Kindergarten

Months ago I agreed to sub for three days in kindergarten this week because I like to screw over my future self.  It's over now and it wasn't so bad.  Of course, nothing could be as bad as what I had envisioned.  The kids are adorable, but part of what makes it so hard for me is that the girls are about a year and a half ahead of the boys maturity-wise.  So kindergarten girls are like second grade boys.  Second grade is fun.  Kindergarten sucks.

Kindergarten boys are difficult for me.  If something CAN be thrown, it's thrown, if someone bugs a kindergarten boy, that poor someone gets pushed down, slapped or pinched.  If someone has a toy that boy wants, the toy will be ripped out of their hands. If that kindergarten boy gets confronted for throwing something that shouldn't be thrown, or hitting someone who bugged him, or taking something someone else was playing with, he cries.  If that boy has something to say and I am talking, he will scream whatever it is that pops into his head whenever it happens to pop into his head.  That, in a nutshell, is what makes kindergarten such a nightmare.

And the parents. One mom dropped off her boy every day and then lingered. Endlessly lingered. The first day I was there she complained that some of the other boys were bothering him at lunch and could I make sure they don't do it anymore? Turns out her sweet little angel was the biggest trouble maker in the class. The boys were messing with his lunch because he was first messing with their lunches, as a sort of game. I kept my eye on this kid all week and he was ALWAYS doing something he wasn't supposed to do. If the kids were gathered on the rug, he was by the cubbies, digging in people's stuff. At playtime, he was in the bathroom squirting liquid soap all over the place, etc. etc. etc. What a BRAT.

The weather was gorgeous yesterday so I took them outside for a while.  They were having a great time.  One of the little girls came up to me laughing and told me that she and a few other kids were playing the BEST game!  The boys were chasing the girls and putting them in jail.

Me:  Oh, you're criminals?

Girl: YES!

Me:  What crimes are you doing to get put into jail?

Girl:  Because we're so PRETTY!!!!

Me:  The boys are capturing you and putting you in jail for being pretty???

Girl: Yes! And we catch them and put them in jail too!

Me:  Because they are so pretty?

Girl:  No silly!  Because they are rich!

Me: Wow ............. That is Fucked Up.

Just kidding, I didn't say that's fucked up but I was thinking it.  A while later she came up to me and her hands were cuffed behind her back with a hair tie.  She thought that was brilliant.  Somewhere Betty Friedan was spinning in her grave.

There were, of course, some good things that happened during the week.  Working with five-year-olds always boosts my ego.  At playtime I went to the coloring station and drew pictures.  I am TERRIBLE at drawing, always have been.  They thought I was excellent, on par with the great masters.  They lined up for me to draw a picture for them.  If adults had their taste in art, I would be a rich and famous artist.  Also, they think I am gorgeous.  I was told how beautiful I am dozens of times.  I was hugged hundreds of times.  I was told I was the best sub they ever had every day.

And they are funny.  They made a "special person" poster about one of their classmates (apparently they do that for every kid) and I was to go around and get a quote about her from all the other kids.  Most said, "She's pretty" or "She's nice" but there were a few that were oddly specific like, "She draws good daisies on the Smartboard."  I asked one little boy, a rage-aholic, what he had to say about her, thinking he would refuse to say anything because he didn't string three words together all week unless he was having a tantrum.  Without skipping a beat he said, "She loves me."  I laughed and another kid said, "She really does," and I laughed some more.  Crazy kids.

One day I was getting impatient with the mama's-little-angel brat mentioned above when he was racing around tables when everyone else was sitting on the carpet waiting for a story.  I said, "Please go to the carpet.  I already told you that five times.  I shouldn't have to tell you to do things more than once," and a bunch of kids piped up and said, "Hey! My mom says that to me all the time!" and "Yeah, my dad says that to me every day!"

Cats

Yesterday I took a kindergarten job.  I don't know why I do it.  I guess it's like a challenge, and also the teacher likes me and asked me specifically to do it, so I took the job.  I'm a sucker.  Those kids are SO CUTE, but teaching kindergarten is like simultaneously managing a room full of cats and putting out fires - all day long.  Occasionally I have to take the cats out of the room to the library, or the lunchroom and that is a total fiasco.  Getting the cats to put on all their winter clothes to go home is another fiasco.  Cats don't care if the bus is going to be there in 5 minutes.  Cats don't care about anything but what they want to care about, and you can be sure it's nothing you want them to care about.

