The end is near...C'mon Spring!

I know I haven't posted my 100 day entry ( I promise, it's coming) or any other entry for that matter, but I have good reason...SNOWPOCALYPSE!

That's right, we had a record snowfall for the month of February this past week. It moved in Monday night, and we were out the rest of the week.

Today was our first day back after our "6-day weekend." Class-wise, it was an awesome day. My class fell back into routine; we sang, read, had an unofficial  Groundhog day, and even celebrated a birthday.

However, on the teacher side of things it was a tad hectic. OK, it was down-right crazy and super annoying. We have progress reports to due this week, as well as get ready for parent-teacher conferences next week. With us being out 4 out of 5 days last week, I am way behind in assessments for progress reports. On top of that we have QTA this week. For you lucky individuals who have no idea what I'm talking about I will explain. QTA is Quality Time Analysis. Basically, each teacher/faculty member is given a spreadsheet to record how many minutes a day we do everything. We have to record everything from teaching time to bathroom breaks to discipline, and turn it into the site administrator by the end of the day.

For example, I have to record how many minutes I spend giving whole group instruction in reading, how many minutes it is to transition to the small group or independent assignment in reading, how many minutes the kids spend completing the aforementioned reading assignment, how many minutes I spend one-on-one with kids checking the assignment, etc. Now multiply that by however many subjects/ lessons I teach a day. Multiply that by 5 days -- yup, it's all week long. Annoying right?

Did I mention that Wednesday is supposed to bring SNOWPOCALYPSE II? Yeah. More snow. Woo.

Super frustrating week, but I still love my job!

SNOW!

Today was a snow day. Not the kind that gets you out of school, but the kind that makes you wish it was.

We've had snow on the brain for a little while now, not only because of today's precipitation, but because it's January. And, in kindergarten, January means snow. We've read a few books, made a circle map, had a few discussions,etc, etc. But nothing quite compares to the real thing. So, being the rebels that we are, the K team decided to let our kids out and enjoy the light dusting of powder for 5 minutes.

You would have thought Hannah Montana was coming to play. Oh, the screaming and excitement. The snowball fights. The muddy feet. The raised eyebrows from other teachers. It was positively wonderful.

The only thing that could have topped that was making our own snowflakes. Which we did, of course. It took a few tries for some, however once we mastered the cutting of the fold and symmetric principles, we churned out some pretty awesome snowflakes. I think the best part was hearing the kind and encouraging words that spread like wildfire among my kinders.

Man , I love my job!

Fire Drills and Tornadoes

It has been quite an interesting day.

Tomorrow is our Kindergarten Awards ceremony, so we spent a large part of our day finding our places on stage and rehearsing our songs. Corralling 80+ almost-first graders is quite a feat in itself, let alone two choreographed numbers. How ever, it went well, and I am so excited to see my not-so-little kids  make themselves and their parents proud.

If performing on stage is not enough to rile up a class, today's class activity also involved painting. We read Little Cloud by Eric Carle and created our very own "little clouds" with blue construction paper, cotton balls, and white paint. They turned out fabulously. However, while creating the aforementioned clouds, we had an unexpected fire drill. Apparently, the heat from the cotton candy maker (PTA) next to our classroom was enough to set of the alarms for the entire school. While there was no actual fire, it was enough to get everyone's blood pumping. Although not perfect, we did a pretty good job getting everyone out and accounted for.

Today is also an "extreme weather" day in our state. I had recess duty, so I made it a point to keep my eye on the weather reports all day. As expected, we had indoor recess, and now I sit working on the awards ceremony slide show under a tornado watch (soon to be warning), for the second time in a two week period. Granted severe weather affords me time to hang out with friends at my old stomping grounds, but I'd rather not have had this happen the night before awards. Oh well, c'est la vie.