Back from break...

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay. We're back from break!
I will admit I was a little bummed at how short Christmas break was, but I guess a shorter break means that we don't have to go back to school after Memorial Day in May. I'm still wondering if it's worth it though...

I woke up this morning with a stuffy nose. Awesome. I realized I probably caught it from my younger sister, Candyce. I slept in her room the past couple of days and she was sick. Great decision on my part.

Well, most of the periods went well today.
My first period was all asleep. They love to tell stories, so as soon as the bell rang, I told them they had five minutes to share stories with each other. Did anyone share any stories? Of course not. It took a good thirty minutes for them to finally warm up and get back to their usual selves, but they did get back to normal (normal being fairly scatter-brained at times and a wee bit on the chatty side). Still, my first period is my best behavior-wise, so I was fine.

Second period I was told that I was grumpy. One student said, "I hate Christmas break. You come back all grumpy and mean."

Fourth period was no different from normal. I count seconds for how long it takes them to be in their seat with their materials after the bell rings (ie if they are not in their seats when the bell rings, I count how long it takes them to get in their seats with the needed materials) and however many seconds it takes is how long I make them stay after class. This is quite painful for them because a lot of them have lunch right after. Well, one girl was late and she made everyone else get seconds. So what did my students say? "It was Christmas break!" "We forgot! Give us a break." "Let it be our Christmas gift..." And the list goes on. Don't worry, their cute faces and charming smiles didn't crack me.

During sixth period, one student had a terrible migraine and hammed it up quite a bit. This student can be fairly dramatic anyway, and when students were writing in their journals, he wrote, "I was thrown from my bike and have a terrible migraine." Then when I had students practice their spelling words, he wrote his a few times, and when I told everyone to clean up, he wrote "Shhhh" on his white board and held it up. He didn't say a single word the entire period. Something was definitely wrong. Poor kid!

Seventh period. What to say about seventh period? Sassy? Rude? Ridiculous? At the moment, yes. One boy, who I had seen earlier in the day, came in with a lip ring. Was it fake? Yes. Did he tell everyone it was real? Yes. When I first walked in the classroom, he whispered to me, "Don't tell anyone!" Then when he and his buddy were making a big deal about it, I said, "If it's going to be a big distraction..." and he immediately quieted down. Funny stuff.
One girl also dropped her binder and all of the papers fell out. Fortunately they were still in order, but she came up to me and said, "Ms. Damron? I dropped my binder and all of my papers fell out. They're still in order though! Can you put them back for me?" I laughed. OUT LOUD. "Are you serious?" I asked. She said yes. Bahahaha I just laughed and said no way. (She was really quite serious about me fixing her binder for her though. I'm a little curious what she gets away with at home...)
Another great story was when students were looking up their grades on PowerSchool. One student, who likes attention and procrastinates everything possible, said, quite loudly, "Ms. Damron - I forgot my lunch number." I flat out told him I didn't believe him and asked him what did he do for lunch. "I brought a home lunch." Maybe he did, but we all know he didn't forget his lunch number over break. I told him to figure it out and try really hard to remember. He loudly started shouting random numbers he was punching into the computer and when I came back, I said, "Here's what we can do to problem solve. Your lunch number is listed on the sign-out sheet. If you go over there, you can figure out which number is yours." While I was saying this, you could see on his face that he had no desire to actually get out of his seat and do something, so he "suddenly" remembered his lunch number. I finished my statement saying, "...unless you magically remember your lunch number." What did he say? "I...I magically remembered my lunch number." Riiiiight.

Oh it's good to be back.

-Ms. Damron-