My class

We got through most of the day with no major problems.  We had reading centers and did a pretty intense math activity.  That took the whole morning with me running around helping, solving problems, picking stuff up off the floor, resolving conflicts, tying shoes, buttoning pants, listening to tattles, etc. etc.  I was, for every second, either being talked to or talking.  I didn't have one minute to sit, go to the bathroom, or take a drink of water.  I don't know how kindergarten teachers do it day in and day out.  It is exhausting. 

Finally it was lunch time.  I gave them 15 minutes to get ready with all their winter clothes for recess afterward.  Some kids were ready in one minute, some kids still hadn't even put their snowpants on when it was time to leave.  So I brought the first wave down and then came back to get the second wave.  When I finally got back to the room to eat my own lunch, a parent came in with a kid that wasn't there in the morning.  I told him the kids were down at the cafeteria for lunch, thinking he could bring his kid down there himself.  He stared at me.  The kid stared at me.  I said, "Joseph, put your stuff on for recess and go to lunch."  The dad said, "He has to wear all his stuff just to go to lunch?"  Yes, Mr. Underminer, because if he doesn't put his boots and snowpants on now, he will totally miss recess because of how long it takes a five year old to put their boots and snowpants on, not to mention the fact that if he isn't wearing everything he needs, he will lose half of it on the short walk to the cafeteria.  I didn't say all that.  I just said, "Yes."  Then he stood there while his kid sloooooowwwwwly put on his stuff and griped about why the kids have to go to lunch wearing all their stuff.  He finally left and I had about ten minutes to myself where someone wasn't poking me or crying about something.

Then I went to get them.  There must have been a bee on the playground because every single kid told me there was a bee on the playground.  Then one kid said he got stung by the bee.  I asked where and he didn't have an answer.  Another kid heard the first kid say he got stung so he said he also got stung.  Then everyone was saying they got stung. They lie.

The afternoon was much less intense than the morning; they had library, which left me with a merciful 25 minutes to pick up the room and get ready for them to come back, and then when they came back it was story time (my favorite), and then free play time.  During free play time a group of them wanted me to read stories to them.  They LIKE me!  They made me sit on the carpet and then they piled around me like a bunch of puppies and listened to me read.  It was pretty sweet, but while I was doing that, there was another group of kids who silently FILLED the water table to the tippy top. They did it by filling and re-filling a four-cup measuring cup.  I bet there was fifty gallons of water in that table, and the kids were soaked and the floor all around was soaked.  I made the water-table people help me clean up the mess they made, which had the exact results as it would if you told a bunch of cats to help you clean up a mess.  It was more work getting them to grab paper towels and soak up the water on the floor than it would have been to just do it myself, but we finally did it.

Then the sub notes said to gather on the carpet and talk about our day.  "Hey cats, I want all of you to sit in the same general area at a specific point in time!"  It eventually happened, but I had to chase and cajole and plead with five or six of them to go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug, can't you see everyone else on the rug?  go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug.  Let's go to the rug!  Wouldn't going to the rug be fun?  go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug, you don't need to check your backpack for your toy shark right now, go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug, you can get your water bottle after you go to the rug, go to the rug, go to the rug, don't worry that your shoe is untied for the 800th time right now, just go to the rug, go to the rug, yes, it's very intersting that you have scabs on your leg that vaguely form the letter Y but right now go to the rug, go to the rug, no, I didn't know your teacher usually says "carpet," does it matter? oh, it does? okay, go to the carpet.


go to the rug

Finally, time to go home.  This brilliant teacher has set things up so a bunch of fifth graders come and are assigned to certain kindergarteners, and they help them get ready, gather their things, and then walk them to their bus.  I was so grateful to see those fifth graders that I could have cried.

Today I'm subbing for a woman who teaches AP social studies.  I have not had to tie any shoes or button any pants (so far).  Nobody has tattled and I don't expect to hear any tattles.  If they miss the bus, I won't even know about it, much less be responsible for it.  Aaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....

