School-Marm

I substituted for Deanna's teacher this Tuesday. The children have only been in school one week, but I've agreed to be THE SUB for 4th grade this year (at least, until Christmas Break, when we'll re-evaluate). This means that I'm the first line of defense for the teacher. If she's ill, has to go out of town, or has an appointment, she calls me first. I should make every effort to work out the details so I can be available when she needs me.

When she asked me to commit to being her Sub for the year, she told me that she had permission for me to bring Daelyn with me in the Classroom. On Tuesday, we took two backpacks of toys. She set him up at a table in the back of the room with his "stuff". I brought snacks and a drink. He was quite timid at first, but loosened up as the day went on.

Mid-morning, we played a math game where I threw a ball at one of the children as I called out a math equation. They were to catch the ball, yell out the answer, and throw the ball back to me. Afterward, we moved onto math papers. I put the ball under my desk. Daelyn asked if he could play with it. Deanna's classroom has a door on the outside leading into a lovely courtyard. I let him take the ball into the courtyard to play. Later, he brought the ball back inside and went out to climb trees. I could see him through the windows, he stayed occupied, and there was almost no interruption in my teaching.

He had a fun time and is looking forward to me subbing again. I only had one problem with him - once his shyness wore off, he starting yelling out answers to the questions I posed to the Class. The scary thing was that he got most of the answers right. The fourth graders loved that. They got a real kick out of Daelyn. They all know him, especially the girls who baby him terribly. It was like having their own little brother in the room with them. Everytime I asked a question and waited for students to raise their hands with the answers, Daelyn would yell it out from the back of the room and everyone would crack up. He didn't seem to understand that the questions were for the fourth graders.

I was telling my friend, Kelly, about it. She came after lunch and picked Daelyn up to go to her house to play with her son, Daelyn's buddy. I didn't want to push it too much the first time in the classroom. I was telling Kelly about Daelyn answering the questions. She laughed and told me that her younger son, who's 4 like Daelyn, had gone with her when she took her third grader to the eye doctor. When the Optometrist asked the older son to identify the letters on the eye chart, the 4 yr. old yelled out the letters to his older brother that he had trouble with.

The great consolation in all this is that we have very helpful, attentive children. The down side is they haven't yet learned restraint. I'm not entirely certain I want them to.