Love These Funny Kiddos

It's been way too long, so here are some of the ones that I remember:

I got a new student a couple of weeks ago.  The day before I was telling my students about the new student.  I told them that it was a girl.  I heard one of the boys in the class whisper to another boy "I hope she's pretty."  I called him out on it and said "Did you just say that you hope she is pretty?!" (I knew that it wouldn't embarrass him)  He said that he did and the whole class had a good laugh, myself included.  He was also really hoping that the new girl would sit next to him. 

One of my students came up to me a while back and said "I don't get why it is called 101 Dalmatians if there are only 15 Dalmatians."  Good point kiddo.

A few days ago there was honestly a chorus of coughing going on in my classroom, it was ridiculous.  I couldn't even talk because the coughing was so loud, so I laughed instead.  One of the girls in my class who wasn't sick chimed in and said "I'm catching a cold every second I'm here."  I knew how she felt, how do you survive the day without getting sick when everyone is coughing around you left and right...

I had a girl stay in during recess to work on an assignment yesterday.  She was humming the song "Kiss the Girl" (the boy she likes was in the room, he was sick and couldn't go outside).  She said that she loved the song.  When I asked her why she said "Because it's romantic, and I just love everything romantic."  She then proceeded to explain that she loves kissing, but not seeing it when people are starting to kiss. haha.

I love my students!  I am THE luckiest.  I can't believe that I get to be their teacher and that I get to do something I love so much every day! 

Love is in the Air

Today I found out that I will be getting a new student tomorrow.  I was preparing my class for that.  I told them that it was a girl.  A few seconds after that, one of the boys in my class turns to the boy next to him and says "I hope she's pretty."  I called him out on it (I knew he could handle it) and said "Michael, did you just say "I hope she's pretty."?  He responded that he did and the whole class was laughing including him.  Another boy then pipes in and says, "I hope she isn't fat." 

The "pretty" comment made me laugh.  I'm pretty sure none of us were worried about that type of stuff when I was in second grade, but I guess times are changing.

The "fat" comment made me sad.  What has the media and society done to warp our brains?!  And it is starting so young!

Apparently last week there was a girl in my class who kissed a boy in my class on the cheek.  Today as they were coming back from Library she was hugging him the whole way in the hallway, until she saw that I saw it.  She sat next to him on the carpet and was trying to lay her head down on her lap.  I stopped that one.  What the heck?!

Another kid in the class was talking about how one of the boys in the class had a girlfriend...oh my.

I don't even know what to do about all these crushes and all this love! haha Kids are the best and I am so lucky that I get to be in their presence so much!

The Marriage Question

Student 1 - "Miss Paul are you married?"
Me - "No"
Student 2 - "She's looking for a husband."

Totally made me laugh.

Student 1 - "I have a cousin who is your same age and my mom wants to hook you up with him"

Haha, the joys of being a single teacher.  Gotta love it, they sure do make me laugh!

My Favorite Place in the USA

Next week we are celebrating school lunch week.  There is a drawing competition for the kids and the theme was "My favorite place in the U.S.A."  Here are some of my cuties drawings:

 

And of course...don't forget McDonalds:

 

I also got this e-mail from a student last night!  I am the luckiest!  I love my kids!

 

 

Here is a funny quote from a girl in my class yesterday:

 

"It feels like there is a big staple in my shirt. Was my brother stapling my shirt?"  Haha I love that that her first though was that her brother had been stapling her shirt.  Cute kiddos!

 

 

The Class Pet

My kids are on some strange class pet obsessions.  Actually it's not strange.  We read a story called "Teacher's Pet" in our literacy program last week. I think that is what got the ball rolling along with the fact that some kids in one of the other classes brought in a leaf eater and worms and called them their class pets. 

Two days ago one of the little girls in my class came in with a jar.  In it was a caterpillar.  At the carpet in the morning she proudly announced that it could be our class pet.  She put it over on the counter where it wouldn't be a distraction.  At recess the kids diligently collected leaves for it to eat.  At the end of the day she took it home with her. 

This morning she came back with the class pet.  When one of the students in the class asked how the class pet was doing she said "It's almost dead."  Leaves were still collected for it at recess, but it was forgotten on the counter at the end of the day. 

The poor thing that found its way into the hands of a second grader.  If you die overnight little caterpillar, may you rest in peace. 