My blog is my sty

I'm having a great morning.  I got a job teaching for half a day for a health teacher who I get called for every spring when she is teaching something totally awkward and embarrassing.  I don't think she is embarrassed by it at all, in fact, I think she's totally immune, but I have to wonder at her needing a sub in the spring and never any other time.  Hmmm...  Anyway, today the kids have guest speakers talking about date rape.  They are doing a unit called "One by One: Teens explore Date Rape"  Just the title alone is enough to cause a 15 year old to claw hopelessly at the ground hoping to dig him/herself a giant hole to climb in.   I LOVE that ninth graders, who can be pretty obnoxious at times, are reduced to looking busy and interested in the most insignificant scribble on their desks when someone asks, "What are three ways a girl might say "no" in a date rape situation."  Is there any good answer a 15 year old boy can give to that awkward, potentially incriminating question? -- "Well, when I dabbled in date-raping, I found girls usually just said, 'WHAT do you think you're doing?'"  -- No, there really isn't a good way a kid can answer that question,  so they stay silent and still, knowing that the guest speaker can only see movement, and if you stay still, avert your eyes, and blend in, they won't even know you are there.  

I needed a good job today.  Yesterday I taught kindergarten again.  I only sub for one kindergarten teacher and only because I like her, but I might have to break the news to her that I HATE kindergarten and can't do it any more.  She's kind of a big shot and is gone to meetings a lot, and that means a lot of work for me, but I don't know if it's worth it.  Yesterday three kids peed their pants.  My mom, who was a kindergarten teacher for many many years said that she thinks it is because they are afraid of me, but I know that isn't it.  Two of them are best friends and both peed their pants during a bathroom break after lunch.  They peed their pants together in the bathroom.  Like it's what all the cool kids do.  Another one came out of the bathroom that is located in the classroomwith pee all over her pants.  Excuse me, aren't you six years old?  WTF is with all the peeing?  

One girl came in to class first thing in the morning and told me that she needed a student to assist her for the day because she went blind. Here's our conversation:

Girl: Can Ava sit by me and help me today?  I need help because I went blind.
Me:  You're blind?
Girl: Yes.
Me: When did you go blind?
Girl: Yesterday after I went bowling.
Me: Do you mean you can't see anything, or you can't see well?
Girl: Yesterday I couldn't see anything.  Today I can't see well.
Me:  Did you go to the doctor?
Girl:  No.
Me: Did you tell your parents?
Girl: Yes. 
Me:  Do you have a headache?
Girl: No, I'm just blind.
Me:  -----
Girl: So can Ava help me today?
Me:  ...........  Yeah, sure.   

I agreed to teach that class again tomorrow.  New class rule -- NO DRINKING LIQUIDS ALL DAY LONG.

I have to say that after my last post, exposing to the world my true nerdiness (and my sister's true nerdiness) that I am loving the comments!  My aunt emailed me and called me a big nerd, and then went on to give me her opinion on which Hogwarts houses she thinks the Founding Fathers would be placed in. (NERD.)  Diary of a Mad Bathroom made me crack up this morning when I read her comment that kindly suggests I find like-minded nerds to talk to, like if I don't find an outlet for my nerdiness I might do something dramatic and irrational.  Of course, this is all happening on my blog, which in itself is an indication of my immense nerdiness.  I embrace my nerdiness and roll around in it like a pig in a sty.  My blog is my sty. 

Child Abuse

That title is misleading.  Nobody was abusing children today.  Children were abusing me.  I got called in last minute to teach kindergarten.  I rushed through showering and making my lunch and got there to relieve the teacher who was feeling terribly sick.

There were six kids absent today because there is some kind of horrible bug going around.  Ten minutes into class, I was reading a story and somebody stopped me to tell me, "Brady is puking!"  I looked at Brady and he had his fingers in his mouth and was puking down his arm, all over his lap, all over the rug.  Endlessly puking. Gallons of puke.  It was so so so gross.  When he finally stopped, I gave him some paper towels and sent him to the nurse with a helper.  Then I called the janitor to come and clean it up.  He came in to survey the damage and one kid said, "Hi, Bob," then every kid said, "Hi, Bob!" and wouldn't stop saying it until he said hi to each one individually, but I think he freaked out a little because he gave up on that after about five kids and bee-lined it for the door which only made the crazy little bastards say, "HI, BOB!" with more and more desperation.  It was like a whole classroom full of Chuckie dolls.  Ask Bob, I bet he'd agree with me.

Hi, Bob, Hi Bob, HI BOB!

Bob cleaned up the disgusting mess, Brady went home and we got on with the business of kindergarten.  Things went smoothly until it was recess time and I was zipping jackets and when I was bending down to zip a girl's coat, she sneezed a very wet, productive sneeze all over my face.  ALL OVER MY FACE!  I wanted to shriek and dance around and say, "GROSS GROSS GROSS GROSS GROSS!!!"  but I didn't.  I said, in a sweet sing-song kindergarten teacher voice, "remember to cover your mouth when you sneeze!"

