Grimm(way) Fairytales Edition 5 9/22/17

Grimm(way) Fairytales 

Edition 5 

9/22/2017

Not a lot to write about this past week. I guess one can say it was a slow week. 

1).    On Monday, as I sat on a bench near the playground, I was talking with some scholars as we were waiting for the bell to ring to start the day. I am constantly amazed at what runs through the minds of children. A couple of students ran up to me and pointed their fingers at each other and said, almost simultaneously, “she called me a dork.”

“So, are you bragging or complaining?”  I guess that must have really confused them because they both just stared at me utterly baffled. Finally, they looked at each other, started giggling and ran off together arm in arm. I turned to another girl who was sitting on the bench beside me listening to the entire exchange of elementary verbiage, and asked her if she was a dork.

“No! I’m not a dork…I'm a 4th grader!”

I guess once you pass the 3rd grade, you grow out of the dorkness stage?

2)     I had the opportunity of substituting for Candyce Miller one day this past week so she could attend an IEP meeting. She gave her students a very interesting writing assignment. Apparently, she told them that she was going to have to leave for awhile and explained to them that their assignment was to write out in complete sentences where they thought she was going, who she was going to be with, and what she was going to be doing.

I was reminded, as I took the opportunity of reading through some of their essays, that many times students just assume that everyone knows what they are thinking and that everything is connected, and we all “get it” and it all makes sense.

One little girl wrote, “Mrs. Miller zoomed out of the classroom and went to Disneyland…or Kansas…or maybe Spain.” Now I have no idea what the connection is, but to this young lady, it was all perfectly understandable.

3)     One of the cutest interactions of the week occurred between Katelyn Prosser and a lunch scholar. Mrs. Prosser was assisting Chef Anna as she met with a member of the health department. Katelyn was scanning the scholars lunch tickets when a young man approached her and emphatically asked, “Do you know what you're doing?” 

Katelyn stifled her outwardly humor and simple said, “Yes, I think I pretty well have it.”

Without skipping a beat, the boy affixed his gaze upon her and said, “Have you even practiced?”

Katelyn miraculously held her own and simple answered with a, “Yep, Chef Anna gave me some pointers before she left.”

With that, he seemed satisfied and continued to his seat.

Just a FYI or perhaps some general information. I have had several staff members indicate to me how much they enjoy reading these little weekly ditties. I appreciate the feedback, thank you.  If you enjoy reading these, you are welcome to log into my blog page (it's free) and read other short stories and accounts of experiences I have had. I especially enjoyed writing about the time I capsized my boat in the middle of Chilhowee Lake, and the “fun” I had getting back to shore. Or maybe you will like reading about how much fun it is living with an Autistic child. If you are interested or if you really have a hard time falling to sleep and could use a little “jump start” to la la land then you can go to fishingwithoutanet.blogspot.com 

Until next week.

Grimm(way) Fairytales - Edition 4, 9/15/17

Grimm(way) Fairytales 

Edition 4

Friday, September 15, 2917

The fourth edition is going to be filled with several short observances that particularly struck me…enjoy.

1).   This first one actually occurred a week ago. But, I forgot to include it in last weeks edition. It was in the cafe. When a small scholar approached me and asked me a very important question, or at least it was important to her.  Because I have been inflicted with poor hearing, and because she spoke in that extremely quiet kindergarten voice, I failed to understand a single word she said. I told her that I didn't understand her and asked her to repeat her question, which she did, but with the same result. At that moment Chef Anna approached and I asked her to intercede. 

“What did you say?” Chef Anna asked.

The little girl repeated her question. Anna looked down at her and said, “Now where are you supposed to be?”

With that the little tot ran off to “where she was supposed to be.”

“That was amazing!” I said to Chef Anna. “ What did she say?”

“I have no idea.” Chef Anna answered. “I couldn’t understand her. I just say ‘where are you supposed to be right now’ and they just scamper off.”

Ummm, I think I need to remember that.

2)     I spent 2 + days with Ms. Nicol Jensen in kindergarten and had a ball. Because of my acute hearing loss, I have a difficult time hearing certain things…like the cricket this morning in the teacher work room. Lisa Marie and the others in the workroom where besides themselves at the irritating sound that cricket was making. Unfortunately for me, or maybe fortunately, I could not hear it, in fact I have never heard the annoying sound that a cricket makes. Sorry about the side trip, back to kindergarten…I was having a hard time trying to figure out why Miss Jensen kept giving deductions for flirting?  First of all, this in kindergarten, do you mean to tell me kindergarteners engage in flirting? They're 5 years old, for crying out loud. Do they even know what flirting is? Do they know how to flirt? AND they get deductions for flirting? Finally, it made sense. Little Susie made a comment without raising her hand to be recognized. Miss Jensen said, “Susie, that is the 2nd time you have flirted during class this morning. That will be a deduction.”

