The Joys of a Small School...

One of the unique things about teaching in a small school, located in a small community, is that teachers have the opportunity to interact daily with many students who are in many different classes. This year, for example, in addition to teaching all subjects to Kindergarten and Grade One students, I also teach P.E. every day to Grades Two and Three and Music once a week for Grades Seven and Eight. I was one of the sponsors for the flag football tournament two weeks ago, which involved 22 hours of driving (round trip), four hours on a ferry (round trip), three hours waiting for the ferry, multiple stops at gas stations/stores/etc, and camping out with the entire team at my Mom's place over a four day period.

*side note* Whenever possible, do long trips with a group of kids who are accustomed to the mantra that "if we miss this ferry we have to wait at least two more hours"...they know to keep their bathroom/snack breaks really fast. Man, that part was easy! Even stopping at the mall with a bunch of teenagers was easy! Nothing like living over four hours away from the nearest big center to really increase the amount of desire amongst everyone for some "big city shopping!" Also, EB Games is a wonderful babysitter. I dropped my collection of boys off there, told them not to leave, and did a ten-minute whirlwind tour of the bookstore, chocolate shop, and Starbucks. Fun times!

*back to the point* The trip was actually very fun, and quite painless, and tonight the football team is having a scavenger hunt party. Sometime in the next hour I expect groups of students to be converging upon my apartment to bake cookies, eat cookies, and deliver cookies to someone else, before heading off on their next task.

Why am I saying all of this? Why am I rambling on with atrociously long run-on sentences? Here's why. I love teaching in a school system where this is all "ok"...where I don't have to worry that someone is going to flip out about their preteens stopping at a teacher's house on a Friday night (with their drivers, of course), and where we can enjoy time spent in and out of school with a variety of people. Don't get me wrong. The system in which I work has it's downsides. Major downsides. The community in which I live has it's downsides, too (*cough* over four hours to the nearest bookstore *cough*). But, I get to bake cookies with the big kids on a Friday night. Awesome!


Now to end with the funniest Kindergarten moment of the week!


Small boy, "E", sticks his juice box and straw in front of my face and says "Open It."

I, obviously, respond with "E! You need to ask me nicely!"

He flutters his eyelashes, looks endearingly at me, and says in his most convincing voice... "will you please open my juice box, Sweetheart?"

I die.

UPDATE:

Grade Seven and Eight students learned that it's not possible to make cookies "bake faster!", and had to be deterred from trying the "turn the oven up to 500 degrees" method...too fun!