fire drills and peer mediation

this week I worked across the board
I did teach 5th grade twice, which I decided is a grade I really like. Beyond all the preteen drama they are pretty much still sweet little kids. I did a lot of peer mediation between friends and between "couples", we had quick little pow wows over by the teachers desk and resolved their problems with a little BOSS advice. I think I almost made one girl cry, because she felt so bad about making fun of another student after my talk.
Another consistent event in this week was that I managed to always be at a school on either their fire drill day, an assembly day, or a combination of both day.

let's break down the days by the grades that I taught

5th grade-the gifted class
I didn't know what to expect with the "gifted" class. I will say that they were probably one of the more behaved classes that I have taught, but I don't think their 5th grade knowledge content was anything worth shouting about.
I think the problem is that I have really high expectations of what children should be able to do, which in most cases is a good expectation to have as a teacher. This is why I have here by determined that I need to teach 3rd grade or above.

kindergarten-"are you ready to sing a new sonng"
That's right, I was literally making up songs left and right, along with other activities to give them. The teacher didn't leave much for me to do with them, but she did leave a note that read "do not let them touch ANYTHING". That is a hard rule to follow when you have 32 five year olds sitting in a room that is surrounding them in colorful toys. This was probably the longest day of my week. I just don't relate to these kids, haha. I did bribe them with a movie, which they could only keep their attention on for 25 minutes before I had to instigate a new activity...that messed up what I thought the schedule would be. I will say I lucked out with this classroom because it had its own bathroom for the kids, and if you don't know 5 year olds go to the bathroom a lot! I was prompted by the art teacher that some kids in my class have been wetting their pants in her class and not saying anything, just sitting in the mess. All I can say is what I didn't know, didn't hurt me, but I'm pretty sure there weren't any accidents...

7th grade-"omg, fomfl, lol"...really?
A little bit refreshing. Every time I teach middle school I get flashbacks and wonder, was I really this ridiculous? There was a lot of talking going on, and it mostly concerned relationships between boys and girls. I had a self proclaimed "emo" girl in my class who wore two black gloves that read, rock...I would point my finger at hot topic to take the blame for those. She talked a lot about how "awesome" texting is. The boys in the class mocked her pretty much the entire day. I was previously warned about a student who had severe ADHD, but I was on that issue, I moved him to the front of class and literally just sat next to him and made him my best friend by going step by step through the assignment. He kept asking me if he could shoot things with his rubber band, and I just kept denying him permission. The kids in the class apparently liked me, because they wanted me to come back and told me, "you should be a teacher, you are really good", to which I applied, "yea, I am a teacher". I can't wait to have my own class. This sub lady experience is really teaching me what works and what does not work in a classroom. I think I will definitely be able to keep my future class in line.

yesterday I taught 5th grade again
They were crazy, what can I say. I was doing peer mediation about every 5 minutes. This consisted of different kids coming up to me, with a sad face on, to tell me something that someone else said to them, and then just standing their starring at me. I usually returned the look with a moment of, so whats the problem here, but then I quickly counciled the child and then called a quick meeting between all other suspects. By the end everyone said they were sorry and the problems were resolved. It is crazy how at the start of the day two children can be enemies and by the end they are skipping around together as best friends....oh what it would be like to be that age agian.

I was going to take today off, but I had a talk with God last night about just doin what he puts before me each day. Anyway, I didn't get a call today...I'm going to take the time to finally do some things for myself.

Peace
DA BOSS