The Investigation and the gun...

I am now at school, on Thursday, still without a phone. It is 7am. I called the phone around 7:30 and left a voicemail saying I would be getting police involved if it was not returned that day.
7:40am: The one and only student in my classroom who would have poentially taken it get's interviewed by me...

His Story

He told me he stayed behind when we went to music because he needed to get is jacket.

He said while he was in the room, 2 bigger kids walked in and teased him and accused him of stealing and told him he needed to get out. He argued that he wasn't stealing and boy #1 chased him around and finally out of the room. Boy #2 lingered behind...

7:45am: A very large man walks into my room, interrupts my teaching to tell me he has a phone that was taken from the school yesterday. He pulls it out and it is MY phone! I ask the man how he got it and he told me his son came home with it. (His son is Boy #2) According to dad, my student gave boy #2 the phone when they passed each other in the hall. I gladly took the phone back, wrote down the boy's name and had the dean come down to meet with the parent. (Dad had told me when he found the phone he took it and turned it off)

8:00am: My student is taken out of class for interviews.

9:00am: My student is returned to class and the principal is 99% sure it was him who took it. (At this point I was wondering why he would be allowed to come back to class but of course didn't argue)

11:00am: Recess Time. At this point I had so many people in and out of my room asking me questions, asking to see the phone, talking to my student that I wasn't sure if I taught my class a single thing. So we were definitely looking forward to going outside.

11:10am: Playground...I was sitting on the bench enjoying watching the kids play when one of my student ran up to me and pulled what looked like a real gun out of his pants!!! I jumped to my feel and grabbed it from him w/o thinking. Realizing it was fake, I sat him down and asked why he brought this to school. He told me it was cool.

11:15am: I am in the asst. principal office, gun in hand, talking to the cops now about the phone. (WHAT A DAY) I forgot I was holding the gun and couldn't figure out why the police were giving me insane looks....haha-oops. I told them my side of the phone story and then explained the gun.

11:40am: Gun kid taken out of class and sent home...suspended until Tuesday.

12:00pm: My phone student now being questioned by police. (He is 7)

1:00pm: My student suspended for 3 days for theft and possibly being charged by the police.

1:40pm: Buses. I put my kids on buses and went in to talk with the asst. principal. She NOW tells me it WAS NOT my student and that they need to un-suspend him. (OMG)

What we now know...

My studnet and the chaser (student 1) reported the same exact story about what happened to 3 different adults and the police. Student 2 (who is know for theft already) told all 3 adults, and the police, a different story and even tried convincing student #1 to agree with him.

Student #2 has been suspended for 2 days on accounts of lying and is most likely going to be home-bound for the rest of the school year. He is also being ticketed by the police. His parents are furious at the school.

Lesson I learned: Lock my classroom door when ever I am not in there.

The Case of the Missing Phone Part 1

Well, needless to say, this week was BY FAR the most interesting week I have had as a teacher. It started off great and well, by Wednesday I was living outside of my own body watching what to me looked like a movie.

I woke up Wed. morning excited about the day...Veteran's Day. The first thing I did that morning was text my little brother who is an Officer in the Navy. (This was done right when I got to school) I then texted Nate, as I do each day. Then I placed the phone on my desk (which is in the back corner of my room) and went on with the day. The morning was fun and very productive. I took my kids to lunch at 11:00 (phone in pocket acting as a watch) and came back to eat/work in my classroom. I then again put the phone on the desk...a very normal thing for me. Well, after picking my kids up from lunch and taking them to music (about a 10 min process) I came back to my room to find my phone missing. At first I didn't think much of it, but after looking in all possible places and calling it twice, I realized it was missing. I reported it stolen and asked the asst. principal to make an announcement offering a reward for the phone.

I left school Wed. night at 6pm without a phone. I spent the whole night tracking calls and calling the number. No calls were made when I went to bed at 10:30 except to my own voicemail...at least they were checking my voice mails for me. :/

It was only a matter of time...

Well, it is official. Wednesday, October 28TH at 8:15am I left work. I have been told I am not allowed to return until Monday, November 2ND when I will officially be fever free for 24 hours without medication.

2 words: Swine Flu.

I have been hearing our school nurse say for some time now that our school has the highest number of H1N1 cases in Minneapolis. It was only a matter of time until myself or another teacher ended up with it.

I have been trying to be careful, I was the kid's desk everyday after school, I wipe down the door handle each afternoon and I am constantly using hand sanitizer when I can't wash my hands. It must be from all the hugs. :)

I will officially be away from the kids for 3 school days. I am having a hard time because well, 1. I miss them and 2. I just get nervous with a sub. in there. I am sure they are doing great. For now, I have been sleeping the majority of the day and night. I drink water like it's my job and my body can't decide whether it is freezing or sweating. I do think my fever is reducing and at least I still have an appetite in order to get my nutrients. I will be happy to leave the house and move around though. I am getting pretty bored, and achy, from laying down.

Now we are just praying Nate doesn't get it...

100 Chain Links

It again has been quite a long time since I have updated this. I guess being a teacher has kept me busier than I thought. ;) Believe it or not, we are about a week away from being done with the first quarter! Next week is a 4 day week so teachers can put grades in on Friday. I cannot believe how fast time flies...especially when you are having fun!