After lunch they came back in and had rest time, which would more appropriately be named watch-your-classmates-and-tattle-on-them-for-not-resting-every-second time.  Not very restful.

I got through the afternoon without being too horribly grossed or freaked out until it was time to get ready to go home and I was helping them pack their crap into their backpacks.  Oh My Dear Sweet Lord some of those backpacks are gross!  I can't even tell you how much unidentifiable crusty crap I had to avoid while zipping and unzipping backpacks.  What is that stuff?  Food?  Snot?  Whatever it was, it was gross.  Hey parents, backpacks can be washed.

I need a new job

I think I need to find a job.  I'm really starting to hate subbing.  For one thing, I think that all the laid-off teachers have started subbing and are getting all the decent jobs because when I do get called to sub, the job description is something like this:

Job # 12345 7:30-3:45

-Start at Central High for Mr. So-and-so.  Teach 1st hour special ed. in resource room.  (question:  where the fuck is the resource room?) Teach 2nd hour Consumer Science (fancy name for home ec.) in room 153.  (walking down hallway, see rooms 152, 154.  There is no 153.  After walking about a mile looking for it because it MUST BE by 152, learn that for some inexplicable reason it is on the second floor. ??? Oops!  Clerical error!  We meant 253! lol!)  Walk in late, flustered and sweaty.  Read lesson plans and learn that you have to supervise thirty-five 16-year-olds making flan. (what the fuck is flan?)

-Go to STC (Where the hell is that?  Oh, it's across the 15 acre ice-rink parking lot?  I wonder how many times I will fall.)  Teach 3rd hour remedial math for Mrs. Whats-her-face in a freezing cold totally isolated classroom with 15 boys who look like they want to kill you and make your skin into a suit.  

-Drive to East High School.  Teach 5th and 6th hour  for Mr. Blahblahblah in room 353.  Yes, the school in fact does happen to be 95 degrees!  How did you guess?  BTW Mr. Blahblahblah is a slob and won't have any lesson plans for you.  Good luck!

-Drive back to Central.  Babysit an 8th hour study hall that has a student teacher.  Sure, it's a total waste of time but what do you care?  You're getting paid an almost poverty-level wage no matter what you teach so quit your bitching!

Or even worse:

Job # 23456 7:30 - 3:30

Any Elementary School: All day kindergarten.


(Actually, I taught in kindergarten yesterday and it wasn't so bad.  The kids were very cute.  I was wearing a red jacket and one little girl came up to me and said, "I like your jacket," and on the word "jacket" she poked me hard, dead-center in both boobs with her tiny monkey fingers.) 

I think I want to find a job that pays a lot of money, has low expectations, is part-time, where I won't have to drive around all day or get sexually assaulted by small children.  Is that too much to ask?

Kindergarten = Insane Asylum

I am subbing at one of my favorite schools today, in the morning for a fifth grade teacher and in the afternoon for a kindergarten teacher.  Fifth grade was a breeze.  Fun, easy, rewarding.  I felt like I was really something special after that.  Teacher of the year!  

Then I came into this kindergarten class and they are slowly but surely eating me alive.  This may be the last thing I ever write because they are at lunch right now and I only have another 15 minutes until they get back.  I forgot how fucking crazy kindergarteners are.  As soon as their teacher left, we were doing an activity on the smartboard, putting pictures that started with S next to the big S and putting pictures that started with M next to the big M (easy).  They started arguing with each other about who was going to get to pick which picture, and who was in line first, and who got to be in line first last time blah blah blah.... pandemonium.  

We finished that awful activity and then we went to the gym to play Duck Duck Goose.  Total chaos.  The "it" person would go around the circle and touch each person's head and say "duck" but you could always tell when they were about to goose someone because it went like this:  duck...., duck.., duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, duck, Duck, Duck, DUCK,DUCK, DUCK, DUCK!, with each new kid getting slapped just a little harder in the head until someone got goosed, I meanGOOSEd!!! and then those two were running around the whole gym like a couple of maniacs, and the Goose person would go after the It person with such a vengeance that when the It person finally got tagged by the Goose person the It person usually fell on the floor from the sheer force of five-year-old excitement/gooseslap-rage.  Holy shit!  Calm down, people!  And THEN the people who were tagged were supposed to sit inside the yellow circle, but they wouldn't stay there.  If I turned my back they would slide their little bodies out of the circle and try to trip the Goose person and the It person when they were running around like maniacs.  

