This Week

This week was pretty rough. You can usually tell when I'm having a rough week because I don't post very often. Yesterday was especially challenging - filled with fits, crying, screaming, being overly talkative, not following directions, etc. There were a couple of times when I actually had to step outside of my room to take a deep breath and count to ten before going back in to deal with situations! I like how I use the strategies I teach my kids to deal with their anger and frustration myself :)

Because I see much more benefit in focusing on the positive things than on the negative, I'll just share some of my funnier stories from the week.

On Thursday we were walking down the hall on our way to specials, with Jake dragging in the back. I heard this loud moaning, and when I turned around to see what it was I saw Jake pulling his sweatshirt slowly out of his other shirt, screaming dramatically "I'm having a KID! I'm having a KID!!!"

T shared some of his deep thinking with me yesterday. He said "Mrs. White, in this class we all love each other. Take you and I for example, Mrs. White. We may experience really bad difficulties, but we still love each other." I thought it was ironic that T is the REASON we "experience" these "bad difficulties."

Yesterday morning I had one of my students leading calendar so that I could pull small groups at the horseshoe table. After finishing, I decided to take the opportunity (while they were behaving) to go to the restroom. When I walked back in, seriously less than 2 minutes later, I heard a lot of talking and giggling. Then I heard E loudly whisper "The party's over."

Jake grabbed Em's bottom in specials, which of course resulted in a color change. After throwing himself to the floor in the middle of the hallway, with me warning the other children not to "step on 'Jake,'" When we got back to the room to begin our math test, he eventually joined us with frustrated sobs and loud blurts about how angry he was at himself. He kept yelling "I'm the worst kid EVER! Why do I have to be on BLUE? I'm a LOSER!" Since we were trying to take our math test in silence, I warned him that if I heard one more sound come out of his math he would get another color change." A few minutes later I walked by his desk, looked down at his test, and saw a drawing of an angry face with tears. Above the drawing he had written "I'm a loser." If you know Jake, you know how smart he is and how confident he really is with himself, which is why I can laugh when he is being so eccentric like yesterday.

There were many more things, but that's enough for today.

In addition to the stresses at work this week, I have been working on my first week of grad school assignments. I had to take 8 personality and leadership styles surveys and assessments, and then write the results and my reflections about then in a personal assessment paper. I also had to take the practice TEXES principal competency exam so that I could see the areas I most need to focus on over the next 18 months. I actually scored a 87% on it! But I am completely aware that even though I can answer test questions correctly, I am in no way close to knowing what I need to know. I'm so excited to be in school again because I love learning; I think that's why I fell into being a teacher myself. I'm also excited to be able to solicit the help and advice of my own principal, who is my site supervisor for the program, throughout the process because I have so much respect for her and how she leads our school!

Also, I am proud to say that I have successfully cooked for one whole week! Not just reheating, people. I'm talking about choosing recipes, making meal plans, buying necessary ingredients, and preparing said meals. This is big. It's my own personal New Year's Resolution, and part of mine and Kevin's shared NYR to better manage our finances - not eating out is a good step toward that! So I've been a very busy girl this week.

Today Kevin and I are grocery shopping, doing laundry, cleaning house, and just hanging out together at home with our furry children. :)

I hope you have a great weekend!