Friday Funny

My kids finished up and turned in hero essays today.

Happy Friday!

Kids Write the Darndest Things (in Letters to Leprechauns) and Currently in June

So, just when I mention that Josh Groban isn't an obsession of mine anymore, he has to go and post this pic on Facebook:

And his caption? "Hey gang! Today I'm gonna spend my whole day looking for Blue's clues!"

It's like he's trying to win me back. That guy is just friggin' adorable.

Too late, though, buddy. This curly-haired goofy cutie may be 1000 miles away right now, but he's got my heart:

But that doesn't mean I'm not jealous of Elizabeth from Fun in Room 4B who got to go backstage and meet Josh Groban on her birthday because she taught his bodyguard's kids. Um, can I teach at your school?! JELLY.

Ahem. Anyway.



I love linking up with Oh Boy 4th Grade for Currently every month. If you haven't heard the two songs in my Listening part, they are both just gorgeous. (I am such a sucker for pretty piano.)

I've been organizing and packing up my classroom a little more this week, and I found something I hadn't seen before.

A few months ago I had my second graders create leprechaun traps as a family project.

A few kids forgot them, or refused to do them took their time to get them done, and then we had Spring Break... So, in April, a leprechaun came and messed up our room before school one day, but left us a tiny note on an index card saying "he he he, you didn't catch me!" with some green candy.

Next year the leprechaun needs to find some green shiny candy that's not mint because not all kids like mint. (But the leprechaun loves eating leftover Andes mints... *sad face*)

Anyway- the leprechaun visited late, and then none of my kids wanted to take their traps home in case he came again. His timing was not very good, so as the teacher (who was sick of having leprechaun traps everywhere), I decided that we would write our own tiny letters to the leprechaun.

I was not aware how vengeful these kids would be. There were multiple death threats to the leprechaun, including drawings of skulls and stuff. Yikes.

This was one that had gotten misplaced in the room, that I just now found and read.



He's threatening to "barycyu" the leprechaun.

Took me a minute to figure out... barbeque. Cracked. me. up.  I love working with kids.

Petal to the Metal!

Husband is in the middle of a monster road trip, somewhere in Arkansas, on his way to Texas for the summer. I have a field trip to go on tomorrow, and then report cards to do, class awards to decide, files to update, assessments to grade, gifts to make, and a class to corral for FIVE. More. Days.

Tonight, I should have been productive but I wasn't. At all. And it felt gooood. Life is moving FAST right about now, isn't it?

So, Wednesday of last week, I decided that a better Mother's Day idea for my class just wasn't coming to me, and I decided to go with an easy one- flower pens.

 

I'm sure most of you have made these before. If not, they are completely easy. I'm thinking of making some flower mechanical pencils for next year that ONLY get to be used at my guided reading table. (Hopefully, flowers would make it obvious where my pencils disappeared to!)

Basically, get some fake flowers. Pick out the best looking ones. I find that I do well at Dollar Tree, but I hear that these are easy to find at thrift stores, too.

I get 5-6 flowers for a dollar, usually. Start out by bending each flower away from the bunch.

Because these flowers do still have wires in the stems, I used a pair of scissors to cut the plastic.

Then, I just bent the wire back and forth a couple of times until it broke.

Keep doing this until you have eleventy-billion flowers. For me, I wanted my students to choose 2 flowers each, so I went a little crazy. They were so cute- some even knew their mom's favorite colors or flowers!

Now, find some pens. I snagged most of these from the "parent donations" bin in our supply room. Smoother pens are better, but any will do. My sample was made from an old hotel pen.

Check that the flower stem is not longer than the pen (and re-cut if it is). Then, start wrapping the floral tape around the pen a few times at the top. Floral tape is a little stickier on the outside of the roll, usually, but it's pretty hard to tell. It will stick either way, but not immediately. Starting the tape on the pen was the hardest part for my students!

Once you have it around the pen 5-6 times, stick the flower stem next to it and wrap tape around both, together, at least 4 times. Floral tape will stretch, so be sure you pull it tight.

From here, pull the tape and rotate the pen!

At the bottom of the pen, pull hard enough to tear the tape and then press it down. It will stick to itself. 

If you wrapped just a layer or two, your cap might fit. I had a kid or two in the class that were insistent that their moms would want the caps. (I don't know if that's inside their purses, or what...) 

My favorite thing about this project is that, when I first showed the kids, they gave me this look like, "Yeah right! I won't be able to make it look like THAT." And then, really, most of them did! They were so proud when they were done.

My worry the night before was how to make this look presentable. After Dollar Tree, my next stop was Hobby Lobby, where I found the floral tape for less than two dollars and the "vases" for 40% off.

They're can coozies! I just hot glued a cute piece of ribbon around each one. Ta-Da!

These make great easy gifts that the kids can really make. I know Mother's Day crafts are over and done, but a bouquet of flower pens could make a great end-of-the-year gift for the school secretary who essentially runs the school, that Title I teacher who works her tail off, or those room moms that deserve a little something extra.

The kids really enjoyed this, and I helped small groups through it as the rest worked on writing a short essay about what makes their mom so great.



I was pretty happy with how they turned out, and I like that it's a practical gift a mom (or grandma, or important female in their lives!) can really use.

Cracking up!

Grading is one of my least favorite parts of teaching. Yes, it's important because it gives me feedback, but that doesn't mean I enjoy it (no matter how many colorful pens and markers I use).

Still, every once in awhile, I am in the middle of grading when I come across a gem of an answer that makes it all worth it.

You can ask my husband. He's usually sitting next to me watching Modern Marvels or How It's Made when I'm grading along silently and suddenly crack up and can't stop.

In this case, I was grading a worksheet where they ask kids to write a caption for the picture. There's a picture of a girl in a wheelchair. She's pointing ahead while a man pushes the wheelchair.

Most of the kids looked at this picture of a girl pointing and put something like, "Go left, Dad!" or "Let's go that way."

This girl- who is full of personality?

Yeah... our job rocks!

What's the best hilarious answer you've gotten?