Then we had to go to the bathroom and there was almost a class brawl while they argued about if they are supposed to line up next to the wall, or on the black line.  First of all, I didn't see any black lines anywhere, so I don't know what the hell they were talking about, and second of all, just line the fuck up and shut your toothless little traps!  

And then we came back to the classroom and they were supposed to have center time.  It was total chaos trying to tell them what to do at each of the four centers.  When I'd go to help one center, the three I wasn't at would start yelling poop and pee words and laughing hysterically (it was kind of funny) and wouldn't do their center activity.  One kid had to sit in time-out because he instigated the whole poop conversation amongst his peers and whipped them into a poop/fart/pee frenzy.  (Kady, you would have been in hysterics.)  I have to go pick them up now.  Farewell...

****************************************

I'm home now.  I survived the afternoon.  I have a headache of massive proportions.  After lunch went better than before lunch.  The most alarming thing about those little people is that they really like me. Why???  I try to be a hardass and make them a little afraid of me, but they won't be intimidated.  When I was standing in front of them when they were lining up to go to the bathroom, the kids in the front were petting my stomach fat with their tiny monkey hands, and telling me how beautiful I am and how beautiful my clothes are yadda yadda yadda, and when I walked them down the hall the line leader held my hand.  Then the fat kid couldn't get his pants unbuttoned so I had to do it, then he couldn't get them buttoned so I had to do it, and whenever I would turn my eyes away, another one was running away, or getting in trouble.  

One girl lost her tooth during story time and wanted me to hold up her disgusting bloody little tooth-stump and show the class.  Gross.  

The worst part was at the end of the day when we were getting ready to leave.  The teacher didn't give me any directions about what time to get them started, or her procedures for having them get their stuff on or anything, so I was basically winging it and gave them 15 minutes to get their stuff on.  About a third of the class was ready in two minutes and then standing in line causing problems, another third took about ten or fifteen minutes (and were causing problems while they were dressing), and then the last third were making me sweat because they hadn't even located their jackets by the time the bell rang and it was time to get on the bus. 

One kid said he was mad at his classmates for some reason so he just wasn't getting ready to go home.  Um, what?  I said,"YOU'RE GOING TO MISS THE BUS!"  He didn't care.  

But then mixed in with the utter chaos were moments where they were so cute I could barely stand it.  During their story (Over the River and Through the Woods) there was a picture of a woman rolling out dough with a rolling pin.  I asked them what they thought she was making and one kid said, "Cookies!" another one said, "Pumpkin pie!" and a third said, "Green beans!" another said, "Chicken!" which led to this argument:

Kid 1: You don't make chicken, you kill it!

Kid 2:  Well, if you don't have a chicken to kill, then you just make it.  

Kid 1: ...Oh, okay.  

They were talking about their class "tuwkey" named Albuquerque and they told me that he gets a new feather every day they are really good.  He had some really nice, shiny, foil feathers.  They really wanted a yellow one today, hint hint... 

Ha ha... revenge is sweet.  TFB, Albuquerque. 

Everyone Poops (except me)

I have had a long term subbing position at my favorite school (Kira's school), in my favorite class (the library). It has been great. The only problem with full-time work at this school is that there are no private bathrooms. Just girls and boys bathrooms with stalls.

It turns out I have shy bowels and so, naturally, I've been constipated and have been having to rely on "weekenders" (a term Mitch made up) for relief on a weekly basis. I am disappointed that I can't function normally so I've been trying to encourage myself to "perform" when I need to, so today I chose time when I thought the bathrooms would be empty and I could be alone and relax and try to have a positive experience. I went to the furthest stall, and was going to sit there until something happened. About a minute into my vigil, I saw an eyeball peering at me through the crack in the door and a little voice said, "Hey, I know you, you work in the library." It was the kindergartener who has annoying back pockets. She went in the stall next to me and said, "Hey! I'm going potty too!.... Are you done yet? Can you see my hand?"

"Yep," I said, "I'm done." (and yes, I could see her hand) Needless to say, the dream was over and my shy bowels are now agoraphobic bowels.

Then she started singing really loudly. (because although the bathrooms are rundown and cruddy, the acoustics are great)

p.s. It's only Wednesday.