Friday, June 15, 2007

Four days....

Even though it doesn't feel like it lately here in chilly CT, summer really is just around the corner. Or rather, summer vacation. We are at the point in the year where pretty much everything is done, and teachers have the same conversation every morning in the hall:
"What are you doing in math today? Anything good?"
"I was thinking multiplication bingo, but maybe we'll just skip that and illustrate our published books for an hour instead. Third graders can color for an hour, right?"
"Sure they can.....what should I do? Forget it, I'm going to watch a movie!"

That's right folks, anyone who thinks REAL learning is taking place at this point in the year is sadly mistaken. (Which is why, incidentally, snow days should not be added on to the end of the year. You don't actually make up the learning that you miss in the winter. You just have to babysit an extra few days when you'd so much rather be at the beach.)
I did manage to impress a colleague when I told her that my students were still doing book clubs. Some of them are still publishing their poetry anthologies too. She couldn't believe I was still teaching curriculum and even asked in a rather awed voice, how are you doing that?!

Four days and counting--and two of those are half days!.....the To-Do list is shrinking, although not nearly quickly enough for my liking. The students energy level is growing and the teachers are desperately trying to maintain some semblance of control these last days.

3 comments:

shelleycoughlin said...

Are you in until Tuesday as well? Next week is two half days- only one with the darling children. I'm thinking of setting up DDR for the staff on Tuesday... who says we don't teach anything new the last few days of school?! :)

Anonymous said...

Lisa,
I can't wait! Yahoo... you're going to be off for the whole summer!!!! Maybe we will get to play.
Love ya' Mom S xoxox

Chrissy said...

I'm so jealous that you get your summer off! My preschool is still open for the kids whose parents still need to work all day. Today, in sunny Denver (85 degrees and sunny hot!) we were stranded at the park for 2 extra hours because our school bus broke down. Most of my 4 year-olds, and me too, were burnt to a crisp because our sunscreen bin was left behind (we didn't think we'd be there that long!) We slathered them with it before we left...

Anyway, enjoy your last few days, and I hope you have a great summer!