Fun Friday

We had a field trip to the aquarium on Friday. Preparing for it had all the energy of getting ready for a road trip with a toddler.  We thought through all the eventualities and recalibrated when parent chaperones either did or didn't show up unexpectedly.  (We had both.)

On the way to school, just as I was going up the hill on State Street in Lindon, there was a buckskin colt running down the middle of the road.  It was confused and stressed out and bizarrely out of place.  State Street is hopping that time of morning and hopefully the horse made his way home.

I tried to decide if a horse on the loose was a good omen or a bad omen, but I had no idea which.

Everyone was excited.  We did manage a little math, but we left to load the buses about an hour after the bell rang.  We loaded children and lunches and jackets onto a bus, three in a seat.  It was...cozy...but also exciting for the kids who don't usually get to ride buses.  When we got to the aquarium, we divided everyone into their designated chaperoned groups.  The groups had been carefully crafted to put kids with their friends and also to isolate behavior problems.  As the winner of the behavior problem jackpot this year, I had two groups of exactly one student each.  One student was with their parent and another was with me.  We mostly tagged along with another group and we had two diametrically opposed goals.  His was to lose me and mine was to keep track of him.  It was exhausting.

We left the aquarium with the exact number of children we entered with so we counted that a success.

We loaded back on the bus and Miriam had directions to a park where we were going to have lunch and let the kids play.  The bus driver didn't know left from right.  I am not one to judge since I am not good at left and right (I'm a port and starboard girl myself) but I am also not a bus driver.  It was not a very endearing trait when Miriam kept saying turn left and she kept turning right.

We made it to the park and we unloaded all the boxes and bins from underneath the bus.  We corralled everyone and made them eat and then clean up before they could play.  Three teachers and two aides who came with us can be pretty bossy, especially when you give them each a whistle.  I think the parents were a little taken aback but there were 68 of them and not a speck of garbage left behind after lunch.

The park was very fun.  It was Wardle Park in Bluffdale.  I had the fleeting thought that we should go back sometime as a family and then I remembered that my children are all adults, which is kind of rude of them.

It was also cold and slightly rainy but the kids were in heaven and we teachers kind of were too because our students were having so much fun.

Me, Miriam and Janelle.  Miriam is over 6 feet tall and crouched over and I am standing up on a higher rock--I am definitely not taller than she is.  Also, why am I the only one with crazy windy hair?

That's Kylee pushing, who is one the favorite aides at the school.  She didn't know until 5 minutes before we left that she was coming with us.  We had a parent not show up and we enlisted her because if you ever need anything, she's the go to.  Also, this picture stresses me out because that girl whose head is hanging down?  She's one of mine!  

We loaded up the bus again and drove back to the school.  I was near some of the other third graders while we were climbing on the bus and I told them I was ready to get back to the school and do some work.  They looked at me very nervously and said, "I thought we were doing Fun Friday."  

I said, "Well, we were, but I think school work sounds better."

I finally told them I was kidding because they were near tears.  I found a seat in the back of the bus with some of my kids.  They said, "We're having Fun Friday, right?"

I said, "I think we should do some school work.  How about Word Power?"  (They all hate Word Power which is our phonics curriculum we named Word Power to try to sell it as a fun time.)

They looked at me with a ha ha very funny expression and didn't believe me a bit.

It made me think maybe I lie to them a lot and they are used to it.

Fun Friday is about 20 minutes of free time we have on Friday afternoon as a reward for work done throughout the week.  One of the classrooms is the "work room" and the students who didn't get their work done have to go there.  Everyone else gets to either go outside or go to one of the other third grade classrooms.

We definitely didn't need to have Fun Friday when the whole day had been fun but 1) our students are mercenaries and earlier in the week, when they were doing Lexia, they said, "Wait, are even having Fun Friday?!?" and 2) we knew that we'd get back to school with less than 30 minutes left in the day and we'd all be tired and unproductive anyway.

So we had Fun Friday.  Most of my students wanted to do a Kahoot.  I found one on ecosystems that they weirdly wanted to do. 

I realized that this is the time of year that is my favorite.  My students and I know each other well.  I can tease them about having to do school work when they know full well that they don't have to and they tease me by doing things like changing their profile pictures on their computers to Caillou because they know I can't stand Caillou.  (If anyone whines I tell them our classroom is a Caillou free zone.)

Also, I'm reading them Beezus and Ramona and Beverly Cleary's magic works every time.  Every day is Fun Friday when I'm reading to them and they beg me to read more.