Karate Moves

The kid at school who said the "Karate Moves" quote in my last post is still crackin me up. He is a kindergartner, has a mini-frohawk (real close to his head, just a little longer than his real hair) and makes me laugh every time I see him. He reminds me of a kid from last year nicknamed "Nick at Nite" who is in first grade now and sometimes tries too hard to be funny, and gets too upset when he gets called down. Frohawk is real excited to be at school and every day lives an adventure.

Frohawk never interrupts class and raises his hand to speak. When he does say something, it is usually something funny. If what he's saying isn't really funny, he makes it funny with his delivery. He has dark skin, kinda lazy eyelids and a little bit of a bottom-teethed smile. His best quote actually read like this, "Whenever I use my karate moves to clean up my room faster, I get a present."

Every year we get at least one kid who could already make a million bucks a minute for just opening his mouth and sayin' stuff and looking cute. I should become an agent.

Kinder Quotes and Joke

"Steven said the "S-word", he said "Shut up."

"Whenever I use my karate moves to clean up my room faster, I get a present."


"Why did the baseball hit the vampire in his suck teeth? Because he didn't have his mits"


"It's 'crowdy' in here"


"I think I see a 'hootchy mama'!" Yes, the Mama and the Teacher heard him say it.


After seeing all the kindergartners in their graduation T-shirts, I asked, "Where did all of you get matching shirts?" The kid nincamed Nick-at-night said, "Maybe they got 'em at the dollar store."

Roots

I love this saying. "If you keep digging up a tree and moving it around, it will never get a chance to grow roots." I tell this to parents of the kids that keep moving around. I know that parents have their reasons for moving around so much and I am sure that I can't completely understand because I am not a parent. However, I cannot stress the importance of stability. The kids who move from school to school are breaking my heart. I will just start to make a breakthrough with a kid and their parents will dig them up and move them on to another school. I keep a class role for all of the classes I teach and the more turnover there is, the worse the students are. sigh.

VY

If you didn't see the UT/USC game then you really missed something special. Vince Young is a Houston ISD product and really sparks excitement in the kids at my school. I am using his focused performance on the field to inspire my students. I say: Did you see VY before the game? He was dancing with his teamates and getting excited about the game. Did you see him after the game? He was jumping around again. Did you see him DURING the game? His face was so serious. He was focused. Do you think he talked while his coach was talking? Do you think he played around in the huddle? NO. He had on his game face. When you are at school, there are a few times when you can play around but when you are doing your work or your teacher is teaching you something, you need to have on your game face. You need to be focused. That is how to be a winner.

Mr. Moon

As some of you may know, I have a big belly. A kindergartener put her hands up on my belly and said, "It's like the moon!"

Mad not sad.

Today I was talking to a class about what makes them upset or sad. One of the kids was telling me that he never gets sad and that nothing upsets him. I asked him who he loves more than anyone else in the world. After he thought about it for a while, he said his mother was the one he loved the most. I asked him if he would be sad if his mom lost her job. He said no. I asked him why not. He said that he would be mad, not sad.

I think so many of the kids I know are afraid to be sad and they turn their sadness into anger. HISD had to beef up the security today in many of the Middle and High Schools because of the fighting between the Houston kids and the New Orleans kids. Some of my former students who are now in middle school have seen the fighting at their own school. They tell me that they just stay away from it. I tell them to be nice to EVERYONE!

I wish I could get all of those kids in a room and make them hug each other or something! (sigh)