Wednesday 30 December 2009

Christmas hols...

How lovely it was once again to see the whole school taking part in the festive end of term play....The children had to perform, not once, not twice, but five times for the parents and the year 3's , but they coped amazingly well and the teachers/ta's were all very proud of them.

The one thing that sticks in my mind though is of a teacher, who is very scatty and, dare I say blonde. She is a really great teacher and participates in everything with so much enthusiasm...One of the songs we had to sing was 'Bumping up and down on a camel' , to which the children mime holding reins and bumping up and down on their invisible camels. Needless to say Mrs S did the same with her imaginary camel, somehow though this looked very suggestive. It wasnt until the third or forth performance that this was pointed out to her, and bumping up and down on a camel took on a whole new meaning......All eyes were fixed on Mrs S and our stifled laughter was noticed by the bemused parents, who realised exactly why we were laughing .
I had some lovely presents from the kids in our class, chocolates coming out of my ears, but Im not complaining....Hope the kids all had a brilliant Christmas. And Im really looking forward to the start of the new term.....

Tuesday 6 October 2009

Dreams!

Last night I had the weirdest dream, we had an 'on the carpet' discussion the previous day about our favourite stories. I was asked , as us TA's often are , to give an example . I told the children of a far away land where a nice friendly witch cast spells on all the children to make them be good all the time.

I dreamt that it was our schools 'turn' to have spell books for the day....each teacher and child were given a spell book and told we could use it as many times as we wanted and that at the end of the day everything would go back to normal.

By break time the whole place was chaos.......children suspended in mid air, a hundred or more little green frogs, a polar bear, princesses, power rangers, and one child locked in a rabbit hutch......that was my handywork !!! :-).......I couldnt help smiling to myself when I saw that child this morning and got to thinking , if only...............!!

Saturday 3 October 2009

When you are a TA

There are so many things you just except, like kids scratching their Nit infested heads, kids carrying the little grey sick bowls, most of which end up being worn as a hat when they realise that however much they look at you with those sad eyes, they are NOT going home !!
I can even cope with the occasional mishap of little puddles on the floor.......but I will NEVER ever get used to snot!

Often a child will come up with it on their finger asking for a tissue, but last week a little boy who I will call Dan was sat next to me on the carpet. As I looked at him he pulled his finger out of his nose followed by a string of snot ( I am heaving just thinking about it) !!! Then he put it straight in his mouth.....I was in pieces , I ran out of class and stood outside the door for a good few minutes trying to stop myself from puking, (very unprofessional I know) . Eventually I was calm enough to go back to class eyes still streaming......''Are you ok Miss G'' asked my teacher, ''we all wondered where you had got to , didnt we children? ''

At lunch time , however, Dan refused point blank to eat his peas , Obviously full up from his little feast. Eeeuuuwww!!!

Sunday 20 September 2009

Swine flu...

We have lots of kids away with suspected swine flu, and four cases confirmed, one in my class. On friday we had a child coughing and spluttering all over us, I have just had a text from my teacher to say she has gone down with it too!!!
Im not looking forward to next week without her. :-( .......get well soon Mrs F!!! XX

Wednesday 16 September 2009

Colleagues

One of the great things about this job is working with a lovely bunch of people. Everyone is so friendly, its just like being part of a big family. I have worked with the same teacher for a few years now, not only do we have a brilliant working relationship and support each other 100%, but we are friends outside of work too. I cant ever imagine doing any other job.....Is that sad????

Friday 11 September 2009

PPA


As TA's we take the class while teachers have whats called PPA time, where they plan sessions for the following week. In this time we do various things with them , this week I gave my children a problem to solve, ie Teddy's chair is broken and he would love a new one, how are we going to make it?.....
After getting out all the junk modelling, glue sticks, sellotape etc, they set to work, in little groups to come up with a chair that teddy could sit on. Little Naomi, bless her, got a cereal box and stuck her apple core (which she had fished out of the bin from snack time) to the box. She said it was to cheer teddy up because he would be missing his old chair!!
Jack decided he was going to cover the teddys nether regions with glue and stick him to his 'chair'. Teddy is now pegged up by his ears looking very sad on my washing line....I love my job :-)

Wednesday 9 September 2009

Tummy troubles!!

