I just got back from a fifteen day excursion through some of Americana. There were some places I wanted to see that seemed to be essential sights for my bucket list. We saw Mt. Rushmore, Yellowstone/Old Faithful, and the Grand Canyon, and a petrified forest. On the way back, we stopped to see a reproduction of the Parthenon in Nashville. Along with time spent with the family, it was an awesome vacation. A day spent resting, and tomorrow I will start setting up my classroom. I don't officially start back for two weeks, but other than this fifteen day vacation, I have done something school related almost every day this summer. Is that good or bad? I'm not sure.

So, Friday, April 1st, I wrote down the homework assignment.

Reading: Read for 20 minutes. Record in Reading Log.
Writing: Write a 3 page story about the best present you ever recieved.
Science: Find 10 simple machines in your home. Identify the simple machine and its state of matter.
Social Studies: Write a report on Greece, Rome or Mali. Include illustrations.

Sternly, I reminded the students that there is no talking in the morning as they write down their homework assignments and begin morning work. As they finished writing down their homework, I went to each student, as I do each morning, to initial their planner. But Friday, instead of initials, I wrote down "April Fools!" and, after making sure they saw what I wrote, quickly shut their notebook.

Things I find funny, and charming.

1. The students rarely "tell" on me to other students. Each student is surprised, because...

In my district, we give tests in each subject at the end of the quarter. Yesterday was our math test. It consisted of nearly fifty questions for my third grade kiddos. My special ed kids did not finish the test until about 2:30. (Started about 9:45, had a break for music and lunch, no recess) I still had regular ed kids finishing until about 2:00.

Why? Our SOLS won't take that much time. But our district's math department prides itself on the "rigor" of these assessments. Which really means that they use the most convoluted questions to "test" the student's understanding of the concepts.


When will the math gurus (who apparently haven't been in a classroom in years) remember that our kiddos are only eight years old, and deserve a fair test. District average was 60% on this lovely test. My class and school did a few points better. Does that mean we are terrible teachers, or that the kids don't know math? No, it means...

Yesterday, my alarm went off at 4:00 in the morning, which is my usual wake up time. My particular clock is set to go off only during the week days, not the weekends. It took me awhile to figure out that it really WAS Tuesday, and not a major malfunction in my alarm clock.

I wasn't quite so sound asleep this morning. I couldn't sleep because I was creating/grading tests all night. (Do you ever do that?) Finally, I fell into a deep enough sleep that I began to dream. The custodian was calling to tell me that there'd been a fire at my school, and my room was destroyed. School was cancelled until May 5th.

I was lamenting my lost library, and more importantly, begging the custodian to SAVE my brand new SMARTBOARD! I was worried about how my students would ever pass the SOLS after such a long break/loss of instruction time.

Wouldn't it be nice to be able to have a vacation without worrying about school?