Adventure #21: The 100th Day of School!!!

We made it to the 100th day of school! I can't believe it- I can't figure out where in the world all that time went. I feel like yesterday I was sitting in our apartment for the first time wondering what in the world I got myself into :) Sometimes I still wonder what in the world I got myself into! But I love my job and I love my students and I wouldn't trade it for anything right now. There are definitely days where I want to quit- days when I don't feel good and my students seem to never stop talking! But then I get some sleep and slow down and take a deep breathe and realize, they are just kids. They are kids who may be very talkative some days, who may not want to listen some days, and who can be perfect angels on other days!

Yesterday one of my students came up to me and said, "Miss Parkinson, thank you for teaching me how to draw stars!" It kind of threw me off a little, because it was such a random thing to thank me for, but she was really sincerely thankful. The kids were supposed to draw stars on their math paper and lots of them didn't know how to and were complaining as such, so I stopped for a minute and showed them how to draw stars. It was such a little thing, but this little girl was so excited to be able to draw stars. And its moments like this that remind me why I am a teacher. There have been lots of moments in the past couple weeks where I have really been able to see growth in my students- growth in their knowledge of the world around them and growth in their behavior. Its been awesome to see students who at the beginning of the year were driving me up the wall and back down again, now able to sit in their seats for most of the day and raise their hands when they have a question. I have really begun to feel like my students are learning something from me-and that's a great feeling :) That's the thing that keeps me waking up those days when I'm not feeling so well, keeps me going back after days that weren't so much fun, and drives me on through the mounds of papers I have to grade and file and keep track of :) Speaking of which, I better get on with getting those grades in the computer!