108 4th Graders...2 mile hike
As you will see from the rest of this post, I have had a week of quite "comical" things that would only happen to me. Yeah...it's been one of those weeks...
Monday- Nothing all too exciting actually happened on Monday that I can really think of at this point. I started not feeling well...cold symptoms and by the end of the day I was starting to lose my voice which leads to...
Tuesday- Woke up, and had absolutely no voice and did not feel well really at all. Drove to school contemplating how I was going to teach without a voice. This is quite the necessity and sort of goes along with the teaching profession. I used a lot of gestures and the board. They honestly did not even notice until about 30-45 mins into the morning that I was not talking at all. Luckily I have a co-teacher for math and she taught for me. As the day went on my voice did slowly come back, but not to the full front. I avoided talking as much as possible. It was an interesting experience trying to find various ways to control 20 4th graders when you can't hardly whisper above them. Luckily they are quite well-behaved. I did have a few get a little devilish glint in their eye when they realized I could not remotely speak over them. After school I did end up going to doctors to get some good drugs, which they did supply very willingly which leads to...
Wednesday- Before I tell you what happened on Wednesday let me explain why Wednesday was a special day at school. Our school was basically being "audited" in sorts. We had 20 administrators and teachers from other schools coming to interview, observe and watch us for the day. In basic sense it was a huge day, and not the best day to call in sick. So back to Wednesday. I got up, feeling a lot better than the previous day. Took my medicine and headed off to school. Well about 15 minutes into teaching my math lesson I started feeling not so hot. Or actually I started feeling very very hot, woozy, and very nauseous. It took pretty much everything I had to not toss my cookies on top of those kids. I finally gave up, and told my co-teacher I needed to go to the restroom. Where I um...relived my breakfast. Thought I was feeling better, and that maybe the medicine was not mixing well or something. Went back, got my kids and took them to specials. During specials my fellow 4th grade teachers and I were interviewed by two of the visiting teachers. They asked many many questions, and as the interview went on I started feeling not so great again. The wooziness returned and I just sat sort of motionless in the meeting, not sure as to what to do. Eventually, a question was asked that apparently my fellow teachers thought I would have a good answer to. The teacher next to me mentioned later that she was just sitting there thinking hmm...Christy hasn't said anything in a while and looks over and thought that I was going to throw up right there on the table. So anyways, all eyes on the table are on me, and it took me a few seconds to process this and I suddenly just say "I gotta go, like right now." And, I got up and ran back to the restroom. Hmmm...that's one way to avoid answering a question. After this, I go to the nurse and get some crackers and gatorade. Try to get my energy back up. I also ran into my principal who noticed my juice and crackers and seemed a bit suspicious, so I told her my actions of the morning. She asks if I want to go home, but being my brave self I say oh no I'm fine. I pick up my kids from the gym and head back to the room. When I get to my room I see that I am going to be observed by one of the visiting teachers. All of this is really a blur, I recall vaguely telling her that I wasn't feeling well, and sent the kids to the carpet to do calendar math. They of course don't answer anything correctly and act like they've never heard of a fraction...I'm thinking awesome, I look like an idiot. The nice observer lady leaves, and I decide to read them a book for writing that day. I start reading the book, and the wooziness returns. Every few seconds I have to stop because of the wonderful gagging going on. Finally I finish the book...barely and the guidance counselor comes in for the guidance lesson. As soon as she comes in, I walked out in a sort of stupor and went straight to the office to the secretary and just blurted out: "I need a sub now!" She's like ok, we can do that. I think I freaked her out a bit. So on the way back to my room I ran into my principal again, and told her I was leaving, which she gladly agreed from my quite paleness. I went back to my room, sort of blurted out to my kids that I was leaving, and they all seemed to think they were going to be teacherless for the rest of the day. I of course have to get my subplans fixed for the rest of the day, and my assistant principal comes in for some reason, I vaguely remember why, then someone else came in, and then finally my principal again telling me they had a sub and I needed to leave already. Which is how I got sent home by my boss...good stuff. Oh and did I mention that during all of this there was some poor lady observing the guidance counselor's lesson and my class watching all of this medicine. Somehow I made it home and slept the rest of the day to wake up that evening to prepare for my first fieldtrip on...
Thursday: Woke up on Thursday, feeling much better and ready to conquer my first field trip! Somehow in my two years or interning and student teaching I missed all of the field trips. The plan for the day was to take all 108 4th graders on the North East Georgia History Museum in downtown Gainesville. After the museum, we took all 108 of these wonderful kiddos on a 2-mile planet walk around downtown Gainesville. The museum visit went quite well, but the walk was quite the adventure. We toured a settlers house where J-man swore to me the whole time that there was no way anyone actually lived there. It was quite comical how insistent that people really did not live in it back then because there are light blubs in it now. Hard to explain, but very funny to how determine he was to prove me wrong. Anyways, the basis of the walk is it shows the kids the relational distance between the planets in the solar system. How close the first four planets are and how far away the outer planets are from each other. The walk had us cross many different streets and at one point walking next to this steep hill/ravine looking thing with no sidewalk. My wonderful "drama king" (in my first post I discuss about how he got "lost" on the playground when he fell down the hill and decided to not get up an come back in), is walking and pointing to the right while not paying any attention to the ravine on his left. As he is pointing, he starts to slip down the hill where I luckily grab him and yank him back up. Nearly gave me a heart attack. A few minutes later my followers, getting bored from the walk, decide that this is a great time to start asking Ms. Geer personal questions! Although I have told them many times I am not married, I got the "Are you married?" "Do you have any kids?" "Do you have a boyfriend?" I answer of course...no...no...no... Then I get oh she's lying, you really have a boyfriend, she's just not telling us. I tell them, no I really don't, and drama king says "I am psychic, I am getting a prediction." As he proceeds to put his hands on his head and mmmm. Finally he says in this robotic voice: "I have seen something...you will meet your new boyfriend in 15 minutes...and his name is Michael." Sadly though...I never did get to meet my future boyfriend Michael on Thursday or...
Friday: After all the stress of the week, Friday was sort of a blur. It did end well though with High School Musical 3!!!! Well at least it was a great ending to quite the interesting week... Enjoy these pictures of my wonderful 4th graders!
