Yesterday

 My students came to school giddy from Easter.  They wanted to tell me all about it.  One girl told me she gets a live bunny every year for Easter.  

"Really?" I asked.  "A live bunny?"

That felt like a big commitment to bunnies.  I said, "How many bunnies do you have?!?"

She said, "They disappear.  After about a week."

I said, "Where do they go?"

She looked at me with pity because I was so stupid and said, "Easter Island."

I give equal weight to every theory I have.  Do they lose the bunny like she loses her pencil when walking across the room?  Do they borrow the same bunny every year and she's none the wiser?  Is she utterly confused about the whole situation? I have no idea.

***

I made the mistake of telling them if one more person asked me if they needed to turn in their paper, they would have to do 5 pushups.  Then they all asked me because they all wanted to do pushups. 

I need to find a different consequence.

***

A first grade teacher sent this to the third grade teachers:

A student reported to me that some boys were telling her that they put a tracker on her shoe and were going to follow her all of the time.

What would possess third graders to participate in psychological torture of first graders is beyond me.

A lot of it is beyond me.

Here's what I can get behind though:  we did our third grade culture program for the parents yesterday afternoon and I loved it so much!

We perform songs and dances from different cultures.  They do their speaking parts with their different accents and in one case language (I assigned a girl to say her part in Spanish and she was not sure, until I explained that her mom would understand and she got the biggest smile). During the performance of the Samoan Sasa, the islanders that were kind of sitting on one side of the gym, started whooping and it shocked the students, except the islanders. I heard parents behind me singing along in Spanish to de Colores. 

Our finale is This Land is Your Land and it gets me.  I sat there, leading them, trying not to cry.  Their earnest smiling faces were singing this land is your land, this land is my land and behind me were the parents from all walks of life.  

You are welcome!  I want to say!  My America is your America!  

(I have feelings about immigration.)