My First Day of Kindergarten

Cael, Braden and I all had our first days of kindergarten recently. I hope theirs was better than mine. My first day was horrible. I had no clue what to expect. I hadn't taught kindergarten for the past three years. The last time I taught kindergarten, I had no control of the kids at Nixon. I think I had 30 kindergartners in each of my classes. When I got five kids under control the other 25 started acting crazy. I think one even started smoking when I turned my back.

Things didn't change that much for me on Wednesday. The kids at Monroe had never been in a room the size of the gym. Their eyes got huge and their medication started wearing off. I had flashbacks of walking through the Mexico City airport. It seemed that I was the only one in the room that spoke English. When I finally did find someone that spoke English it was a five year old girl. Things got worse and worse until their teacher came to pick them up. When their teacher showed up, I was relieved... I turned around and saw another group of shorties walking in a line that looked more like a octopus. My relief turned to grief. It didn't take long for me to start looking at my watch.

Thursday was much better. I didn't start the class by asking the kids their names. In fact, I decided if I did learn the kids names it was only because they were getting themselves in trouble. This seemed to work. I got the kids moving right away and they were happy. Now that they were having fun moving, I had something I could take away from them. If a student can't sit still, they can watch us play. If students start giving each other tattoos when I'm not looking, they can watch us play. This strategy was awesome! The first class of my second day couldn't have gone better. I think I might survive kindergarten. I will have to ask Cael and Braden if they have any pointers.