Smart Brain and a Magical Miracle Worker

I have a wooden wolf in my classroom that I have the students put on their desk when they go to the bathroom so that I can easily see who is gone.  Unfortunately my students have been rough on him and he was broken in three places.  It's a rough life being a wooden wolf in a second grade classroom.  I had all of the pieces to fix it and so I decided to bring it home and use my wood glue to fix it this weekend.

I was working on it while my brother was over and he actually ended up fixing it.  When I brought the wolf back to school I told them that I had fixed him this weekend and that they needed to be very careful with him. 

At this I hear one of the girls in my class say "You are a miracle worker!"  Made me smile.

 

During Guided Reading (when I am reading with small groups of students) I use some dice with questions on them after we read the story.  The kids roll and answer the question.  I have three different sets of dice for different levels of readers and different types of books.  I had a guided reading group come in.  The green die were on the table from a previous group.  Once the kids got going I put the green dice away and got out the blue ones that had more appropriate questions on them for the group I was reading with.  Later after the students had read the book one of the students in the group piped up and said "Now they're blue, she painted them!" 

 

Today I was working on re-teaching a small group of students a concept that we had already learned.  We were working on subtraction.  The students were working with some flash cards.  One of the students picked up a flashcard that had the problem "11-3" on it.  He answered 8 very quickly without using the number line which is uncharacteristic of him. 

 

Me: "How did you know it was 8"

Student: " I Guessed it in my brain"

Me: a face that tells him I don't believe him and that's not how we get answers

Student: "What?  I've got a smart brain today!"

 

I only wish I could show you his little smirk, he was so stinkin' adorable that I couldn't even be mad. 

 

    

The Lost Lost Tooth

In second grade kids are loosing teeth left and right!  It seems that on some days half of the "good news" that I let them share in the morning is "I have a loose tooth" or in the case of this morning "I have 5 loose teeth". 

At the end of each day I have the students clean up the classroom.  They move the lunch clips, stack their chairs, clean off their desks, straighten the bookshelf and clean up the floor. 

Last week we were cleaning up and one of my students shouts out "Miss Paul, I found a tooth."  I didn't believe him at first, but sure enough he came and showed it to me and it was a tooth.  I asked if anyone in the class had lost their lost tooth, but nobody had.  When he asked me what to do with it, I told him "Put it in the lost and found."  What is one to do with a lost tooth that's gone M.I.A? 

Someone told me that I should have told him to keep it and put it under his pillow to see if the Tooth Fairy would come.  Can the Tooth Fairy be tricked like that?

Miss Paul and Pit Bulls

This morning a student from another classroom came in and was looking through my ball bucket (where all the balls, coats, and lunchboxes are kept at lunch time) for his missing jacket.  It happened to be full with playground balls.  As I was looking through it with him he said "I think I know why your name is Miss Paul now, because you have so many balls"  Apparently he thinks that my name is Miss Ball.  It's cool, whatever floats your boat kid : )

This morning one of my students was sharing his Student of the Week poster with the class.  On it there was a picture of his dogs.  After he had shared his poster I asked the class if they had any questions for the student presenting.  One of the students asked how tall the big dog in the picture was.  The student replied very confidently "It's a pit bull so it's maybe like 5 or 10 feet tall." Now wouldn't that be a sight to behold!  I haven't taught measurement yet, looks like he will have a couple of things to learn in that unit : )

Another conversation that I had today with one of my students made me laugh:

Me: Get to work (Everyone had started working except this particular student)
Student: I have the hiccups.
Me: O.k. well you can still work even if you have the hiccups.

I love that I get to be around AWESOME kids every single day!  They really are the BEST!

Creativity

 

"Teacher, look at my Frankenapple!"  This little boy came in this morning so excited to show me this : )  He made it this morning at home.  Apparently both his parents go to work before he leaves for school and this is what he decided to do this morning before coming to school.  So creative.  I was so happy to see that he was doing something creative as opposed to sitting in front of the TV or computer. 

 

One more funny thing from this morning:

In the mornings I often spend a few minutes letting the kids share good news with me.  This morning when I asked for good news one of the girls in my class raised her hand and said "My dad wants another baby so we were going to go to the place where you get babies from, but they didn't have any left."  Not sure what type of place that is....Kids are great!

Name Tags, Birthday, Antarctica, and a Rivalry

Alright.  Here are a few of the funny things that happened today. 

