I’m recuperating this morning from the first week of school.  I shouldn’t say recuperating, although it feels like it.  This past week was merely introducing or reviewing procedures, doing an activity, and reading a book twenty five times.  Twenty five times.  By the time I finished the book “Because”, for the 20th time, it was like “yeah, well, whatever.  So the music changed her.”.  It’s a beautiful book with a message that brought me to tears the first time I read it, but like I said, after the 20th time, not so much.

I’m a firm believer that a child cannot learn if they don’t know how to behave or what to expect and that’s why I spend time the first week going over these things.  I want them to understand boundaries, my expectations for how they treat things and each other in my room, and the consequences of their choices, good or bad.  I also want my new little friends to know the basic logistics and rules, like where’s the bathroom, where do they sit, where the tissues are, etc. But again, after repeating virtually the same thing 25 times, I begin to question myself.  Maybe they don’t really need all that info, right?  Nope, they actually do, and so I trudge through.

One down.  One week of school finished.  One week that for some reason felt like two.  At least.  I’m looking forward to actually teaching next week, singing, playing instruments, playing games and learning about MUSIC.  However, I’m also a little concerned as I observed some interesting behaviors from my kids.  The first week of school is usually what I consider the “honeymoon” period.  Even those kids who have had me before, knowing that each year is a little different will cut me a break the first week, at least behaviorally.  But not this year.  Oh sure, I always have those Kindergarteners or new kids who just don’t have a clue as to how to dwell in a classroom setting who are literally wandering around my room, but this year I had some friends who never broke stride from when they left me in May.  Same inappropriate behavior, same frustrations, same anger, same calls for help.    Very seldom do I have kids cry during the first week unless they’re in kindergarten and they miss mommy.  I had cryers at some grade level every day this week. It was a little scary actually.  School shouldn’t be a place of sadness or stress.

I also had those kids who were so happy to be back, running up for hugs, asking excitedly about choir, wanting to know who the new dead guy was, trying to impress the new kids with their knowledge of how things are done in music class.  Smiles and hugs everywhere.  By the end of the week however, they dragged themselves in, tired eyes, sluggish, not quite in the routine of it all, looking a lot like…their teachers.  I have to admit I really felt for them.  I’m having trouble keeping the eyes open as I write, but I’m forcing myself to stay awake because I’m meeting a friend for brunch and it would probably be a good thing if I didn’t oversleep. But this past week kicked my butt.

One week down and 36 or 37 to go.  I’m not quite sure.  In education we usually count our time in days.  I’m contracted to work for 191 days.  There are 176 student days.  So, I have 171 more days with students.  Not that I’m counting.  But I can do anything for 171 days, especially if I count them down a week at a time, right?  Teaching little ones is a young person’s sport, or at least young at heart, that’s for sure.  I certainly kept up with them much better nearly 30 years ago than I do now.  I always say kids have not changed, but the culture and environment have, so how can they help but change with it?

When I have Kindergartners who don’t know their classmates’ names after the first week because they’ve done nothing but academics since they walked in the door, that’s a change.  Some say this is progress, that kids need to be challenged academically at an earlier age.  I respectfully disagree in that I think they should be playing games and getting to know each other and taking naps and having snacks, especially if they’re at school for a whole day, before they are introduced to the academics.  We as educators  spent an awful lot of time talking about building relationships with our students this year, but I’m not sure that we give them the opportunity to build healthy relationships amongst themselves.  Maybe that’s the plan for next week.

One down.