Sunday, September 6, 2009

Back to School Night

The boys had back to school night last Thursday. We packed up their small fortune in school supplies and headed out to meet their teachers. Actually Noah's teacher was my student teacher three year ago and also his basketball coach last winter, so we knew him already. The boys were so excited. We went to Ethan's room first. He unloaded his "stuff" and met his teacher. She seems so nice! Exactly what your would want for a first grade teacher (I wonder how many parents thought that of me after meeting me on back to school night?) Noah remarked three times during the evening that "she must be good because you can tell she spent a lot of time making her room look nice- she must be at school all of the time."- Only a teacher's child would notice that. Later he said, "She must really understand little kids because she put the minutes like 5, 10, 15, 20... on the clock for the first graders to learn." Ethan sat in his new chair and looked around. I read the names of the kids that will be sitting near him. He started to get tears in his eyes. Thinking it's because none of the names are familiar I walked around and said more names which resulted in bigger tears. Finally a name looked familiar. Ethan has a friend named Max. I should remember his name because we call our dog Max, Maxine and Ethan called his friend Max Maxine on the first day of school last year. However, Max looks like a Will to me. So I said and enthusiastic, "Ethan Will! Will is in your class! Will Ethan, Will!! More tears. He later tells me in the car that Will is not Max, but the boy in his Kindergarten class that is blind, has cerable pulsey and can't talk. Oh well. He'll make new friends. I did find out a boy down the block will be in the same class. He rides the bus with him, so Ethan knows him.
Next we went to pay for lunch, buy Noah a planner and Ethan a calculator. The lines are always super long. However, the calculator line was empty, so I took Ethan and went there first. The people selling the "stuff" are volunteers from the PTA- parents. The calculator lady was an older grandma. I said I needed a calculator and saw about 100 sitting all around her. She said, "you don't have to buy a calculator dear. If you have one at home, just send that." Funny. Every year we have to buy the "school" one for Noah because he always loses it over the summer and no one told me that. I bet they aren't going to put her at the calculator table next year, think of all the money the school missed out on- especially when the calculators come with the curriculum. Next, on our way to Noah's room we see the principal. Noah and the principal have been personal friends since back to school night for Noah before Kindergarten when Noah was wearing a Vikings jersey and the principal is a huge Vikings and Twins fan. He even has a cousin that plays for the Vikings- so that is the next best thing to his principal actually playing for Noah. Every Monday during football season in Kindergarten, Mr. Kopperude would come and get Noah during snack and milk break to take him to his office to have snack with him. Mr. Kopperude stopped us in the hallway saying, "Welcome back Noah and Noah's little brother." Oh well. If he knew Ethan's name it would be for a very different reason, so maybe it's good he doesn't. We talked football and Twins with him, then headed upstairs to Noah's room. Noah has a lot of friends in his class this year, and they were all there at the same time. Noah had to do a "scavenger hunt"- like at every back to school night, which I rather enjoy doing with the kids, but Noah did this hunt with his friends. Who ever said I was ready for him to grow up? Mr. Ganab, Noah's teacher, called me "Sara" for the first time in three years- even last year at basketball he called me Mrs. Fairfield. He also called Scott "John" making Scott wonder who this John was that I "must have talked about" when Mr. Ganab was student teaching. All in all it was a good night. The kids are excited to get back into the swing of school, and my students will have been in school long enough to have a reading and spelling test. Huh.
Thoughts I think: I have a student who doesn't listen and does whatever he wants. On Friday, I decided we needed to have a little talk. I started it out with, "Don't you ever get tired of ignoring everything I say?" He just looked at me with big eyes, probably thinking, 'No, I never get tired of ignoring you- it's easy actually. You maybe get tired of it though...'

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