads like a piano teetering at the top of a tall building. I put x's on the board, count down from 5, yell a bit, and put more x's on the board. They try to be quiet. They scream at each other to shut-up-or-we're-going-to-miss-gym.

Yes, they were horrible. Yes there were about 20 boys and about 8 girls. Yes they were throwing little bits of eraser at each other all day. Was I overwhelmed? no. Did I break down or lose it in a fit of crying or screaming? no. Did I send several students to the office? yes. Did the principal hear us from down the hall and come and stick her head in the door several times? yes.

It's nutrition break. I'm in the work room cutting something up. The vp walks by. "So how's it going?" she asks me. "Oh fine," I say with a smile. It is going fine. "Well, yeah, they are the worst class in the school" she says. I laugh, "Yeah, I think things are going okay".

Wow. Harsh. The worst class in the school.

It's the end of the day. Gym has come and gone, so there is no longer a threat in that. The next worst thing is to add minutes to the end of the day. I have decided to do a bit of a classroom clean-up to impress the homeroom teacher when he comes back tomorrow (although I wouldn't be surprised if he never came back...). This was not a good idea since it means allowing people to be out of their seats. Things have gotten to the point where kids are standing on chairs, throwing things, yelling and screaming. I am also yelling. The better kids (mostly the girls), have collected a giant heap of bits of eraser from the floor. I have counted down. I have yelled. I am now calling the vp. I say, "I need you to come and sit in the classroom for a bit." "No problem," she says. Students notice that I've called her, and they start getting worried and start to quiet down. They know this is serious. She comes in and starts right into them: She is ashamed that two supply teachers have had to call her to come to the classroom in the last two days. She is upset that as the oldest students in the school they are acting like seven year olds. She is disappointed because she expected more from kids who she knows have a lot of potential. They are quiet. They are not moving. I inform her that they will not be leaving when the bell rings and she agrees. We wait. "You have wasted my time, I will waste your time". Classic.

It's about two weeks later. I'm back to my favourite school, this time in a calm little grade two class. I see one of the students from "the worst class in the school". He remembers my name, and seems thrilled to see me.

Bitter, bitter cold

2008-02-12T08:45:00.000-05:00

So it's a ridiculously cold day (okay Kat, not as cold as Thunder Bay...) and everyone is talking about it . The kids are still going out for recess, but not without an inspection by a teacher, checking for proper gear. Everywhere you look people are bundled to the max, shaking their heads saying "Holy crap it's cold out here!". Because it is.

So the day ends and I head to the office to give back my key. I'm all bundled up myself, and try to keep up a bit of conversation with the secretary (because it's always good to be on their good side...).

"Did you have a good day?" she asks pleasantly.

"Oh yeah, they were really good" I respond, as I put on my hat and pull my hood over it. "It sure is a cold one out there," I say.

"Well, this is Canada," she states, sounding a little annoyed. Yikes.

"But at least you're dressed properly," she says, seeming to lighten the mood a little. "But I'd probably wear snow pants". Oookay. Sorry I brought it up. Note to self: do not talk to this secretary about the weather.

It's just funny how some people hate it when people talk about the weather. They think we should be used to it by now. That this is just the way it is and there's no need to mention it...
Well I think they should be used to talking about the weather by now! That's just the way it is in Canada. People talk about the weather. And especially in tropical Southern Ontario - complaining about whatever it is that we happen to be experiencing at the time (cold, hot, rain, snow, hail, sun, cloud...) is just what we do. There's really no need to get all bitter about it.

good old old order

2008-02-04T10:02:00.000-05:00

First of all, you should be warned that I will not be posting this often forever. Since I've already had about five months of supply teaching, I've got a bunch of stories saved up. Once they're done, we'll have to wait for more to happen...

Anyways, near the beginning of the school year, I got a call to go to a little school way out in the sticks. Fine. At that point I was taking anything I could get. As it turned out, this school was made up of 50% Old Order Mennonites (not sure if that's supposed to be capitalized, but I think they deserve it). It was totally amazing. Not that I've never seen true blue Mennonites before, but I haven't really interacted with them. Of course all the boys were wearing their straw hats, and all the girls their buns or braids. All the boys were wearing their plaid shirts with black pants and suspenders. Which actually suspend their pants. So regardless of the actual size of the pants, they stayed up, some of them just sort of floating around their bodies. Which makes perfect sense, since they can just grow into them. And of course the girls were wearing their tiny floral print dresses (the dresses aren't tiny, the print is) with pinned on aprons. Which seemed to get used all the time, amazingly, even in school. And they all spoke with an accent of some kind, which I can't quite describe. So much so that at times I couldn't understand what they were saying to me. But it's basically exactly how you would expect these kids to talk.

