New School Year – Day 8

She wrinkled her 5-year-old brows, trying to solve the problem. If they bring two snacks, they are supposed to clip them together with a springy clothespin with their name on it. “Miss Sharon?” she asked. I looked down to see that one side of the clothespin was inserted into one of two tangerines. “I can’t figure out how to clip these two together.”  This was my big smile for the day – which I was able to share with some of the other staff.

I was alone in a Kindergarten classroom that usually has both a teacher and a teacher’s aide. Let’s just say that we accomplished as much “work” as possible. I was losing patience with one girl who interrupted and asked questions about every five minutes all day long, and with a boy who consistently elbowed his way into line or over to another student to play around. I discovered that this group loves to be read to, so I read them two long Seuss books (Horton Hears a Who and Oh, the Places You’ll Go!), which was not on the original schedule. I’m comfortable enough with subbing now to realize that the teachers don’t necessarily expect everything to be accomplished – especially with kindergarten!

This classroom does not have its own bathroom (as some schools do!) so there was a continuous “potty-quest” throughout the day. Since I didn’t know their names, it was hard to keep track of who was gone, and who came back, let alone who was next. This teacher did not have bathroom passes, so I decided to create some for my sake. I grabbed two paper cups, labeled one “Boys” and one “Girls” and explained that these were passes to take to the bathroom – that they showed they had permission to go there. I also had the foresight to realize they were cups and to tell them they were not to drink out of them. They seemed to catch on. I was surprised, however, 3/4 of the way through the day, when a boy came and asked me if he was supposed to pee in the cup! Note to self: next time make the pass out of something else!

Breakfast was a huge mess – muffin crumbs all over desks and floor. So I got the kids onto the “carpet” and we talked about the date and so forth while I cleaned up the desks and two girls used a whisk broom and tiny dustpan to sweep up the crumbs around them. The sub plans said to be sure to enter the attendance into the computer before 9:00 a.m. Yeah, right. I hope they were happy that I sent a written copy to the office around 9:30.

The plans also said to take 4 kids at a time to my desk to work on the craft – Mr. Sneezy, a construction paper head (in 4 available colors, from which many kids did not choose the one that matched their skin tone!) with a tissue and two hands glued to it, and eyes and hair drawn on. This was to be done while the rest of the class worked independently on their work packets. Teacher had assumed there would be an aide in the room. Instead, I ditched the afternoon work period (after the we-don’t-want-to-rest-period) and pulled ALL the tables together into one long line, placing 24 chairs around it. This was much more manageable for having everyone do the craft at the same time, since I could keep an eye on them all at the same time. (Usually the tables are set up here, there, and all over, in a sort of grid). This went very well, and was indeed a very jolly time for the instigating boys and the girls at one end who decided that it was the absolute height of hilarity to draw boogers on Mr. Sneezy as well.

Overall it was a busy, and productive day. I do need to work on being patient with the continuous questions, though.