I was so confused. The 2nd time she has flirted?? I hadn't noticed that she had even flirted once. I started to analyze Susie’s actions that morning. Again, I never noticed that she had flirted at all…with anyone!  The only thing that I saw was the couple of times she just blurted out without waiting to be called on. “Wait a minute.” I thought. “Blurted…..BLURTED…flirted…FLIRTED.” 

Ohhhh, Geez!!!

3)     So you think our children don't listen to us when we speak to them? I'll let you be the judge of that.  I had the extraordinary opportunity of reading a story to Miss Jensen's class entitled “Peter’s Chair”. At one point in the story, Peter’s mom was looking all over the house for him, but couldn't find him. Finally, she saw what she thought was Peter hiding behind a curtain. When she moved the curtain back, she discovered that he had tricked her and put his shoes next to the curtain to fool his mother, and she was none to happy. Before I turned the page, I asked the scholars if they thought they knew what Mother was going to say to Peter when she found him?

One particular boy, without so much as a second of hesitation, shot his arm in the air.

“Yes, Billy?” I said as I pointed to him.

“You are grounded until I say otherwise.”

See…they are listening.

4)    On Thursday morning, I had the opportunity to deliver some packages to the edible school yard, and while I was there, I was able to watch Stacie, Molly, and Megan, our three miracle workers of the kitchen, prepare some peach salsa. They had a copy of the recipe and they allowed me to take a copy for my cookbook. 

Later that day, I was helping to supervise some 3rd graders during recess and one young lady wanted to show me a copy of a recipe she received during the edible school yard class. She produced a copy of the peach salsa recipe.  To show her that two can play this game, I said,

“Well, guess what I have here in my pocket?” And I pulled out my copy of the same recipe. 

“Why do you have it?” She asked, obviously confused.

“Because I'm going to make some to see how it tastes.  Are you going to make some?” I asked her.

“Nah, my mom makes this stuff every weekend.”

“Oh really!” I answered. “Can I come over and have some of you moms?”

“Oh, yes! That would be great! Why don't you come over on Saturday?” She asked.

“Well, I don't know where you live. (Pause) So where does your mom live?” I finally asked.

She looked at me and without so much as a second thought she said, “With my dad.”

5)     While helping the yard aides today, I was subbing for Patty and several girls came up to me and asked me if I knew where their recess teacher was. I asked them who their recess teacher was.

“I don't know her name.” They answered.

“Well what does she look like?” I questioned.

“Ahh, she has brown hair.”

“Nice, but I need a little more to go on. A lot of the teachers have brown hair.”

“Well, she's a girl!”

I give up.

)     On Tuesday before school started, I was making my rounds on campus and spotted a young 2nd grader sitting alone on a bench. She didn't look very happy, so I approached her. 

“Hey, there sweetie.” I offered. “ You don't look very happy. What's wrong?”

She said she was sad because a boy had pushed her and made her trip and fall down.

I asked her if she was alright and she nodded. But, she wanted to know why he did that?

“Well, you know, he probably just has a burr in his breeches. I wouldn't let it bother me.”

“A what in his where?” She asked. Totally bewildered as to my reference.

Am I really getting to the age that nobody understands my connections? I just chuckled to myself and assured her that it would all work out. It wasn't until the latter part of the day when I was sharing my experience with one of the young female yard aides. I told her that I was stunned that this little girl didn't know what a burr in ones breeches meant. She explained to me that it is all about the language and how languages change over the years.

“For example.” She said. “What is your opinion about twerking, and should high school girls be allowed to twerk?”

“Twerking??? What the heck is twerking?” I questioned.

She just smiled and said, “I rest my case.”

Finally,

6)     This poor baby hung on for as long as she could. But, when the teacher said to put their heads down on the desk for some quiet time…well, that was all the encouragement she needed.

Grimm(way) Fairytales Edition 3

 As most of you know, I started sharing some of the cute, poignant, funny experiences I have had here since the start of school. I am trying to publish these little (jewels) each weekend of the year. I ran into a little snag towards the end of August and did not post anything for a couple of weeks. Hopefully, it will come a little later. But, for now here are a couple of cute ones that happened just this past week.

1)     On Tuesday, while in the cafe, I watched and listened to a Kinder boy and girl as they shared a very interesting discovery. The little girl scooted over real close to the boy and asked him a question. She was very quiet and secretive like she was getting ready to share her most guarded treasures. 

