This is the week that makes me crazy. I introduced the winter program songs before Thanksgiving. Today, after a week long break, I expected all kids to come back singing them to me "glee"fully.
Here's an open thank you to third grader "Jackson" who sang every verse to Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho including the line that starts "then the lamb ram sheep horn began to blow..."
Yes- we are doing all spirituals. No it is not multi-cultural. Yes there is educational value to it. No I couldn't do another year of Rudolph and Jingle Bells without completely losing my mind. I'm a formerly Jewish now Buddhist putting together a
There will be some Amens and Hallelujahs- because kindergarteners sound so adorable trying to say Hallelujah. (they also sound pretty funny saying "I'm gonna clap when the spirit says clap" because mostly the letter "L" sounds like an "R") The thing that I know the most is that there will be some music that will make the audience happy and that the kids are happy to sing which means a lot to me.
This is all about motivation- mine and theirs. At one point today I said to 3rd graders "if you are halfway good, they will clap. If you are terrible, they will clap. If you put your heart into it, they will clap and mean it like crazy."
But back to the point of this post. One thing that got me through the first day of drive me crazy week was the Keurig coffee maker that now adorns my desk with an on and off timer. Breakfast Blend first thing in the morning, hot chocolate at lunch and something called "Nantucket" that should have been called "this will give your afternoon a kick in the a$$" a little later in the day.
It could also be called "enjoy this energy while it lasts because when you come down from this, you will be useless." Such was the case by the time I got home. I was also starving. And now to the point of this post (or maybe not). Mr. Sophanne has learned about this time of year and pays attention. I said, "I'm hungry." He took charge, went to Hardees and in addition to the tacos he brought from the "Red Burrito" part of Hardees, he brought home a chocolate milkshake.
I was a wiped out zombie and he brought me a chocolate milkshake. He can be a smart ass all he wants. I don't know how lucky I am.
p.s. I am 5 posts away from post number 1000 on this blog. That's just crazy! How should we celebrate?
6 comments:
You crack me the hell up, too. Heh. The only Christmas song in my program this week is Jingle Bells. Added last week. Oh and a French song called Voici le Noel. Everything else is basically picked because I like it. Heh. Including the Sandra Boynton nonsense lullaby.
Aww, your husband sounds like a definite keeper (mine tries to do nice stuff like that, but he's very much the absent minded professor). I also would have killed to be in your music program as a kid, my schools always had an exactly equal number of songs mentioning Christmas as Hannukah with no other acknowledgement of any other ideas, and they were always the most trite and overdone songs to boot. Partly the reason I refuse to listen to Christmas music (I now put on opera if I need special music during holidays).
You crack me up too! I will love the Christmas program this year, sitting in the audience with a small grin on my face. And yes your hubby does sound like a keeper!
And, spirituals are culturally significant. Besides, they are so much fun to sing, aren't they? I think it's brilliant and so different. And, Mr. Sophanne? He's the best. Let's have a party for the 1000 post, shall we? BYOP Bring your own Punctuation?
I wish I could be there for your program!
Hugs to your husband. He's smart and kind.
I -- agnostic, atheist, once0long0ago-Methodist -- love spirituals. Go, Becky!
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