JSBKT The Imperfectly Perfect Family of 5: Embrace the Camera ~ Embracing My Moment

Today’s post is slightly special for me. Yesterday I had the opportunity to sub in my daughter’s first grade class. Let me begin by saying that it was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!!! Not only did I get the chance to experience the classroom world for the first time on my own, but I also got the chance to embrace it with my little girl in tow.

I have been able to experience different types of classroom settings over the past few years and every experience has been exciting for me, but today was different. Today, it was just me and 16 bright smiling faces.

When I got my bag of “tricks’ ready, my goal was to make sure that I was prepared (a little hard to do since this is a first for me). The first graders have been working on an apple theme this week. I thought back to one of the lessons I had put together for my science class at ULV. I pulled out my binder and found the perfect project. I knew that we might not be able to get to it (Kalyssa’s teacher is wonderful and always prepared), but I wanted to have it ready just in case. I spent some time getting everything ready; from cutting things out to bagging the items in individual baggies for each of the students. I picked out a special apple book from our home library collection to read and I made sure that I had my stamp pad with a special apple stamp that I have been "waiting patiently" to use.

(Take a deep breath and don't forget to smile)

When I got to the school, everything was ready to go. The teacher had everything laid out from beginning to end. We worked on reading, writing, and math. We sat together and read all about the life cycle of an apple. We held a class discussion about the life cycle and took turns acting it out. We finished up our lesson by putting together a book. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time for my apple project but, I did have enough time to stamp each little hand with my 100% apple stamp :)

I think Kalyssa enjoyed having me in her class. I think she was a little confused on the whole name thing. I introduced myself as Mrs. Mall but of course I am just Mommy to her :) She chose to not say much; instead she just raised her hand to get my attention.

I had my fair share of learning too. The class is very structured and very smart. They know exactly what needs to be done and how it should be done. If I didn’t do things exactly like their teacher, I had a hand or two fly up in the air ready for an explanation :) It was a learning process for all of us, but after a while we all settled into things quite well and our day went better than I ever could have hoped for!