First Day of School

well i survived my first day of teaching. it was so fun and i know this is exactly what i am suppose to be doing. i have a great group of kids, 16 to be exact. it is a very diverse group: several Americans, Koreans, a Turkish American, a Singaporean, and a South African. this morning i actually felt rested when i woke up at 6:30am - i took a dramamine last night to make sure i would be able to sleep.

school starts at 8:30, and at 8:35 one of the little girls in my class threw up all over the floor. it made for a very nice "welcome to teaching" gift. the kids were going crazy...and i had no idea what to do. thankfully the 2nd grade teacher told me who to call and offered for my class to join hers until specials started at 8:45. i spent my planning period trying to get the smell out of my classroom as well as printing off activites for the day. i am still getting used to not having a printer at my apartment - i have to email everything to myself and print it off at school.

i just did some basic things with them today...going over procedures, rules, getting to know them, etc. it's nice because so many things have already been implemented...i am just reinforceing them. i am still trying to figure out how i am going to get them to behave in the hallway - it is madness and they are so loud, i HAVE GOT to get that under control soon. i started reading Frindle to them, one of my favorites (thanks to my literacy professor in college). AND probably the most exciting thing was passing out their pen pal letters from Miss Wilson's 3rd grade class in Raleigh, NC. they were thrilled and cannot wait to write back :) oh and i spent about an hour after school making a calendar for the bulletin board. and if you know anything about me you know i am not very creative or crafty - so its hilarious to me that i had to make a calendar - but i guess thats what you do when you are in a foreign country and their arent teaching supply stores around!