Waiting for the big day....

To say that I'm excited about Caroline's arrival would be like saying that an Indy car can go faster than a moped...it's a little bit of an understatement. Unfortunately, we made it all the way through ISTEP without any excitement. I was hoping that I might be able to not have to sit here and stare at kids looking like they will literally die of boredom. Not to mention trying to control the squirrelly little boys who want nothing more than to play games with each other as soon as the test is done. It does remind me how funny it is to be a teacher at times. Take for example the power of the "Teacher's Eye." How is it that a kid can literally be sitting as far away from me as possible messing around, yet all it takes to correct the behavior is to make eye contact and use a face completely devoid of any emotion. Immediately, the response is one of silently mouthed apologies and appropriate behavior. I mean I've basically created the feeling of remorse by making eye contact. I've also figured out that, with the help of the eyebrows, I can add two other emotions that can be helpful for corrective behavior: Raise the eyebrows and suddenly I've created the feeling of embarassment. The head drops to look directly at the floor, the shoulders slump, and the body slowly slips down in the chair removing a head from the horizon of red, brown, blonde, and black. Lower the eyebrows and you create a sense of panic, like "Oh crap he saw me trying to pass this note!" The eyes mimic those of a deer in headlights. Their body goes rigid and they stare like this until you look away. They might even stop breathing, I'm not entirely sure! Anyway, that's what I'm thinking about on this last day of ISTEP.
I'll try to keep you posted as to when the big event arrives. We plan on trying to keep you up to date through our baby blog (thanks for the idea Bouses!). I've created a group on my cell phone so that I can just send a quick message that we're off to the hospital! Once you get that, then feel free to check the progress of things on the other blog: http://akwallace.blogspot.com Until then....

Trying to do better...

Well, after finding out that I've upset the masses by not keeping my blog updated (sorry Tiffany!), I guess I had better put a new post up. The last few weeks of school have been quite fun, as I had hoped. I think I've finally got the first names of the kids down, and have moved onto to trying to get last names down. I told the kids to be kind if I messed up their names unless I totally butchered their names. "For an example," I said, "if your name is Kylie and I call you Kayleigh, that's close enough for you to remind me kindly that I called you by the wrong name. If however, I call you something ridiculous, then you have every right to call me Mr. Wilson, or Mr. Watkins." I had a student a few years ago who came up to me to ask a question about math. I was working at my desk, and he walked up and said, "Grandma..." I looked at him and said, "GRANDMA!? If I look or sound anything like your grandma, I'm afraid that I wouldn't really enjoy meeting her!" We all laughed, but it will probably forever be one of the strangest things I've ever been accidentally called. I have gotten the accidental "Dad" name from some of the kids, but grandma!?
We've done some pretty exciting things in class, like making Alka Seltzer rockets and Oobleck and watching Mythbusters to learn about the scientific method (you gotta watch this clip, it's great!!). It's been quite fun and I have a lot more exciting things in store, which means that I should hopefully have more funny school related stories to come!
Another note of interest would be to check out the Wallace Baby Blog that we'll try to keep updated as much as possible, maybe even while we're at the hospital, we'll see.

Funny school related story of this week:
This one actually comes from one of our Language Arts teachers at school. She was trying to talk to her class about pronouns and choosing appropriate pronouns for use in sentences. So, off the top of her head she decides to create an example sentence. She tells the students, "You want to make sure that your sentences make sense, so you wouldn't want to say to someone, 'The squirrel sat in the tree and ate their nuts.'" At which point the boys in class start laughing. She's flustered but presses on and says, "No, you wouldn't want to say that. You'd want to correctly say, 'The squirrel sat in the tree and ate HIS nuts.'" She said that class was pretty much over at that point...can't imagine why!

I'll write to you again soon!

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