Another Day in (W)hole

ARGH I’m having one of those frustrating days where everything feels too difficult.

My dogs are giving me sad eyes and looking pathetic, wanting to go out and play. There’s nowhere convenient to take them to run and play, and they hate apartment life.

Kasin had an essay to do over xmas break as a make up assignment for science. We totally forgot about it until TODAY, the last day of break, and NOW he’s telling me that he needs all this login information and to use a computer to post it to Google Classroom and that the template for the essay is on Google Classroom too and since he doesn’t know the login information, he doesn’t know how to do it correctly. Now he’s telling me that it’s really easy and he’ll be done in like ten minutes. So I told him I’m going to read it and edit it and make him change it when I’m done, and he’s like “there won’t be anything to change.” UH PLEASE.

I have spent all weekend in bed, mostly.. like, literally all day yesterday until dinner time. I came out to make Milo something for lunch, and that was it. The kids hung out with me in my bedroom most of the day, watching movies and hanging out and playing on our phones/tablets. As a result, my bedroom is totally trashed, there are tons of crumbs in my bed, Milo dumped an entire brand new package of pistachios all over my room, there are tissues (I still have a cold) and cups and paper plates and bags of snacks scattered everywhere… when the kids WEREN’T in my room with me, they were mostly in the living room playing with toys, or watching TV.. so the living room is ALSO totally trashed.

That’s what I get for having a day of “Rest.” (In my opinion, it doesn’t really count as rest since the kids were in here most of the day, asking me questions and pestering me and making a mess, not letting me nap, etc) So I told them today that we would spend today cleaning the house up and getting it back in order. THEN I realized that Kasin hadn’t done his essay, so now we’re working on that. Kasin also discovered this morning that Milo had chewed up the stylus to his BRAND SPANKING NEW Wii U, and had a complete melt down this morning over that. He has some Christmas money and wants to go to WalMart later to look for a replacement stylus, but he and Milo were also both taking a mom-mandated break from video games all day yesterday, so they are both itching to play today. BUT NOW it doesn’t really look like they will have time for that, because we have to get through this essay, go to the store, AND clean up.

I go back to work tomorrow. I didn’t get a real Christmas break since I work for an hourly rate, I would have never been able to afford to take the time off… so instead I was working in one of the toddler classrooms, Discovery Preschool, which is 2.5-3 year olds. I had a lot of fun with it, and I did all of their regular curriculum stuff with them (we have curriculum and daily lessons for every class, infants on up) and we did art projects and activities, sang songs and played games. I figured since I was in there I just had to keep up whatever they had already been doing and just make sure their curriculum was getting done and the projects were being completed. The teacher for that class quit back in like..August or September? And they haven’t hired someone new yet, so it’s been a mess in there since the last teacher left. They’ve had a few different people try to take over the class, but everyone has had a really hard time. I jumped right in and had no problems, I even got one of the kids who recently turned 3 just about potty trained, despite the fact that she apparently never uses the bathroom for ANYONE else. Her mom is a co-worker, and she was super thankful and excited about it.

I had a billion co-workers comment all week long on how that class had never been quieter, usually you can hear them all causing a ruckus through the walls in every surrounding room, the kids were actually learning something and participating in curriculum and activities, and it was amazing, They also loved all the artwork and things that we had done and displayed, liked my bulletins and displays and apparently told the management that I was doing GREAT in there. I had management come observe me and they were shocked and grateful and now they are talking about trying to keep me in there full time, but they CAN’T, because I’m the only person with a teaching certificate that can teach the kindergarten class.

Plus, I REALLY want to finish out the year in kindergarten, stick with my students, and see them through the entire year. Last year apparently they had three or four different teachers in and out of the kindergarten room and basically none of the kids were reading by the end of the year- all those kids are now in resource classes for reading in their first grade schools. :\ I aint having that! I have one kiddo who just turned 5 in the middle of september, and his mom was reluctant to let him go ahead and attend kindergarten this year, but he is practically reading now, and she is so impressed. Most of my kids are starting to read and I’m so proud of them. I really want to stick with them for the rest of the school year and make sure they move on to first grade with everything they need to know to be successful.

ALRIGHT.. this took over an hour to write. I’m outtie.