A typical day

6.30 Time to get up, wake up, get ready, think about going back to bed but had better not
7.15 Made a sandwich for lunch - gonna have cheese today... yum - better get going though
7.45 Arrived at work - lots to do... type up a planning sheet, discuss a few things with other people that get there really early too. Had to do a few swaps - Monday afternoon is now Tuesday afternoon; Monday playtime is now Tuesday playtime...stuff like that.
8.10 Toast delivery... strawberry jam today (yummy)
8.55 Kids arrive - have to open the door to let them in. They come in and write their names and then they sit down for the register. I say their names and they say good morning. Some of them come in a bit late.
9.05 Have to line up to go into assembly. It was an especially good line this morning.
9.10 The assembly is all about some bloke and a lion or something. The bloke is a slave but he escapes and finds a lion with a thorn in it's paw. Bravely (or stupidly) he goes over to the lion and takes the thorn out and becomes best friends with the lion. Then (as the teacher doing the assembly asks the children) what is the worst thing that can happen to him? One child suggests he gets eaten by the lion but this idea is dismissed as not possibly being the worst thing (although I was disagreeing at the time) and it is revealed that this "worst thing" is actually being recaptured and being a slave again. Anyway to cut a long story short (the clock in the hall was broken you see) he gets recaptured and is about to be eaten by a lion (this is in Roman times) but the lion doesn't eat him cos it's the friendly lion that he made friends with! This is supposed to teach the kids about being friends with each other so I hope it hasn't taught them that they should try to make friends with a lion because that is going to land them in trouble.
9.40 Got back to class after the assembly. Time for maths. Maths is fun when you are 4. We sang "Five fat sausages frying in a pan" - what happens is that one by one the sausages go "bang" until you have none left. Taught the kids how to draw a frying pan with 5 sausages in it and then cross them out one by one as they go bang. This is advanced stuff and is in the school calculation policy.
10.00 Let them go and play for a bit... play is important - kids learn through play at this age. Some of them were encouraged to draw a frying pan with some sausages (they could do as many as they wanted... some did loads) to show to Mr Crow later on. Mr Crow likes pictures and writing and stuff like that so the kids will do anything for him. Also made some sausages out of play dough and counted them, made them go bang etc.
10.20 Time to tidy up and sit down again.
10.25 Did some patterns with beads. I put some beads on a string that went red-blue-yellow-red-blue-yellow-red... kids had to work out what came next.
10.30 Let them have their milk but they are only allowed some if they chant correctly "bottle and straw and sit on the floor". Most do so they have their milk.
10.35 I am on playground duty so I go outside with my whistle. Sorted out the odd disagreement and gave those that requested it permission to go to the toilet. Made sure that the boys playing football didn't kick it over the fence. Discussed the principal of "finders keepers" with a boy that found a toy in the undergrowth.
10.50 Blew the whistle and the kids lined up. Took my class in to sit down.
10.55 Phonics lesson - we practised the letters of the alphabet doing actions for each one. Then did a bit of writing of easy words like "cat" and "mat" and "mop" which is a long way from not knowing what a letter is.
11.30 Showed Mr Crow his sausage pictures - he liked them a lot.
11.50 Sent kids to wash their hands for lunch.
11.55 Made them line up properly... those that talked got put in the "chatterbox line".
12.00 Sorted out the reading books
12.10 Got some toys out for outdoor play e.g. the scooter
12.25 Went to the staffroom for lunch. The cheese sandwich was nice and someone had brought some chocolate biscuits so had one of those too. Yummy. Discussed the assembly and my thoughts about being eaten by a lion was worse than going back into slavery. Some teachers agreed and some didn't but it was a lively discussion. Miss R was in a strange mood but she has been since she got pregnant and we think it might be the hormones. She tried to make out that there was a connection between the lack of a goalpost in the playground and a shortage of pritt stick glue sticks. See what I mean.
1.00pm Back in class for afternoon register. Watched the TV programme "Dotty and Buzz" - it was all about forgiveness.
1.20 Took 10 children to the outdoor area to play on the scooter (we made a list so they took turns) and got them to do some writing too. Some of them did some skipping.
2.00 Came back indoors and helped the kids who had got ALL of the blocks out to put them ALL away again. Had to make them tidy the place properly because they aren't good at that.
2.20 Sat down on the carpet and played a game... you have to listen to an animal sound and then identify the animal.
2.30 Sent the kids to go out and play.
2.40 Kids came in but there was a "suspicious smell" - interrogated the usual suspects but didn't get any postive answers. Read the big book "The Three Billy Goats Gruff" whilst several children also noticing the "suspicious smell" held their noses.
3.05 Got the kids to get all their stuff and sit in the cloakroom to be collected by their parents. "Suspicious smell" overpowering in the enclosed space of the cloakroom so opened the door and got the kids to go home as soon as possible.
3.15 Finally identifed the culprit. Dad got him changed whilst I found some clean clothes for him to get changed into.
3.30 Tidied the maths shelves - bit of a mess today. Discussed a few things with Miss T, the other reception teacher. We are going to invite some people to come and talk to the children - people that help us such as a fire fighter, policewoman, lollypop lady etc.
4.10 Miss T had to go because it was her Spanish class so I decided to go home too.
4.30 Arrived home and had a bagel. Yum. Came online to read my emails and train my frogs and see if Nat had written her blog which she hadn't. Then Nat sent me some vomit (nice of her) so I enquired about the blog and she told me all about her day and her impending driving lesson.