A week of "whoas" (and woes)

First of all, let me just say how much I detest being sick. Seriously. I rarely am sick, so when it happens, it catches me off guard, and I do not appreciate it. Monday brought with it a terrible upset stomache which ruined my schoolday and made short and snippy with the kids (I know, but Maggie- you're already short. Shove off, you.). I hate being a meany (a surprise to any and all who have seen me at camp, perhaps. But then, I've always hated the 'law enforcer' role. It's the voice- when you can be heard a mile away, people tend to make you the "yeller".) *Side note- a LOT of parentheses today. Sorry*

Any who, I went home Monday and proceeded to vomit several times over the next 4 hours. Then I tried eating... and vomited again. Oops. It was a bad night. Now, I've got this ridiculous head cold that is making me stuffy and disrupting my whole "happy chee".

Ok, complaining over, moving on. School has been a B- this week. We started the week with more grammar (a personal favorite)- nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and adverbs. The kids are picking it up, and I'm not doing a lot of difficult work, just the basic parts of speech (there are 8- anyone know them?) and their functions. Wednesday I gave the GATES test, a test that gauges their level and their knowledge of vocab and reading comprehension. It was a light day for me since the GATES takes 55 minutes and class is only an hour. Today (Thurs), I had to split what I was doing since both 5th and 6th hour don't have class tomorrow due to an early release (lucky little....). So, in my first 4 classes, we did CBMs (quizzes that check for weekly comprehension), a writing prompt (describe the best or worst movie you ever saw), and a book review activity which helps the kids begin to understand plot, character, and theme.

But I'm sure hearing my wonderful lesson plans isn't nearly as fascinating as it should be, so story time!
   I've been going over to Candy's house on a regular basis since I get lonely and talking to myself just isn't a viable option, although it occurs with startling frequency these days. Her kids had taken to calling me 'Miss Maggie,' of which I approve, but yesterday I was upgraded to 'Auntie Maggie' since I brought them presents in the form of a Cars juice cup, and Disney Princess plate, and Capri Sun juice jammers. I am the favorite :0). I've never been an 'auntie' before (thank God. If my siblings are reading this- DO NOT HAVE KIDS YET!) and it was a pleasant surprise. Of course, this means I am now fair game for all manner of nonsense, including (but not limited to) climbing on me, hitting me with notepads, chucking plastic screwdrivers at me, reading stories, and being hugged. I don't mind the hugging part (or even the rest of it), but hitting and such is a big no no, so now I must also lay down the law and tell them no. Let me tell you, oh ignorant world (excluding those who have or had children- bless you all)- little children under the age of 3 do NOT like being told no. At all. And they do not respond well to that word. It's like working with my high schoolers. Well, scratch that- these kids are often a step above the high schoolers. :0)

Now for the 'whoa' of the week- I had a wonderful (insert sarcastic tone here) encounter with a student who thought it would be beneficial to call a book a "queer book" and then a "fag book" because some of the characters are gay. Then, after being told not to use that language, he proceeded to call the book "the brokeback mountain of novels". Good analogy, bad timing. I was livid with him. I'm used to hearing that kind of language, but to so openly show hatred for this particular group while in a classroom setting after being told not to do so... oh man. You can imagine how well that went. I laid the smack down on him. He became my first kid to stay after class, my first discipline write up, and the first kid I sincerely wanted to boot out of class. The next day, the same student asks if he "had to take the stupid GATES test," and even after I said he did, he layed his head down and went to sleep. There were 48 questions- guess how many he answered. ZERO! So I had the rest of the class pull out their heaviest books, and on my count, they slammed them down as hard as possible. The kid jolted up and looked around, and while everyone else laughed, all I said was, "You don't sleep in my class. Ever." It was menacingly awesome.