"Do you want to see my Owie?"

The little boy looked around the room as if he was checking to see if the coast was clear. "Yea!" He nodded.

The girl lifted her hand and revealed a sweaty wrinkled bandage on her pointer finger. Carefully with the precision of a 5 year old surgeon, she started to remove the bandage. After much struggling and tugging it finally slipped off. Her eyes immediately became big as she stared at her finger, which was totally without blemish...soft and smooth as can be.

"Where is it? The boy asked.

The little girl moved her finger and hand around from side to side, but the owie was nowhere to be found. "I swear!" She said. "It was here!"

"I guess my mom was right." She added. "These band aids work miracles."

2)     One day this past week, I filled in for Ms. Wood our lab teacher. Later in the day, as one particular 4th grade class was filing into the lab…like angels with wings sprouting, I might add. (Ha Ha) There was one particular young lady, who is an angel, came to me and said, “Grandpa, Jose, (not his real name, or course) is pushing me in the back.”

“Ok, I'll talk to him.”

now I might be considered by many…ok, most, to be

       old(er), but I'm not so old that I have forgotten what runs

       through the brain of a young boy.

“Hey, Jose, I need to talk to you.” Jose and I moved to an area that was not within earshot of others. “I want to ask you a question. It’s an easy question, but it might be a difficult answer. Just be honest with me, and this is just between you and I. I'm not going to call your parents or tell the principal or anything like that, OK? Can you do that?”

He nodded his head.

“So, do you think that maybe, a little bit, that perhaps, Susie (again not her real name) is kind of cute?”

Jose got a little embarrassed and started to shuffle his feet and finally muffled under his breath, “yea.”

“Well, it's okay to let her know that you think she's cute, but, take it from me, pushing her, or pulling her hair, or poking her in the back, or touching her anywhere, is not going to work. Believe me, I know. I've tried it and it just backfires…every time.”

He was real quiet and just stared at the floor. “So do you want to know how to become friends with her?”

Again he nodded.

“Okay, now I'm not saying this works every time, but the success rate is much higher than poking her in the back…give her a compliment. Say something like, ‘Hey, Susie, I sure think you have a pretty smile.’ Then just walk away.” 

“Then what?” He wanted to know.

“Let a couple of days past, and give her another compliment, like you think her hair is pretty. After awhile, Susie is going to think, ‘Humm, maybe Jose is not such a big creep after all.’  Then you guys will become friends.”

3)     I had the opportunity last week to work with Cullen for awhile one day. I don't usually mention the names of the children I write about, but in this case, I don't think I will offend anyone. Miss Anderholt was working with the class as a group on the carpet up at the front of her room. Cullen wasn't really interested in doing what the other children were doing, and he was devoted to finishing his math worksheet. We worked on it together of a few seconds when all of a sudden he jumped up and announced that he had to go to the bathroom. Without even waiting for a nod of approval from me, he was gone. (If he decides to become a teacher someday, he will need to work on the endurance part of “holding it” a little.) 

While he was gone, Irene called me on the phone and asked if I could go to Ms. Maitland’s Kindergarten class for awhile, as she had an IEP meeting to attend. Apparently, as it was explained to me, when Cullen returned from the lavatory, he looked around and simple said, “Where’s the guy!”

So…at least I am recognized as “the guy” and not just “grandpa.”

4)     While this next experience is somewhat funny, I have to admit that I'm a little bewildered and maybe even dismayed. I had occasion to share lunchtime with a group of third graders the other day. The young man sitting next to me leaned over and asked, “Grandpa, did they have school when you were a kid?” 

“Well, of course they did.” I answered.

“What kind of things did you have to learn?”

“The same things you have to learn…math, English, science.”

“Oh!” (Pause) “Did they have You Tube?” He continued.

“ No, we didn't have You Tube.”

“Did you have Mind Craft?”

“Nope, sorry, no Mind Craft.”

“Not even Mario Brothers?”

“We didn't have any of that, computers hadn't even been invented yet.” I tried to explain. Again there was a long pause.

“So, what did you do for fun?” He asked, quite puzzled.

“We went outside and played.”

“Played what???” He asked, visibly shaken.

“We played Red Rover, Red Rover. We played Hide and Seek and Blind Mans Bluff. Or we would build houses out of card board and forts out of tumble weeds and cities in the flower beds with our toy cars. Sometimes we played Hop Scotch or Jaxs, or Pick Up Sticks…you know stuff like that.”

We really do live in a totally different world.

Have a great week next week, and make lots of memories.