What Ms. Frizzle was really thinking

I Will Survive

As a follow up to my rant- I am still alive. I am still ready for the year to be over, but I am telling myself that I am going to make it. I took my rant down because I saw what that did to Gundy and I don’t want to get famous that way. My friend Hank is still driving me crazy and hating me because he doesn’t have a brown crayon even though I gave him a brand new crayon and he lost it, but we are going to make it. I do have to give a shout-out to my girl that brought me an iced white mocha last friday. She knows who she is and she’s awesome. My fellow employees are my only saving grace. They are hilarious and they keep me upbeat even when I think it is impossible. I will miss them next year for sure and they have NOT made it easy for them to leave. This is a gift and a curse. I do need to announce to my trusty readers that this blog will soon turn into an account of my new adventure to Germany next year because I got a job teaching Kindergarten in Berlin and I couldn’t be more excited…or terrified. Please be praying for the next steps of this process as getting over there is going to be interesting to say the least. Basically, I have no idea what I’m doing, but God is going to hold my hand through it. Thank you to all of those that have supported me this last year, I can’t believe it’s already over. I hope my stories kept you laughing and I am sure to have more to come as I share the blunders of adjusting to a new culture. I can assure you I won’t do it gracefully. 

Ungrateful

Ms. Wolfe I love my mom and dad-not you.

This he says to the teacher that let him wear a batman mask all day at school and has since fixed it…twice.

Serenity Now

(I am lining kids up on the playground to go inside after lunch) (no, those aren’t typos)

Hank: BUT MS. WOLFE WE NOT PLAY!

Me: Sorry, it’s time to go inside the next class will be lining up soon.

Hank:BUT IT’S DAGERRROUS!

Me: Why is it dangerous?

Hank: THE BUILDING IS BE ON FIRE!

Me: No it’s not, get in line, let’s go.

-He crosses his arms forcefully and starts wailing about. 

I am seriously about to lose my mind.

Beer

Ms. Wolfe why do you drink beer?

That’s not beer! It’s Dr. Pepper

Too Many Too Much

Well after Spring Break I have been keeping a decent list of stories to share and am just now getting around to sharing them all. Good Luck.

We will start back before Easter when I was reading a book that objectively told the story of Jesus’ Resurrection in “kid speak.” When I got to the part about them rolling away the stone it said that Jesus wasn’t in the tomb anymore. Hank shouts “He go to Mexico?!” No Hank, he didn’t go to Mexico.

A few minutes after that there was one (only one) loud thunder crash that kind of scared all of us a little and I have told my kids in the past that if it thunders or lightnings or the power goes out that they will. not. scream. They all looked at me when it hit and I gave them the look of “don’t you dare” and they froze. Hank yelled “It’s THOR!”

During bathroom break one fine morning which, by the way, is my least favorite part of the day I tell me 8 billion times that is isn’t share time. They have yet to get this. I am standing there so I must be ready to hear their stories. One little boy who is super precious and will be dashing when he grows up and have to beat the women off with a stick told me that when he grows up he is never getting married because girrrrls drive him craaaazy.

Moments later during this bathroom break one girl asked me if I had a boyfriend. I am actually surprised that they haven’t asked me about my husband or boyfriend more. None of them have really asked me before. I said no and that was the end of it. She didn’t really care. After she went to the bathroom, the girl behind her told me that maybe it was because I needed to wear more makeup. Thanks. “What kind of makeup do I need to wear?”

“Blush and mascara and lipstick.”

“Are you saying I’m not pretty enough as I am?”

“Well no, but then you would look like a model!”

“Ok, I’ll take that”

One morning I had a “friend” who had apparently gotten hit in the face with a ball the night before and now his eye itched really bad. For some reason these kids think all they have to do is tell me and I can magically fix all of their ailments or that the office has all of the magical fixes as well. Considering I have no idea what to tell a kid with an itchy eye I told him he could go get a wet paper towel and hold it to his eye. As he was getting up, holding one eye, he stumbled a little which prompted his neighbor to say “I hope he doesn’t crash, once there was a boy dressed as a pirate and he crashed into a fence.”

“Ms, Wolfe have you been seeing Mr. Fox?”

“Wait, what do you mean by have I been seeing him?”  

