Sunglasses Always Fit

I’m really cuddly. I’m built like a cuddly person. I’m like Olaf – I like warm hugs. And the nice thing about teaching is that around kids, your hug bucket can always be full. Even if you have to demand them.

The daughter of one of my bests here on staff is as cute as a button, and SO sassy. She’s like a 3 year old teenager. And I like to get on the floor and say “give me some sugar!” and she will either run into my arms with force, tease me and make me work for it, let me start a tickle fight, or stick her chin up at me and say no. It’s always a guess, so it’s so rewarding when she barrels right into my arms.

Today I needed a hug. And it took some cajoling but soon it was a giggle hug fest. And it felt so nice.

Kids are so funny. My kinders are learning all kinds of things, but they are very sure they know how to count. But there is a mystical land that all kids go to after like number fourteen. “1 2 3 4 56789 10 (slight pause) 11 ….. 12……13…..14….. fift- (mumbo jumbo) TWENTY! 21, 2, 3, 4 -” and then it kind of drops off into nothing. It’s hilarious. It’s akin to the sounds that are the letters between “I” and “ellemenopee” and then pretty much humming until we get to “Z” when they recite their creative version of the alphabet.

We’ve been learning physical characteristics in class. The kids are doing little posters about people in their family with jobs, clothes, descriptions, etc. I asked them to each write why they loved the person they chose, and a memory of them.

Here are some responses:

(about his mom)  “I love her because she was who created me and she help me in all the things and she spend time with me.”

(her memory) “One time, my mom was a doctors. My mom like my broders an sisters. I am ask to her I want have 2 more broder and my mom talkin to me she say ‘no no and no.'”  (this girl is from a family of at least six siblings that I know of)

(I identify a lot with this one) “I love my grandma because she is the only person of my family who spend time with me. She get me to the shopping.”

And they also worked on describing teachers at our school, including some gems about their own teachers. The girl who wrote this didn’t speak a lick of English when I tested her last semester. And now she’s composing complimentary paragraphs.

Is so beautiful.

It’s a rewarding job, but an exhausting and emotionally draining job. Spring Break starts tomorrow and I’m going to try and move as little as possible for a 24 hour period.

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