Last Day!

So today was my last day with my students. It was really hard for me to say goodbye. They are such great kids! I am so proud of them! They rotated to each class today so each clown teacher got a chance to interact with my students. I had several come tell me that my class was the absolute best behavior wise, at having fun, at listening, lining up etc. That made me feel really good. I got positively spoiled with adorable cards, baby clothes, and hollywood video gift cards. It felt great to be so appreciated but I felt pretty guilty walking out with all that loot. The gifts were really nice but the pictures and notes the kids wrote made me cry (once the kids were out of sight since I didn't want to upset them). I had a couple nervous kids who didn't want to leave my class. The same couple of kids are nervous about kindergarten but we've been talking it up for the last little while and I'm sure they'll be fine. There have been such emotional moments this year. One of my pm students refuses to go to any community classes or even primary but her mom says she loves my class and always is excited to come. She started out the year very nervous but she and I spent some time coloring together those first couple of weeks and slowly built a trusting rapport and after a little bit she became very attached (okay me too). :-) She was very sad today and told me some very sweet things about me being the best teacher ever and that she didn't want to go. It very nearly broke my heart. Once the other students heard her they all started showering me with those wonderful words every teacher wants to hear "You are the best, I love you, etc etc" One of my am students has a very pronounced speech impediment and started the year with little confidence. Very few people could understand what she was saying but luckily for me I had enough experience to be able to understand her. It must have made her feel more confident to have someone know what she was saying. She began reading and I totally watered up the day she read a book to me cover to cover. Her speech when she reads is almost crystal clear. It must be something with processing or slowing down, or ? Anyway, I'm not sure why it happens but her speech is clear when she is reading and her confidence is sky high. Show and Tell in front of the class? No problem at all. There have been so many little successes as well as hard fought ones. I couldn't possibly begin to describe how much the kids have grown and how proud I am of each of them. I just know that they can do anything. It's so hard to let go. I just feel so privileged to have been a part of it. So that is the totally mushy part of the post.

Now on to the whole clown thing. I had warned that I would be grouchy since I don't think dressing up like a clown is part of my personality. Of course with the kids I played it up and we had a good time but the second the kids were gone? Yes I turned grouchy. I even told my boss the tape she was putting up outside looked tacky. OOPS! The truth just kind of slipped out. It was freezing outside and raining and she had asked me to help tape windmills to the posts with red duct tape. It wasn't working well and I was completely freezing in my thin clown costume! So, I repeated myself that we should have the windmills in the ground and not taped to the posts and that the tape looked tacky. Hmm....nice one Jen. So the tape came down and the windmills went in the ground. One small victory for Grumpy/Grouchy the clown. I got to go inside and warm up. I lost another battle though when my parachute got confiscated. I had it on the floor for the kids to sit on while we read circus stories and watched a video clip from the circus. We used to do this at pirate storytime in california and it made it more exciting for the kids for some reason. It looked so cute and I knew the kids would be excited. The ringmaster (boss) came in and asked to use it for one of the rotations. So my cute set up was destroyed for the greater good. The kids did tell me that they loved the rotation that had the parachute so I felt happy knowing that the kids still got to enjoy it. They are using it tomorrow too (tomorrow is the last day for the MWF kids) so I just hope it comes back still in good condition. You never know with preschool. We had a few criers and my little kiddo who doesn't go anywhere other than my class was incredible nervous. She kept her arms folded across her chest as she walked down the hall to the rotation but I told her I'd be right there in our classroom waiting and she got through all the rotations just fine. It gives me great hope that she'll adjust well to kindergarten. I sure want the best for all my cute little kiddos. Even my crier/shaker who hates clowns said my costume wasn't too bad so that was good. He likes spongebob and made a comparison. Thank heaven for bright yellow huh? So that's pretty much it about my last day of work. I feel happy to be done but sad to be saying goodbye to my students. I am really excited to not have to share my time so much now. Carter will have me all to himself this summer and he's really excited about being able to sleep in and not have to go to preschool now. In fact, the only thing I could do to get him out of bed this morning was to tell him it was the last time he had to go to my work. Once he heard that he was totally cooperative. Whew!