I finished 1st grade!

Today has been great!  I got about 10 hours of sleep because of a surprise nap, so I woke up this morning more than ready to tackle the day!

I was a little sad though because today was my last day of teaching my first graders!  My mentor teacher is taking over the teaching next week and I am supposed to go and observe the other classrooms at our school. I don't need a whole week though.  I might of mentioned this to my kids so that they would be on their best behavior  to make sure I would never have any students as good as they were.  Luckily most of them seemed sad to lose me.  I was glad though that they were excited to have their teacher come back.  I want them to miss me, but their teacher is so great and I wouldn't want them to miss me too much that they wouldn't want her back. . . that would be so sad for her.  They really do love her and I couldn't have had a better mentor teacher.  She was very supportive and she did not ever lose her concern for her students.  Some teachers feel they can take off and relax when they get a student teacher, but she was always right there at every break I had to let me ask questions or share concerns.  She let me be in control for the last couple months, but I always knew that she was ready to help if I started drowning!  

Some of my most memorable moments with 1st grade:

• Notes and pictures to: Mis. Rd, mSs. ruDD, MRS. RDUD, Miss Red, nss rud, Ms Ruub, or Mrs. Rubb
• Valentine's day party. . . one boy seriously could not believe that he would get valentine's.  He would read the note and then walk over real skippity and very excitedly say, "You REALLY gave this to me?!"  He only made it to about 4 valentines during the party. . . very cute!
• One student drank out of the urinal.  I guess I should have let him get a drink in class???
• Tears from a student who was scared of rubber bands
• two kids who just couldn't hold it long enough :(
• one student told me that "his legs were dizzy."  I wasn't quite sure what that meant.
• only sick once!
• One student was so observant, and she let me know that I am getting a little bit bigger, and my teacher was looking a little bit older.  Honest, right?
• One student decided to change his name for a day from Adam to Steve.  Sometimes he would forget and have to cross out Adam to write "Steev".  He didn't like being called Steve the next day, just Adam :)
• Students that pronounce "three" as "free" and spell it like that on every paper. . . even spelling tests :)
• Not getting a sticker for the day's behavior was the worst thing that could happen to them.
• One student telling me I look and smell like a beautiful bouquet of dandelions. . . I tried to not wear yellow flowers in my hair anymore.
• The same student mentioned before sprinkled me with imaginary "princess dust" as he proclaimed me the "queen of the teachers" and kissed my hand :)  Too funny!

and my personal favorite from today:

• one student farted aloud and then said, "Whoa!  Was that a teacher fart?!"  I couldn't believe he tried to blame it on me when he was on the other side of the carpet.  I just said "Nice try Stinker!"  The kids were laughing and rolling on the floor. . . I got a good laugh out of it too! The lesson didn't start up for a few minutes after that.

What a brave kid!  I will definitely miss those kids!  They have been so fun, though teachers stress and worry about the success of their students so so so so much!  Not only do teachers want to adopt all their students that come from sad homes, but they want each student to learn to read, write, do math, and all that fun school stuff that teaches them all they need to know.

I will not be gone from Central Canyon Elementary School for too long though.  I have been hired on to teach reading classes to each of the grades K-5 and I will be back in the middle of April.  I am finishing off the school year for a teacher that is having a baby and is going on maternity leave for the end of the school year.  I am really excited to get to work with each grade level and I am more thrilled that the school wants me to stay!  What a compliment!  David and I have been so blessed. . . and busy!  We like it though and those kids will be sure I am pregnant by the time summer break comes!  Yikes. . . I can't even imagine how big I'll get!!!!