Bit depressed today, for 6 months I have been on a diet and, although I say so myself , have done pretty well. All my new found self esteem plummeted in one comment by a five year old. '' Miss, when are you having your baby !! '' Out of the mouths of babes :-(

Tuesday 8 September 2009

What a week!!!

Being the first week back after six long weeks off, I came home absolutely shattered ! Our kids this year are much younger than last and a lot more demanding .

For our first Literacy session with our new kids the teacher read them a lovely story of a little girl who was sent to her room because she had been a bit naughty, but instead of sulking she decided to play 'lets pretend'....She was a tiger in the jungle and she was crawling around her bedroom roaring and catching things for her dinner, (you get the picture) Now it was the kids turn to be tigers and they had to crawl around the classroom and under the tables to their 'caves' . As I was walking around listening to the roaring and laughing I came across a sound that was nothing like a tiger or any other animal for that matter, 'peeyow, peeyow'.
''Jamie that really doesnt sound like a tiger to me'', I said. '' I hate tigers,''he said so matter of factly,'' so I am a hunter and Im shooting all the nasty tigers before they eat me!!!'' Nice!!

Friday 4 September 2009

First day back....

This morning we had lots of smiles, a few tears, and one very very distraught mum whose uncontrollable sobbing set off her, ' happy to be here' daughter into hysterics. One little lad did his impression of a limpet....we finally prized him off his mums leg!!

The morning was pretty uneventful really, but at lunchtime ( I forgot to mention I am also a dinnerlady) the little angels were a bit manic, I always find that the blustery wind always sets them off...Anyway, one little lad, who is a bit troublesome at the best of times decided to hide in some bushes, that are normally out of bounds. I asked him to come out , I got the defiant stare and the crossed arms. It was at this point I spotted the mass of cobwebs, panic overcame me!! ''PLEASE come out Dillon there are lots of spiders in there and I really dont like them. I will walk away now and I would like you to follow''. Eventually he came out and joined the line to go back to class.

Story time....'' come and sit on the carpet everyone, lets read this one about a dragon'' I said emphasising the DRAGON with a loud roar.....All the children started to laugh, some had an intake of breath, like putty in my hand, I thought, suddenly Julia cried, ''Miss miss, you've got a spider on your tee shirt. I was up out of that chair and jumping around the classroom desparately flicking and shaking my shirt....the kids thought this was hilarious.....all respect GONE !!!

Thursday 3 September 2009

Inset day...

Not much to report today, the usual laminating jobs, putting the childrens names on their coat pegs, making the classroom look ''welcoming'' , and generally catching up with colleagues , hearing of their holiday tales.....it was good to see everyone again. Cant wait to get stuck in tomorrow. Oh, and I would like to thank the teacher I work with for letting me loose with the double sided sticky tape, me and that stuff....not a great combination!!

Wednesday 2 September 2009

Ok , just one day left of the holiday, a little apprehensive now, Im putting on a brave face and telling everyone I cant wait to get back to work, but do I, do I really want to get up early in the mornings, come home absolutely shattered, and still have to fit in all the other stuff like cooking cleaning ironing!!!!!! We shall see.

Friday 21 August 2009

Two weeks to go...

It will soon be the end of the long summer holidays, not that its been much of a summer, but I for one am looking forward to starting with our new class. We met them all on transition day and I have to say that after having a very difficult class last year, these little treasures are lovely, this year will be a walk in the park.........or will it. ? I will keep you updated in, what I hope will be an interesting account of everyday life as a Teaching Assistant.