Quote for the Day 2/2/08
At school, after a loud crash from the lab, followed by muffled laughter, in the midst of a frog dissecting project:
Me, checking in at the lab door, where everyone was trying to focus again on their spread-eagled frogs in the wax-bed lab trays: Are all the frogs and people in here alright?
Seth??: Yeah.
Emily: I just fell off my chair. (Then, unconvincingly. . . ) I was just peacefully sitting here and I . . . fell off my chair.
Tim: You weren't peacefully sitting on your chair. You were tipping it back.
Me: Oh. Well, let's try to keep things under control a little better.
**********************************************************
Tim: Can we have a party during the last half of typing class on Monday for Seth's birthday?
Me: No, but you can do something during break if you want to.
Tim: Not during class though?
Me: No.
Tim: Groan.
Listening to this, you'd think parties during class were an inalienable right, "conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition. . . ."
***************************
Snowy, cold, windy, and otherwise disagreeable weather has driven students recently to more recess-time desperation than usual. They haven't yet discovered the clandestine activity one of my former co-teachers revealed that the teachers used to do in their school in the evening after the students left: playing volleyball across the top of the scoring station in the learning center. However, they have entertained themselves with some creative alternatives:
Water Skiing: This activity requires one person planting each foot firmly on a squashed facial tissues box while holding on to a sturdy rope. One or more fellow students grabs the other end of the rope, and the "boat" and skier go circling around the carpeted learning center.
Bowling: Boys substitute for bowling pins and stand in a triangular formation. The bowler stands an appropriate distance away and rolls a volleyball toward the "pins." All "pins" touched by the ball are obliged to fall over on the spot. The fun part is that this always results in a strike since they're standing so close together, and the falls are so ungainly that everyone ends up in a heap on the floor. For added effect, they spread their arms as they fall.
Go-Kart Riding: The special furniture dolly used to move the teacher's desks when necessary is pressed into service as a human-powered conveyance for thrill-seeking riders.
Shop volleyball: I heard about this underclassmen invention from a slightly disdainful upperclassman. Tables substitute for a net and the ball is batted back and forth over the table tops. I can't imagine this working very well on a typically-sized volleyball court (or for typically-sized students, for that matter).
Kansas Clean-em: This looks like a thinly veiled Poker game to me. I can't imagine that it benefits the mind or the body, and it doesn't look like a great way to strengthen social connections.
Lunchtime Pancake and Pizza Parties: Not on the same day. . . One day the girls at school provided and served to each other pancakes, sausage, scrambled eggs, juice, fruit, etc. that they had prepared in the kitchen with supplies they brought from home. Another day, a group of Kevin Nisly's cousins brought and baked a homemade pizza in the oven. It smelled wonderful, but was not for consumption by the "peons." Kevin was visiting school for the day.
Maybe we need to dust off those President's Challenge physical fitness papers and get the students started on working toward those goals.
Me, checking in at the lab door, where everyone was trying to focus again on their spread-eagled frogs in the wax-bed lab trays: Are all the frogs and people in here alright?
Seth??: Yeah.
Emily: I just fell off my chair. (Then, unconvincingly. . . ) I was just peacefully sitting here and I . . . fell off my chair.
Tim: You weren't peacefully sitting on your chair. You were tipping it back.
Me: Oh. Well, let's try to keep things under control a little better.
**********************************************************
Tim: Can we have a party during the last half of typing class on Monday for Seth's birthday?
Me: No, but you can do something during break if you want to.
Tim: Not during class though?
Me: No.
Tim: Groan.
Listening to this, you'd think parties during class were an inalienable right, "conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition. . . ."
***************************
Snowy, cold, windy, and otherwise disagreeable weather has driven students recently to more recess-time desperation than usual. They haven't yet discovered the clandestine activity one of my former co-teachers revealed that the teachers used to do in their school in the evening after the students left: playing volleyball across the top of the scoring station in the learning center. However, they have entertained themselves with some creative alternatives:
Water Skiing: This activity requires one person planting each foot firmly on a squashed facial tissues box while holding on to a sturdy rope. One or more fellow students grabs the other end of the rope, and the "boat" and skier go circling around the carpeted learning center.
Bowling: Boys substitute for bowling pins and stand in a triangular formation. The bowler stands an appropriate distance away and rolls a volleyball toward the "pins." All "pins" touched by the ball are obliged to fall over on the spot. The fun part is that this always results in a strike since they're standing so close together, and the falls are so ungainly that everyone ends up in a heap on the floor. For added effect, they spread their arms as they fall.
Go-Kart Riding: The special furniture dolly used to move the teacher's desks when necessary is pressed into service as a human-powered conveyance for thrill-seeking riders.
Shop volleyball: I heard about this underclassmen invention from a slightly disdainful upperclassman. Tables substitute for a net and the ball is batted back and forth over the table tops. I can't imagine this working very well on a typically-sized volleyball court (or for typically-sized students, for that matter).
Kansas Clean-em: This looks like a thinly veiled Poker game to me. I can't imagine that it benefits the mind or the body, and it doesn't look like a great way to strengthen social connections.
Lunchtime Pancake and Pizza Parties: Not on the same day. . . One day the girls at school provided and served to each other pancakes, sausage, scrambled eggs, juice, fruit, etc. that they had prepared in the kitchen with supplies they brought from home. Another day, a group of Kevin Nisly's cousins brought and baked a homemade pizza in the oven. It smelled wonderful, but was not for consumption by the "peons." Kevin was visiting school for the day.
Maybe we need to dust off those President's Challenge physical fitness papers and get the students started on working toward those goals.
posted by Mrs. I at
3:16 PM
1 Comments:
"we haven't discovered the volley-ball in the learning center yet"? Ask Mr. Schrock about that. Us girls tried playing it in the foyer, then we got this bright idea to play it in the sanctuary cause there's a high ceiling and the lights are off to the side, so we asked Mr. Schrock if we could. The end result: we are no longer aloud to play volley-ball in the sanctuary, basement, learning center OR foyer. =(
By
Anonymous, at 2/03/2008
Post a Comment
<< Home