I got played

Yesterday was my day to work with the First Graders.  I helped them write stories about a class project.  I taped together Chinese dragons that took too deep of a cut.  I worked long and hard on math family facts with one little girl. 

She doesn’t like to work with me, or anyone else.  We had problems like

** / ***= ____

She was to create the family facts for addition and subtraction from the objects in each box.

The numbers she could use for the above problem were  2, 3, 5

2+3=5

3+2=5

5-2=3

5-3=2

We had two pages similar to this.  Once she settled down, she did a good job.  And once she understood that in subtraction the biggest number always goes first, she loved it.  Score one for me, and one for her.

I then set out snacks for the class.  They were to work while they ate.  I then walked around and listened to them read.  One prima donna started sobbing when I asked her not to eat while reading to me.  She sobbed she was soooo hungry, she had to eat.  I said tough in a nice way and made her put the food down.  She had had breakfast, no starving child here.

But after recess again with a child N soooo hungry.  She took some of another child’s snack.  I talked to her about why, and it being wrong.  She told me she only had had a piece of buttered bread for breakfast.  And her lunch was a jelly, not peanut butter and jelly, sandwich with two pretzels.  I took N to a back table, found a snack and let her work there and eat.  I then talked to to Ms. H about her.  Ms. H laughed and said,”You got played.”  N is the spoiled rotten darling child who has everything she needs and wants. Ms. H knows the parents well.  No starving child here either. She doesn’t like what the parents put out for breakfast and refuses to eat until they give her what she wants.  This time she just wanted more of a tasty snack and took another child’s. 

I’ll know better next time.

Math and More Math

Today was my morning to volunteer at Kaiser with the first graders.  The work stations were math, the vowel i, creative writing. 

The worksheet for vowel i had a list of words to sort into long and short sounds.  Some of the words: rid   ride   fine   fin   shine   shin.  They had to read the words to an adult, sort them by long or short sound , and write 4 sentences using 4 words.  Harder then it sounds if you are 6 years old.

Now to the math.  One group was working with clocks.  They had to draw the long hand to show half past, look at a clock and tell half past what.

Then the other math sheet, addition.  They were given a group of numbers such as 0 1 2 4 6 8.  Then they had boxes to make a problem.  I can’t draw a box so I will just use an underline.     ____+ ____= ____   or     ____ + _____ = ____  ____

The problem was they would write  2  + 1 = 3   That is a correct math fact, but there is no 3 to use.    With the double box they didn’t get that the answer had to be a double digit number.  Or if they did, they would reverse the number  6  + 8 = 4   1   

The hardest helping I did today . . . money.  We have play money that looks just like coins.  I worked with two little boys on pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters.  They could not remember the names of the coins or their worth.   I would ask for a dime, no idea.  I would have them name each coin and then its worth.  The next problem, no idea.  One boy began to get it.  The other boy, nothing was going in.  Over and over he called a penny a quarter , a dime a nickel, or sometimes he couldn’t come up with any name. 

Interestingly he could make the correct money amounts if I helped with the worth of the coin.  I asked for 11 cents using two types of coins.  He used a dime and 1 penny and then used 6 pennies and 1 nickel.  He could make 37 cents with no problem IF I told him what the coins were.  I don’t know who was more frustrated, him or me. 

One relaxing thing I did was read a story to the children, And Tango makes Three.   One little boy asked me how to tell boy penguins from girl penguins.  I was thankful that I don’t know that answer.  No way do I want to explain that to first graders.  The beauty of telling a child I don’t know, is they accept that.  Never try to bluff a child.  They will pin you to the wall.

Our ducklings were not at school today.  Over the weekend, they had to go home with someone in order to be fed.  They were with the man who had brought the fertile eggs.  He will bring them back soon.