If you’ve ever read the Daily Mail, you know that once you’ve read a headline you already know 85-95% of the story that follows.
The same goes for today’s 2G BE KIND blog post title. You likely know — or can surmise — 85-95% of what’s in today’s story!
Brain Slush 1 (Phonics)
Me: What’s this you’ve written here?
S1: T-H-U-N-G.
Me: And that spells?
S1: Hmmm…
Me: Let’s sound it out. /th/ then /ŭ/ — like “up”—
S1: /ng/. Thung.
Me: What’a s thung?
S1: I don’t know.
Me: Is that a picture of a thung? What might it be a picture of?
Long stare at picture.
S1: I don’t know…
Brain Slush 2 (Phonics)
S2: I need help.
Me: What’s up?
S2 (reading a sentence requiring a Yes or No answer): Can a chick hatch from a crack?
Me: What do you think?
S2: Yes? No?
Me: What do chicks hatch from?
S2: Eggs?
Me: So where might the crack be?
S2: In the egg?
Me: So, Can a chick hatch from a crack?
S2: Not if the egg’s already open.
Brain Slush 3 (Phonics)
I’m checking student work. I see a picture of a thin man, suggesting “thin” — one of the lesson’s words that’s already been practiced several times — and…
Me: So, what’s this you’ve written here?
S3: Um…
Me: Well, let’s sound it out. T-H makes what sound?
S3: /th/
Me: Is that a short e or a long e?
S3: Short.
Me: So /ĕ/? As in “edge”?
S3: Yeah.
Me: And the last two sounds?
S3: /n/ and /t/.
Me: So put it all together.
S3: Thent.
Me: What might a thent be?
S3: Um…
Me: And over here you wrote…?
S3: Tent.
Me: And this picture here —
I point to the picture of the thin man.
Me: — this is a thent or a tent?
S3: Is it?
Brain Slush 4 (sharing)
Everyone is sharing one thing from their Spring Break.
Mini-math review:
We’ve established that if everyone takes 1 minutes to share, it will take 16 minutes to get through everyone. If everyone takes 2 minutes, it will take 32 minutes, and so on.
Lunch recess is in less than 15 minutes.
We conclude that talking about one thing for less than a minute would get us to lunch recess on time.
A hand goes up.
Me: Yes?
S4: So— what’s the process?
Me: The process… for… what?
S4: Sharing.
Brain Slush 5 (sharing)
During Morning Circle, one student loudly proclaimed that his Spring Break was terrible, awful, miserable.
Hours later at sharing, when this student’s popsicle stick is drawn from the Bucket of Randomness, we all lean in, eager for details of this poor soul’s 2 weeks of vacation.
Me: Your turn! How was your Spring Break?
The student reflects.
S5: I spent a week at skateboard camp! I….
— and the details of a fabulous week at skateboard camp spill out. Resident skateboarders and would-be skaters turn green with envy.
When brains weren’t slushy they were laughter filled and giggly.
S6: She’s making me laugh!
S7: No— SHE’s making ME laugh!
S8: Her nickname should be Ms. Giggles!
Some years ago, with another giggly class, I did some deadly serious How-to-stop-the-incessant-giggling research.
The upshot?
Be thankful you have a happy class
Other teachers would donate arms and kidneys to have the too-cheerful-class “problem”
Links to teachers who will swap classes with me tomorrow, or even “right now”
Stop whining
Truth be told, Ms. Erin and I couldn’t love our current giggly class more!
Misery is hard to find!
And then there’s always dominos…