Fun is exactly what we have been doing. Don't get me wrong, there has been a whole lot of learning going on as well. After a quarter together, the relationships I have built with my students couldn't be better. I absolutely love my class and all the kids that make it up! It is so fun to see the different qualities they all bring.

I have been holding my students accountable for positive behavior. I believe that once they learn how to be respectful and responsible for their own actions the more they will learn academically. In order to do this, we began a class chain made of paper links. They had to earn links and the only rule was once they earned a link I could not take it away. They earned links by listening through a lesson, walking quietly through the hall (a HUGE challenge), when they got a compliment from the principal or from other teachers who said they were awesome. Some times they would earn one single link, other times they earned multiple. Some days would be considered "double days". If they earned 4, we would double it and they would have to do the math. :)

After a loooong month + a few days, they earned their 100th link. On Friday, October 23rd room 137 celebrated. I bought cupcakes for them which made their faces light up. And...Nate (who took the day off) came in and surprised them at the end of the day! (They had been asking me to tell him to come in for a long time so this was a fun treat and addition to their party.)

But wait...there's more...every Friday our whole school does a "gold ticket" drawing. It is almost the same concept like our chain but school-wide. An individual can earn a ticket or the class can earn one. If the individuals "gold ticket" is drawn on Friday that students gets a prize. If the class name is pulled from the class bin, the class earns a popcorn party. Well guess who's class won! Yep, our class. We added popcorn to the cupcakes and had a wonderful last 1/2 hour of our day!

We have started our chain over back at zero and as of today they already have 8. But this time, instead of chains, we are doing fall leaves. I think my kids are figuring out the better they behave, the faster their next party comes...we have had a great week...my bank account is nervous. ;)

PICTURES!

I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE FUN FOR YOU TO SEE PICTURES OF MY CLASSROOM. THESE WERE TAKEN BEFORE SCHOOL STARTED BUT IT GIVES YOU AN IDEA OF HOW WE ROLL IN ROOM 137! THE ONLY DIFFERENCE A MONTH IN ARE THE DESKS...UPDATES TO COME.

(REMEMBER YOU CAN CLICK ON THE PHOTO TO VIEW IT LARGER)

Apples

When you think of a teacher, when you go into a teaching store, or when you walk into a classroom you are most likely to think or see either apples or ABC's. Well, my classroom has both. Figuratively. The apples are on the door...each one with a student's name on it. The ABC's are posted in both upper and lower case letters high on the wall so that the students are reminded how to write each letter correctly.

The reason I am talking about these two very teacher-like objects is because believe it or not, I received my very first real apple from a student on Thursday! She came in holding, to her, the perfect green apple with two stems. It was so sweet. She told me when she picked it at the store she knew she wanted to being it in for me. That same morning I received a flower from one of my little boys. What a great day!

It is 6:00pm on Friday and I really, really appreciate a good weekend! Which is what I am about to do, go hang out with my other half! :)

***FYI...you can click on images to make them larger!

The Last 2 Weeks

I apologize to those of you who do read this blog often because I have been doing a terrible job at updating it. My September has mainly revolved around my classroom, organization skills, grading, and one specific student. (With the exception of my birthday of course :) )

The first 4 weeks have been running fairly smooth. The kids come in each day with a little bit more of an idea of what is expected of them. I am able to hand out less candy when trying to get them to do anything because now they are used to doing it. My bank account is thanking me. We are now into our schedule full on and I actually feel like they are learning things. I have to test them individually on their reading so every day for one hour another teacher comes into my room to take over. This way I can pull individual students to test. This has doubled my workload because I have to treat the guest teacher as a sub and make a lesson plan for that hour. Luckily the teacher coming in has been Mr. Ramadan, the kindergarten teacher I took over for last year. He told me he would come in and just pick up where I left off and then do a game or read books with them. When I test each day I get through about 3-4 students so as you can see, this is a long process. All the kids are required to be tested by the 25th and I only have 6 more to go!

Beyond the normal, every day chaos that happens in every classroom, we have had a small distraction. We have a very bright student who has needed some extra help and attention. Legally I am not aloud to go into much detail. The important part of me sharing this with you is to say that I have been tried and tested more than ever in the past 2 weeks with trying to figure out how to help him in the most effective way. There have been many meetings with a social worker, special edu. team and family to help this child become successful. Nate said it right - "This will not be your first time dealing with a situation like this"...I guess I should be thinking, "Bring it on!"

On a happier note, I celebrated my 25th birthday with 26 2nd graders and they were delightful. Many of them made me cards when they found out it was my birthday. And I received A LOT of hugs. :) One of my students even told me he would take me out to dinner to McDonalds. (Our school is across the street from a McDonalds) I brought in treats because isn't that what you do when you have a birthday school?? Each of my kids received an M&M cookie from me. Fitting right? As luck would have it, in math that day we talked about the quarter and how much it is worth. One of their clues was to figure out Ms. Stanton's age and they would know how much a quarter is...they loved this, and quickly got it right. :)

Ok, well I have to go get them from lunch...the next 20 minutes will be spent yelling (nicely) at or should I say over, them to be quiet because this is BY FAR the loudest part of their day....ahhh, deep breath, here I go...