First Graders make me laugh

Tuesday was a busy day at school.  Things were just a little different.  Miss R, the student teacher, was doing nearly all the teaching this week.  Ms. H and I were to be her aids.  That was fine, I always am the aid in the classroom.  The big thing was the Math Assessment Test.  These are developed by the Oakland School District.  Hold that thought.  The curriculum is set by the same school district.  Hold that thought.

The test is over material Ms. H doesn’t teach or is just now beginning to teach.  Same people set material to teach and when to teach it, same people wrote the test.  Ms.H knows the students will be upset because some won’t be able to do the problems, or will feel unsure because what they know is so new.  She explained the booklets had new things, old things,  and unknown things.  They were to do their best, not to worry about it. 

And we began.  Testing First Graders is a riot.  The so you can’t cheat shields (3 sided cardboard in front of each child) fall off the desks, children are on the wrong page/problem, they want help, their pencils break, they finish the page before the questions are asked, they fall out of their chairs, and on and on.

I am walking up and down checking what is being done while Ms. H is reading the problems.  One of the problems had a number chart laid out in sections of ten.  They were to find 63 and then find a number two less using the chart.  Then they were to find a number three more using the chart.  One little boy yelled out, “There’s a mistake!”  Can you find it?

41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50

51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60

61 62 63 64 65 66 77 68 69 70

Yes, 77 does not belong there.  Then this child said he didn’t think we should have to do tests that have mistakes.  We should send it back to them and have them fix it.   All the adults nearly died laughing.

Ms. H continued reading problems, “Kim wants to know what number fact is left out the fact family in the box.   Kim wants to know how many tens in 72. Tell Kim how you know.  Kim wants to know how many ones in 27.   Tell Kim how you know.”  Kim wanted to know a lot. The hard part of this section is writing how you know.  That is a really hard concept for little ones.  Plus what they know, they can’t spell.

We finally finished.  Ms. R reads a story to the class to let them relax.  Ms. H and I are checking the tests.  I hear her laughing.  She hands me one of the test booklets.  A wonderful brilliant sassy little girl has written, “If Kim wants to know, have her call me.”  Ms. H gave her full credit.

If there is school, there must be a test

Today I was a little late getting to school.  Traffic was awful.  So I missed what the directions were for the workshop groups.  Luckily I work with first graders and I could figure out what they were doing.

We had groups writing a story about the picture of them in their Halloween costume.  Another group was sorting words by beginning sounds, another one was doing a math paper.  The last group was writing words from the Dolch list and then writing sentences. 

When the groups finished, Ms. H  gave an evil grin.  She asked one of the mother volunteers to put up the testing screening boards and for me to put a test on each desk.

The children were going to do a state mandatory math test.  The nightmare began.  The children do not listen to directions.  They look over the boards to check their neighbour's work.  They drop pencils.  They are on the wrong page.  They try to work ahead of the directions.  This is normal for little ones.  First graders take a lot of hand holding.


Ready for the children to begin the test.

This is Ms. H’s copy of the math test.

The last page of the test. 

Later I read them a story.  The Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett is wonderfully illustrated.  There are so many things on the page to look at.  The children love books by Brett.


It was a busy hard working day.  We all felt we accomplished a lot.  The children were tired and so were the adults. 

I love you more than honey

Yesterday was my last day volunteering with the first graders until Fall.  I am getting over a terrible cold with a cough and really did not want to drag myself out of bed.  But I wanted to tell them goodbye.

The children were working on memory pages.  They glued a picture taken  during the year and wrote about that particular event. They also wrote and drew a picture about their favorite place at school.  You would think the playground would be the number one place.  No, it was the library.  How that tickled me.  Books and reading won!

Then we did the end of the year testing for math.  As I walked around making sure they were on the right problem I was pleased how well most of them were doing.  This test is really hard: clocks, money, number families, reading problems, graphs, adding and subtraction, patterns, geometric shapes, and more.  Ms. H had taught them well.

I read a couple of chapters of Stuart Little to them and then Ms. H came up to me with a gift bag.  They had made a book of letters and pictures thanking me for helping them all year.  Well, that alone had me emotional.  And then she asked if anyone wanted to say anything to me.  The first little boy looks at me and says, "I love you more than honey."  Then nearly every child told me how much they loved me and how I had helped them.  I was in tears when I told them how I loved them and that they are the highlight of my week.  We were all so emotional by then that Ms. H said they needed to sing to me to cheer me up.  So they sang and danced the Chicken song.  This is the best link to hearing some of the words.  Then Ms. H and I taught them Do Your Ears Hang Low. 

By then we are laughing like crazy.  The kids are dancing around the room.  I am getting hugs from kids and from Ms. H.   It was a lovely ending to a school year.  I have promised Ms. H that I'll be back in the Fall.  What will I do with my Tuesdays until then?