Name Tags:

The students have name tags that they wear when they go into other teachers classrooms for rotations.  The hook that we store them on is too high for the kids to reach so when they come back I have them put the name tags on my desk and then I hang them up when I get a chance.  Today I looked over at my desk and found their name tags waiting for me to hang up.  Made me laugh : )

 

Birthday:

 

A student in my class had a birthday today.  For birthdays everybody in the class makes a card and then we put them all together in a book. 

These two were both from boys.  They gave her so many compliments, so cute! Kids are awesome!

 

This one just made me laugh.  "Don't we look funny?" Haha.  Why yes you do.

 

Antarctica:

 

So....my classroom has been freezing.  Maybe not quite as cold as Antarctica, but definitely close.  My poor kids have been putting their arms in their shirts and then pulling their shirts over their knees to keep themselves warm.  Today we were on the carpet and I was teaching about context clues.  One of the boys was sitting there with both of his arms in his shirt.  I asked a question and he got really excited about answering and shot his arm up (it was still under his shirt).  Half of his shirt came up and I couldn't help but laugh.  He quickly pulled it down, put his arm through the arm hole and raised his hand again.  Of course I called on him. 

 

Rivalry:

 

It is rivalry week as BYU will be playing Utah this Saturday.  My school always makes a big deal out of this by posting signs in the hall and by having everybody dress up on Friday to show who they will be supporting.  An announcement came on at the end of the day today to remind the kids to dress up to support their favorite team tomorrow.  Of course as soon as the announcement was over the kids started chanting "BYU, BYU, BYU" and "Utah Utes, Utah, Utes".  As they were packing up their backpacks I heard one kids say "BYU rules, but you know what Utah Utes do? Toot."  He has got the concept of rhyming words down.  I am so lucky to be around such sweet kids, and so glad that is the extent of their mean comments toward the rival team.  There are a lot of people who could learn a thing or two from them. 

 

I am so grateful for my kids that make me smile and laugh!  I have the BEST job!

Age and Marriage

For some reason my kids always ask me how old I am.  I don't mind telling them.  I like for them to know things about me and for them to realize that I am a real person just like them.  Hopefully none of my students think that I live at the school or anything like that. 

We had a water day on the Friday of the first week of school.  The kids were soaked and I was soaked too, we had a lot of fun together.  One of my students asked me how old I was.  I told him I was 23.  A girl standing by who was listening into the conversations was very surprised by my response.  I asked her how old she thought I was to which she responded "I thought you were like 30." I acted quite offended and shocked that she thought I was that old, in a very playful way of course.  My student who had asked the question then piped in by saying "She couldn't be 30, she's not even married yet." (Apparently if you are 30 you have to be married) Then after a second he bounces away while saying, "You should just get married, that would make everything better."  Thanks for the advice kiddo.  Believe it or not, I'm working on it. 

Today another little girl in my class asked me how old I was.  I told her I was 23 and she was also shocked.  I asked her how old she thought I was and she said, "I thought you were like 16." I said "Why thank you." Let's be honest, at 23 I would rather someone think I'm 16 than think I'm 30.

The moral of the story is...there are many second graders that are not very good at guessing ages of people.  They do like to throw out marriage advice though, just like everybody else.  This next story actually happened two years ago (my first year) but it is still one of my favorites.

I was teaching guided reading. I had four boys from other classes. While they were reading a girl from my class came up and asked if I would put her hair clip back in for her. As I did so one of the boys was watching. When I turned back to the boy he asked "Are you a mom yet?" I told him that I wasn't, I wasn't even married yet. He then said "So have you found someone?"

Kids are the best!

Why Another Blog?

Someday I will be married and have kids, when that day comes being a wife and mother will be the best job ever (although I am sure there will be moments where I will want to pull my hair out).  In my current circumstances however I have the BEST JOB EVER!  I get to teach seven and eight year olds every day, and it's great!  We have a ball.  As much fun as lesson planning and grading are (that's sarcasm by the way), the kids are what make the job.  This summer I couldn't wait for them to come back because they make it fun.  On almost a daily basis they make me smile and laugh, and I love it!  I decided that I would start a blog just for those simply daily things about teaching that make me smile and laugh.  The things that make all of the other work and extra hours worth it.  So here's to the kids and loving my job!  I hope that their cute words and actions will bring as many smiles and laughs to you (through this blog) as they do to me.  Enjoy!