They happened to be doing presentations that day about themselves. The girls all talked about how much they love animals, because they're adorable and soft and cuddly. And especially how much they adore babies because they're so cute. They actually used the word adore. All of them. And the boys love farming and horses and farm equipment. It was a complete blast from the past, but not. Because they exist right now. It boggles my mind. And sitting in every-other chair, are regular non-Menno kids, wearing their jeans and hoodies, asking questions like, "do you ever wish you could watch tv?" and "have you ever ridden in a car?". Of course. It boggles their minds too.

But the thing that really got me happened during art. I had carefully set out all their supplies during the break, and was just giving some final instructions. I asked if there were any questions and then put them to work finishing up their water-colour paintings. As I'm saying "okay, let's get to work then", I realize that they don't have any paint brushes. Before I can think twice, or even finish my thought in fact, a few girls have already handed out paint brushes to half of the class. I thank them and everyone starts painting.

This might sound pretty unremarkable, and perhaps it is, or perhaps it should be. But to me it's not. To me, these are kids that take initiative. These are kids that see a problem and stand up and do something about it. Which is rare. And I can only imagine that they've had to live this way to get by in their lives at home, with tons of kids, tons of work to be done, and no tolerance for laziness or complaining. If you have a problem, you do something about it. On the other hand, in other classes I've experienced, we have the non-Mennos, who have grown up with one, two, or (gasp!) three kids in the family, where a lot is done for them. They put up their hands and say absolutely ridiculous things like, "my pencil is broken," or "I don't have any paper", when they clearly know what to do about these situations! But they just don't do it. They just aren't self-motivated. So how do you teach that? How do you teach them to be self-motivated? Sigh...

nut-free

2008-01-31T15:10:00.000-05:00

As is probably common knowledge by now, most schools around here are nut-free. Of course I am aware of this fact. However, being myself, I tend to be somewhat forgetful. So I'm wandering the halls on duty one day during nutrition break (yes, for you non-education people out there, it's called nutrition break, not lunch), while the kids are eating. Trying to be the nutrition-conscious person that I'm not, I'm eating trail mix. Delicious. One kid says to me, "what's in there?", eying the bag in what I took to be a curious way. I think, how nice. What a friendly kid trying to make conversation with the supply teacher. "Oh, y'know, peanuts, almonds, raisins, cranberries..." I inform him, smiling pleasantly. It quickly becomes clear that neither curiosity nor friendliness have sparked this conversation. "You're not allowed to have nuts in school," he states flatly. ... gasp ... A few more pairs of eyes are added to his, curious and condemning, wondering what I'm going to say next. What do I say next? I go with the ever popular, "yeah...I know". I do know! I just forgot! I quickly exit the classroom and hide my face in shame. What an idiot! How could I forget that you can't eat nuts!! Nevermind, eating them while walking from classroom to classroom, spreading the deadly evidence all over the school!! Needless to say, I have been sufficiently embarrassed to ensure that I will never eat nuts at a school again.

Attack of the HOBO!!

2008-01-30T18:06:00.000-05:00

So I'm doing a standard classroom clean-up with a grade four class. Two students leave the portable to dump the recycling. Slowly rumour gets back to the class that there's a "hobo" outside. Yes, a hobo. As in, a person who is without a home. Panic is stricken into the hearts of some, while others, overcome with curiousity go tearing OUT of the portable. Yes, without any apparent thought whatsoever, half of my class goes running out the door. I am in complete shock. What on earth could they possibly be thinking? Of course I run out to the porch, stand shivering in the freezing cold and scream at the top of my lungs "GET BACK HERE!!". A few of them turn around and come back. Others run into the school and still others are already out of sight. Back in the portable, the more imaginative ones in the group are striking terror into the hearts of anyone willing to listen..."He jumped out at me and I screamed and ran away!", "What if he has a gun!!", "What if he's coming to shoot us all!!", "Do you think we'll have to stay here over night?"....

Eventually all of the stray students trickle back into the classroom and we "meet on the carpet" for a stern talking-to. "First of all, in any type of emergency, you do NOT run OUT of the portable TOWARDS the apparent danger!!" and so on. You get the idea.

It was basically completely ridiculous. I promptly reported the whole thing to the principal, just in case she got any phone calls from worried parents wondering about the alleged gunman at the school...

post the first

2008-01-30T17:56:00.000-05:00

Hello people. Well, I have thought many times about having a blog, and I'm still not sure it's a good idea. However, I think that having a specific topic like this will help. So, on with the show!

My first story is not the first one that happened to me, but I feel that it must come first, to explain the name. As you might know, Mrs. Driftwood is not my real name. It's Mrs. Sherwood. But in a junior kindergarten class, what does real really mean? They're too little to be able to remember something as tricky as Sherwood. So, a bunch of kids were calling me Mrs. Woods (an obviously simpler alternative), and one particularly adorable one was calling me Mrs. Driftwood (not at all simple, and in fact quite surprising - you wouldn't even expect a four year old to know the word driftwood!). It was hilarious. Too hilarious and cute to correct, so it continued on throughout the day. And now it's stuck...at least in bloggerland. Of course there was also the kid who would scream out in frustration from across the room "It's Mrs. Sherwood!!"