Back to School: Thursday Thirteen.

I've talked a little about it before, but one of my favorite jobs was when I taught preschool at Jacksonville Christian Child Development Center (the preschool ministry of Jacksonville Christian Academy).  I taught there for seven years and substituted for a while after I "retired."  Every new school year, I get a little nostalgic...and a little shell shocked!  My first class of students are now in their senior year of high school!  Lord, have mercy.  So with that, I'll give you 13 things I miss about being a teacher:

1. Crayons - I don't color in the lines either.
2. Lunch - where we drove the other teachers crazy because we sang a song for our prayer over our meals.  Hey, no generic "God is great" prayer for my babies.  We were going to worship and enjoy what God had given us.
3. Music time - When I hear certain songs now, awesome memories with my "Thunderbabies" flood me with joy. 
4. New units and challenges - need to tell a story here.  One of the units I did was on the seven Hebrew words for praise.  Of course, my kids can't read, so I used pictures to describe each word.  Pictures for kneeling, playing musical instruments and such was easy.  When I got to the word Hallal, which means clamorous praise and exhortation, the only clipart I could find was a girl rocking out on a guitar.  So, when I asked the kids what the girl was doing and what Hallal means, they said, "It means to ROCK AND ROLL!"  Close enough for me.
5. The playground - as heavy as I was, the equipment was sturdy enough for me to play with the children.  We had a blast!  The school had this huge jungle gym with slides, climbing walls, monkey bars; the whole kit and caboodle.  Whenever the weather was nice, we went outside for as long as we could, as many times as we could.
6. The "All About Me" books - The first week or so, I would get to know each child by helping them build an all about me book complete with pictures, drawings, scriptures, and a questionnaire.  The parents loved these. I had no idea so many kids want to be Batman when they grow up...the boys too.  (See what I did there?)
7. Summer Fun -  Summers were the best because I had fewer students and we had more fun days of activities and field trips.  My last summer there, we went to a farm.  This was the first time that some of those babies had seen a live chicken or cow.
8. Laughter, laughter, and more laughter.
9. Singing our ABC's - No, I didn't sing them like everyone else...well eventually I did.  Not until I'd sang the letters out of order and had the kids correct me at least a half dozen times.  See, they were learning and didn't even know it.  BTW--works for singing the wrong animal sounds on "Old McDonald" too.
10. Reading Time - I not only read with different voices, but I also used puppets.  Their favorites were "Critter" - a alligator/crocodile (think Craig Ferguson's Wavy Rancheros puppet before I even knew there was a Wavy, or a Craig Ferguson for that matter), "Matilda" - the duck who was a proper English lady, and "Tony"; a rabbit who talked like Emeril Legase.  BAM! 
11. Art time - I'd use any excuse to get out the glue and glitter.
12. Multiple daily hugs - ain't nothing like a baby's hug.
13. Having someone tell you every day that they love you.  I love you too, my sweet babies, forever.