Organizing Earthworms

There are times that teaching 1st grade is like organizing earthworms. Before you can get them all in order, a couple of them wiggle away. Today was such a day.



In my 7 hours with TWENTY 6-year-olds today,

• 2 children came in late
• 2 different students checked out early
• 3 children visited the clinic
• 1 child went home sick
• 1 student had an accident in her pants
• 2 students had to catch up from being absent yesterday
• 2 parents dropped by to deliver coats and gloves and wanted to chat with me while they were there
• 3 students left items on the playground and had to leave class to retrieve them
• 1 child pulled a tooth causing blood to spill on the desk which caused all kinds of gross reactions from the other students
• the same child dropped the tooth causing more distraction while the class helped find it
• 1 child broke a necklace trying to force it over the other child's head - more cause for the class to hunt and be distracted
• the same child cried for a quite a while over the necklace
• 1 child hit her mouth on the desk while trying to find the necklace - more crying
• 2 children had runny noses and frequently needed to get up and blow them causing noise and reactions from others
• 1 child's hamster died last night causing her to cry off and on all day
• 1 child thought another child took his eraser causing hard feelings and angry stares
• 1 child lost his ice cream money
• 1 child didn't get the ice cream he ordered
• 2 children left for ESOL classes
• 3 more children left for reading resource help
• 2 children left for reading enrichment
• 4 students left for vision/hearing testing
• 1 child fell on the sidewalk coming back from the bathroom and had to have a bandaid (even though no blood was in sight)
• 1 child had a cough that sounded like the barking of a very loud seal all day long.

Of course, each child who missed a few minutes of class time had to be "caught up" when they returned.

In between these distractions:

• we counted mixed sets of pennies, nickels and dimes,
• we made contractions,
• we demonstrated force through pushing and pulling,
• we illustrated desert life, and
• we wrote a "how to" paragraph on brushing teeth.

I don't know for sure how much "education" soaked in today. I DO know for sure that I'm pooped!

Most days, my class runs like a well-oiled machine. Today was NOT one of those days. Today was like organizing earthworms.