Today was: Really Good... like yesterday

Well, I got my wish: it is COLD and WINDY again... just like it should be at the end of October in San Francisco.

Another really good day, despite the fact that the kids seemed unusually antsy ALL DAY [Miles said that Halloween is to blame]. You know, I'm beginning to believe in this "power of positive suggestion" stuff. I tried telling myself this morning, "Today will also be really good day", and, sure enough, it happened.

Math went well. Today's math lesson was about extending patterns so I had the kids sit in a circle and then showed them a clap-tap pattern. After I thought that they had it down [they're smart kids, so it didn't take long], I started the pattern going around the circle by clapping, and then I had the kid sitting next to me tap his shoulders, and then the girl next to him clapped, and then the girl next to her tapped her own shoulders, etc. around the circle. Extending patterns. Next, we did another simple ABAB pattern around the circle, this time with "spooky Halloween sounds" [as I sold it]. You know, I thought we had a classroom full of hams, but, it was torture getting these kids to get into making monster and screeching black cat sounds. Jeesh. We moved on to a working through a couple of mathbook pages together [again, these kids are bright] and I looked at the clock - we still had 10 minutes until recess. We were still sitting in a circle, so I tried a "spooky Halloween sounds" ABCABC pattern on them - I solicited ideas for the sounds and got "BOO!", "WOOOO!" and, bless his heart, this one cute kid in class suggested "a pumpkin". I asked, "What sound do you think a spooky pumpkin would make?" He drew a circle in the air with this fingers. So, the pattern being passed/extended around the circle of kids ended up being BOOO!-WOOO!-[draw circle in the air]. Tomorrow, we're having a Pattern Fashion Show where the kids will get to stamp colored [red, yellow, blue, green] bear patterns onto articles of clothing [necktie, bowtie, hair bow, suspenders, wristband, headband] cut out of white paper. Why doesn't everyone want to be a Kindergarten teacher??

During Read Aloud time on the rug today, I looked over and saw that one of the girls in class had a bloody nose. I ran and got a tissue and got her to walk with me to a chair where she could then sit and tip her head back. When the first tissue was saturated [it was a gusher], she reached over to drop the tissue in the trashcan that I brought nearby and the girl with autism ran over, shoved [and I mean SHOVED] the girl with the bloody nose aside, and sat down in the chair so that she could be next to me. I'm adding another tick in the "She's Getting Too Attached to Me" column.

After school today, one of the most active parents in the class mentioned that she would like to help out with the Halloween party in class on Friday. She said [and I quote]: "Oh, this is a busy time around our house. We've got family and friends coming from all over. We're part of a witch community, you know, so this is one of our High Holy Days." O-k.

So, I don't have to go into school on Fridays, but I'm going to go this Friday afternoon so that I can be a part of the Halloween festivities. The only thing is that Miles is insisting that I dress up. I don't like Halloween, and I REALLY don't like dressing up for Halloween. You might think that a guy who wants to be a Kindergarten teacher would LOVE dressing up on Halloween. Yeah, you MIGHT think so, but not in my case. The school has publicized that they want kids to come dressed as "What I Want to Be When I Grow Up", because they don't want ninjas and "Scream" killers and superheroes, but, how would I dress up as a teacher? Really, the whole idea smacks of reinforcing stereotypes, if you ask me. What on Earth am I going to wear?! I thought about just slapping some bunny ears on my head [coincidentally, we have a pair hanging on our wall...] and calling it a day, but I don't think that I could come up with a reason for why I would want to be a bunny when I grow up.