Monthly Archives: December 2008

1st PTA

Last night from 6 to 7 was Amy’s first PTA. It was a blast, even though I didn’t win the raffle. (Actually, I didn’t even get a (free) ticket. I think they were for the parents.) In addition to the raffle, a few other things reminded me of elementary Christmas programs I was in as a kid at Hampton Park: the enthusiastic chatter in the audience throughout the program, the crowd of parents in the aisle taking photos of their kids during the performances, and — the program’s climax — kindergartners jumping up and down on stage while Feliz Navidad was played on a boombox. (You wanna see that? You’ll have to click on Continue Reading, further down.) Okay, so maybe not quite like programs Amy and I were in as kids. But it was lots of fun!

Amy did have a nervous 20 minutes waiting for her kids to a arrive. From about 5:35 – 5:55 only 2 or 3 of her students had shown up. But by 6:05, about 12 total had come (out of Amy’s 40 1st graders from the last two weeks) to sing Jingle Bells and shake their instruments (first audio clip below). They sang loudly and with enthusiasm

[audio:jingle-bells-01.mp3]

The crowd thoroughly enjoyed their singing, as you can hear from the very appreciative applause:

[audio:applause.mp3]

Yeah, and they’re cute. Here are some photos.

If you want to see a video of Amy’s kiddos — and the kindergartners who, as their teacher told me, “Like to jump up and down”, go on to the next page: Continue reading 1st PTA

Introducing 2C and Pre-KC

Last week was my first full week of teaching at Cochran Elementary School. The rotation for Special classes (music, art, gym, and computer) for grades K-6 is 5 consecutive days of each special every 6 weeks, so I see each class for one week out of each 6 week grading period. Last week I only had two classes per day . . . a nice way to be integrated into the school. (This week I have 7-8 classes per day — PreK-6th grade — in 45-minute back-to-back sessions. More on that later.) I’m currently working on trying to learn the names of my over 600 students. Or at least the 100+ I’ve had so far. Let me introduce you to class 2C and class Pre-KC.

Class 2C                                  Class Pre-KC