Classroom Holiday Parties from HELL

Today was the most exhausting day ever! It was our day for classroom holiday celebrations.

All week long, these children of mine couldn't shut up. On Wednesday, they had lost ALL their minutes for their party. On Thursday, they earned them all back and on Friday after lunch, they lost 15 minutes! They just wouldn't stop talking - in the hall, the restroom, during our learning time. It was NONSTOP!

Well, I was nice and they worked through their recess (15 minutes), so I let them get off with a warning. So, they got to celebrate for the whole 50 minutes. Let me set this up for you:

3:00 pm hits and the principal comes over the PA system and talks some crap about well we have behaved and to enjoy our celebrations.

Right away, the children started screaming at the top of their lungs and hanging from the light fixtures! There was glue and bits of paper and thanks to my room parent, there was GLITTER involved in our classroom project!

The children were making snowflake ornaments. My room parent gave the students 3 options to choose from (mistake #1). The kiddos couldn't make up their minds about what they wanted. Then, she left the decorations up to the children (#2). They need some kind of guidance to get them through. Finally, she was going to pass the glitter around the room and anyone who wanted to use it, could (mistakes #3-1000)!

So, here I am in the middle of the urban jungle and children are nawing on some sugar and caffine treats, running with scissors and gluing themselves to the walls and floors! It was pure madness in the room. And it went on for 50 minutes...

When it was time to pack up and go home, parents started coming earlier than usual to pick up their children. The room was garbage! Everything was everywhere! The secretary kept calling down to the room every 2 minutes to let me know that some parent was here to pick up their child.

If you want to piss a teacher off, come to the school and pick up your child without any notice that they are leaving early. That will get you an F; even if you aren't in the class, you get an F and we make it hard for you to get a job anywhere. Teachers are like the mafia. We can do things without "doing things."

So the children went home happy, the room parent went home with her craft supplies and crazy toddler that would just scream for no reason, and Mrs. Bradner was left alone to clean up a HUGE mess.

I wish I could have just came home and hung myself on the tree. I was one giant ornament with glitter and bits of paper and snowflakes stuck to my a$$. I really didn't think this whole teacher thing through very well....

Merry Christmas! Oh, and I did take a little creative license when describing what really happened in the classroom today. You get the idea though, right?