Happy Tuesday...

part deux.

Told you I'd be back.

:)

Before I show you pictures I shall give you a brief re-cap of my day.  Because I know you are just dying to hear all about my 8 hours with 9 and 10 year olds.

I am pleased to report that this was yet another good day.

BFF:  Isn't this such a change from last year?  Last year you could count the number of good days on one hand!  This year I don't think I have had a bad day yet.  What a difference a year makes!


Today we learned about the following:

Bible:  The woman at the well.  Lessons learned:  (1) God doesn't look at the outside of us and judge us like people do.  God looks on our hearts.  (2) No matter what others may do we still need to be nice.  Even though the women in the village made her life miserable because of her lifestyle, she still made it a point to race back to the village and drag them back to the well to meet Jesus.  Because of the fact that she didn't hold a grudge her village was able to meet Christ.

Math:  More work with equations!  Gotta love them.  The kiddos feel like little Einsteins because I told them they are doing algebra and are possibly further along than some of the kids in 8th grade pre-algebra.

English:  Gasp!  We skipped English today because we are further along than the other 4th grade.  We spent the extra time working in Math.  I love having a principal who gives us the leeway to manage our schedules like that.

History:  We have started WWI much to my utter and complete happiness.  WWI and II are my hands-down FAVORITE things to teach in history.  I split them into different "countries" and every time I say the name of their country they have to respond with their "catch phrase":
                      Germany--nein!
                      Russia--nyet!
                      Italy--that's a spicy meat(a)ball!
                      France--ooh-la-la!
                      England--cheerio!
                      United States--U.S.A., huh!
OMG!  They LOVED it and when it was time to end history they were SO upset!  "Please can we do more!"  "Don't stop noooowwww!!!"  Love, love, LOVE it!

Science:  Hands down the best class of the day for them.  I have been saving all manner of cardboard boxes and tubes since about September knowing that this day would come.  We just started our unit on Astronomy and are spending this first week outside of the book doing various space related activities.  Yesterday they wrote reports on the planets.  Today they used the cardboard to make space ships.  Each team of six got a trash bag full of various cardboard boxes and tubes along with some super-sticky tape.  They had to create a "mother" ship for their team and then individual spaceships for themselves.  Hold moley!  It was the funniest thing to watch them!  They had a great time and I got some very, um, creative looking spaceships!  We are going to use them next week to play a game where they have to answer questions by flying their spaceships to the correct planet.  We'll see how that goes.

The best thing was hearing about how much fun they were having and how much they were learning.  That makes all the mess and the "chaos" worthwhile.

Tomorrow we will be continuing the same thing in history, which they will love, AND they will be painting solar systems.  I think I might need a drink tomorrow night.  Something stronger than just coffee.

Dunkin Donuts Blueberry Iced coffee?

I think so.

And now on to the promised crochet project pictures:

A friend of mine is having a baby girl in early May.  I am doing my normal dress, hat, booties, and blanket ensemble.  I have finished the dress (except for the ribbon through the yolk) and half of the blanket.  My goal is to get the blanket (and hopefully the hat and booties) before Spring Break so that I can start Babette during the break.  We shall see.

Finally...

A big, huge, awesome SHOUT-OUT to my friend, Freddie!  She went back to school to get a degree in dental hygiene and to become an x-ray tech.  She just finished up a series of finals with all "A's"!!!!!!  Way to go, my best MD friend!!! :)

Good night from her:

and me!