What a week! Massive weather changes made the kids go nuts! We had six children go in six different emotional directions at once. It was like herding cats!
At the end of the week, we were all exhausted. We had every kind of behavior known to the human heart - the weepy whineys, the ferocious ferret behavior we all love so much, the sneaky sneakies, and dumbo trip over your ears, huh? routine, and the savage man syndrome.
On Thursday, we rearranged chairs on the Titanic. We engineered a new behavior chart that adds a visual to "Please stop." A smiley face graces nearly every child's name. These very perfect children belong to scholar's club, and joined in the spelling bee and knowledge bee on Friday afternoon, and seven of our children could not be dislodged from their winner's chairs. We were impressed by their ability to answer brilliantly, and every one won a candy bar from the big box in the kitchen.
"How many gallons of milk does a baby whale drink every day?"
"One hundred."
"Where do you find whales?"
"In all the oceans of the world."
"Why can't some whales eat you?"
"Because they have baleen platelets and not teeth."
"Spell elephant"... and so the hour of brilliance continued.
My favorite speller was Aidan. He's so very very young (4) and he tries so very hard, and he spelled every single word correctly. Our best speller was Austin. Our most unique speller was Kaito who speaks Japanese.
For the few who have lost their smiley faces and received the blue faces, the frowny faces, or the no-face space it was a tribute to teacher's patience. Lord of the Flies was revisited on Friday. It was an experience to recall during oral surgery as a matter of stress comparison.
No matter. Friday is gone and Monday is another day, and between Friday and Monday teachers fill their time with other things just like parents do on the weekends. You hardly know we're teachers sometimes.
Blogger was down yesterday, so I didn't post. Today, I got up late - about 5:15 and worked till nearly noon finishing the trilogy I've been working on for 4 plus years. All three novels total about 1600 pages. I think it's my best writing effort so far. But it's odd to finish a book. The characters become quite real over the duration of writing. They take on a real part of your life, and when you finish the last word, it's as if they cease suddenly to be. It takes a while to let go of them. It's important to have a new project in the wings.
Next effort? Miss Molly wants me to write something on childcare. I want to write a book called Romancing Rachel about a young woman with a mother like mine.
So duty called, and I finished the Family Pages for Evansville Living Magazine. I hope someone is reading it, and thinks it's valuable.
I spent some time with Jackie and Wilbur so Miss Molly could get ready for Super Bowl Sunday. For me, the Super Bowl is the thing I make pancake batter in on Fridays for the kids. Although I have a grandson who plays football for Harrison High, I'm about as interested in football as I am in slug petting. I appreciate the skill, I appreciate the excitement, and I appreciate the danger, but watching it on TV is not fun. I'd rather iron pleats.
Tomorrow I will do the grocery shopping for school, write a column for WFIE on cartoons, and prepare kindergarten classes - and so goes the life of the nearly empty nester.
And Monday, we take our second tour of "Around the World in Culture." We began February with a look at the Arctic and the Antarctic. We studied whales, and explorers and the tragedies of the South Pole. Did you know that one of the reasons the first explorers did not survive was because as the tremendous cold strikes the continent, the land mass nearly doubles, so the length of the expedition in was half of what it was coming out, and they starved to death.
We watched little pieces of Master and Commander because it had a long section on the dangerous sea near the poles - around the Cape of Good Hope, and I wanted the kids to see the ferocity of nature to understand how brave the early explorers and sailors had been. Courage is an important element in a child's life, and sometimes a movie will say that very well.
The kids were absolutely enthralled, so I re-wound the movie and showed them a little of what it must have been like to live on a ship back in 1805. They were riveted on this movie. When the canons started bursting, I turned off the movie, but the kids roared with pleas to see the battle. I said I would compromise, and let them watch until I saw blood, and then it was done. I reminded them that it was a movie and make believe, and every child loved the artful depiction of the battle on board ship. I've never seen children so eager to learn as on Friday with little pieces of that wonderful film. Edith wanted to show them the Galapagos Islands, but we didn't have time. The film is PG 13, and besides a little blood, it's a marvelous movie and I highly recommend it. It's a movie to watch with your children so you can moderate it if you think it's necessary.
And mother's, Russel Crow is in it. Normally, all actors look the same to me. I identify people not by the face, but by the way they move - it's a perceptual disability - and he has a fascinating gait for a fleshy man. He moves his head like it weighs forty pounds. I think he did a fine job.
Anyway, this week, we will move over to parts of Africa beginning with the deserts of the north, Egypt, and the story of Moses, and Augustine of Hippo. Wednesday we are taking a field trip. Sweatshirts are in, and we will distribute them on Wednesday morning.
Blessings and I hope your team wins,
Judy
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