Reading can be fun!!!

I never thought some of my greatest fits of laughter would come from the reading logs I make my students fill out every night. Each nights students must read for 20 minutes and record a summary, a prediction, a connection, or a question about what he/she read.

Often, new fourth graders forget to put their names on homework assignments so as I am checking off reading logs each day, I regularly have to ask something like this, "Who is reading Harry Potter? You forgot to put your name on your paper. Pay me a ticket, please." This happens almost every day, but most often at the beginning of the school year. Today I had NINE no name papers. I sat at my desk reading off the titles of the books on the reading logs and got a great deal of joy each time I collected a highly-valued ticket from those forgetful students.

Teacher: Who is reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid?
Student: Me!
Teacher: Sorry, you owe me a ticket. Please remember to put your name on your paper next time.

Teacher: Who is reading the San Francisco Chronicle Sports Page?
Student: Me . . . argh!
Teacher: Ticket please!

This went on for a while and I finally reached the last no name reading log.

Teacher: Who is reading . . . . huh?? Is this a real book? {chuckles} Seriously, boys and girls, who on earth is reading a book called . . . The Day My Butt Went Psycho?
Class: BAHAHAHAHAH!!
Teacher: BAHAHAHAHA!!!
Student: Oh, that's me.
Teacher: Is that even a real book?!
Student: Yep! I'll bring it in when I'm done with it!

I can guarantee the most popular book this year will now be The Day My Butt Went Psycho.

(Note: After looking this book up on Amazon, I discovered the author also has two other books title Zombie Butts from Uranus and Butt Wars: The Final Conflict.)

(Even better note: Amazon.com's Statistically Improbable Phrases, or "SIPs", are the most distinctive phrases in the text of books in the Search Inside!™ program. To identify SIPs, our computers scan the text of all books in the Search Inside! program. If they find a phrase that occurs a large number of times in a particular book relative to all Search Inside! books, that phrase is a SIP in that book. The SIPs for The Day My Butt Went Psycho are: butt shelter, false butt, methane madness, butt launcher, pink toilet seat cover, jungle twine, flying butts, white butt, first butt, main vent, other butts, side vent, utility belt, brown lake, leaf blower)

I am so reading this book.

Getting to know one another . . . a little too well?

The first few days of school always consist of some activities/ice-breakers for students to get to know their new classmates and for me to get to know my new students. I love learning about their interests and their families, and kids just LOVE to share and talk about themselves. Some parents may not realize how much teachers really know about a student's home life . . . and many teachers learn WAY too much from chatty students. Divorces, arguments, lost jobs, illnesses, bathroom habits . . . we've heard it all, even if we really didn't want to know. Here's an example from last week's "getting to know you" activity called "What's in Your Bag?"



Students were instructed to bring five items in a brown bag. Each student then had to "show and tell" about his or her five items and their significance. Most students brought trophies, their favorite book, or pictures of their family.

A little boy in my class decided to bring the ultrasound pictures of his soon-to-be-born baby brother. He started sharing about it saying, "This is my favorite item because it's a picture of my baby brother that is coming." The kids all said, "Awwwww" and wanted to know when the little baby would be born. I encouraged them to save their questions for the end. The boy continues to share, "And now my mom is 1 centimeter dilated!"

I thought to myself, "Did he really just say that?!" My worst fears were confirmed when I heard many voices echoing the same question: "What does 1 centimeter dilated mean?" "Dilated? I don't know what that is." "Huh? 1 centimeter dilated?"

Flustered and anxious, I tried to stop all questions by shouting out, "Boys and girls, remember to save all your questions until the end!!" Well, sure enough, when the end came my curious 4th graders hadn't forgotten their question . . . "What does it mean to be 1 centimeter dilated." I just sat there thinking, "Omigod, how on earth is he going to answer this question? . . . Will it be inappropriate? . . . What do I do? . . . Am I going to get angry phone calls from parents? . . . Ahhhhh . . . how do I explain this?"

The boy calmly answered, "That means that the hole where the baby comes out has grown 1 centimeter."

UNCOMFORTABLE PAUSE

The rest of the class: "The HOLE where the baby comes out?!"

Me: "Okay, okay, that was three questions . . . thank you _______ for sharing. NEXT!"