*conversation ensues*

“Do you mean have I seen Fantastic Mr. Fox? yes, I have.”

Miss Wolfe I just wanted to tell you that I hate school.

Jokesters

Ms. Wolfe you are good at telling jokes

Thanks, do you have one for me

Why did the school fall off?

I don’t know, why?

Cause the teacher didn’t listen.

They still don’t have a grasp on the punchline yet.

Redos

I gave my math benchmark test this last week and somehow got an astonishing 95% of my kids passing it. That is all but one. I don’t know how it happened, but I made sure my principal saw it. My friend Hank, however, was gone the day we took the test. This could explain why all the other children did so well because they weren’t having to listen to Hank say  my name, say their name, tell us about his mom being a secret agent, tell us about his sister’s dog that got eaten by a vampire, tell us about spiderman/iron man, or cry. Nevertheless I am having to give him his test one-on-one which has taken me three days and I am still not finished. As we were going through the test a question asks if somebody wanted to know how many fingers there were in their class should they count by ones, tens, or twos? To overly prompt my friend, I asked him how many fingers he had. Most children can easily tell you ten, but not Hank. He has to count them out. He started by holding up 8 fingers and counted 1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8. I said, “well what about this finger?” and he had nine fingers up. I thought he would notice that last finger was still down, but he didn’t. 1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8..9. “And this one?” I said. 1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8..9..10. Success! Now for the tester, “So, Hank, how many fingers do you have?” (Slight panic in my heart thinking we will go through this all over again) “10.” Than goodness. Here’s hoping I can get through the rest of the test before next week is over.

Valentine’s Day, Optimus Prime and such

Love is in the air in my classroom as we have been celebrating Valentine’s Day this week. Our party is tomorrow and it is so funny to gross my kids out by even mentioning love or kisses. Since there is really no way to segway from one story to the next I am just going to hit them individually.

My kids sit in tables and depending on the holiday or what we are talking about, they make names for their tables and they get “points,” which I do nothing with, but they don’t know that. When coming up with Valentine’s names one table wanted to be the valentine’s cards. Well, since I didn’t want to say valentine’s cards every time I called their table for something I said, “why don’t we just call you the v-cards,” about two seconds later I realized and said, “wait, no let’s just go with cards.” 

When I first asked the kids to start coming up with names they are supposed to deliberate at the table and all agree on one name. I know that is never actually going to happen, but they have to learn somehow. My friend Hank definitely does not have a grasp on “other people being in the world” so he jumps up with his hand raised and shouts out “trucks!” 

Me- “What do trucks have to do with Valentine’s day?”

Pause to think

Hank- “Because it’s Optimus Prime”

Lastly, today I dug out some construction paper from the bottom of the drawer to give to the kids for a project. As I was passing it out, I noticed one of the papers had some writing on it and I assumed it was just someone in a class from previous drew on it or scribbled or whatnot. Luckily I looked before giving it to a child, because it had “sex sex sex” written across it. I laughed pretty hard. I guess someone learned how to spell a new word.

There’s no crying in first grade

I wish this statement was true, but sadly it is not. Not at all. Everybody cries, all the time, about everything. That was an exaggeration, but it feels that way sometimes. Mostly it’s just two kids. One is a girl who has been overly coddled by her mother and is incapable of coping. When I gave her the test where she was supposed to use a word in a sentence every one of her sentences started with “my mom did.” The other is Hank. My friend who i have given an alias because I tell so many stories about him. He has recently been coming up with every ailment under the sun. Ms. Wolfe, I too hot. Ms. Wolfe, I headache. Ms. Wolfe, I never working. Ms. Wolfe, my arm hurts. Recently he has upped the ante to Ms. Wolfe I dying. I give him props for going big, but I don’t know what to say to him anymore. I have just resorted to “ok, go sit down.” I am pretty sure he is my test. If I can survive him, I can survive anyone.

Also this week we have been learning about MLK and the bus and racism on a first grade scale. It feels a little weird for me to teach hispanic students about racism because I wouldn’t have had to deal with based on my race. After telling them about Rosa Parks and what she did, one of my students said “Ms. Wolfe, would you have gotten to sit at the front of the bus?” Well… yeah, but I wouldn’t have agreed with it.