Seat Belt Assignment

My son had to complete a seatbelt assignment for driver's ed.  He had to watch cars and record each passenger as male/female/child and restrained/unrestrained.  He had to get in 30 cars.  I took him errand running with me and he sat in the car while I was in the post office, etc...  Final results?  Just over 25% of the cars he saw had unrestrained people in them.  Really?  I never would have guessed that so many people didn't wear seatbelts.  At least none of them were children.


We got down to the last car, we were in a Walmart parking lot and I parked next to a 20 something girl who had just gotten in her car.  We figured he could watch and see if she put on her seat belt and he'd be finished.  So we waited while she:
put her hair in a ponytail
put a headband on her head to hold back the strays that didn't fit in the pony tail
tried a different headband
did something that looked like change her bra (I wouldn't let my son look)
I think she slipped off some sweats that were over shorts, but I didn't want to look too closely (once again, I made my son look away)
change her shoes
fussed a bit with her make-up
And I'm not sure what all else because we were trying not to look too much.  We spent a good 10 minutes waiting for her to leave so he could write down if she put her seatbelt on or not.  She didn't, but was that because she doesn't wear a seatbelt or because she wanted to get away from the crazies in the car next to her?

Got Cheese?

I'm feeling like having a good whine right now.  However, since it's mostly of my own making (a complete lack of motivation is a major contributor), I'll skip writing up the details.  I just hope it's the short days and cold weather that have me acting like a slug.  That would mean it'll get better without any effort from me.  (Spoken like a true slug huh?)

Fun Monday - Cold Weather Eats

Sayre Smiles is hosting Fun Monday today.  She says:


This weekend's cooler weather put me in a Fall state-of-mind and for the first time since last March, I wanted soup for dinner.  I heated up some chicken noodle soup which the Boy and I shared for dinner.  The Man had leftover pizza.  That craving got me to thinking - what do people crave when the weather gets cooler?  Sign up in comments, and I'll add your link to this post.


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My craving isn't always what to eat, it's what to cook - although of course I do plenty of eating of these things once they're made.  When the weather turns cooler and I start to think of the upcoming holiday season, I get this irresistible urge to bake.  Serious baking too.  I want to make decorated and fancy schmancy cookies.  I want to make every flavor of quick bread I have a recipe for, chocolate, pumpkin, cranberry, etc...  And most of all, I want to roll pie crust.  I have been known to make as many pies as there are people on Thanksgiving. 

Is it my job?

This is something I have always struggled with as a teacher.  Whose job is it to get students to finish work they didn't complete before the deadline?  In the old days I hunted them down like a sniper.  Nowadays though, all of that assignment information is available online, easily available for parents to look up any time night or day.  


So my thinking is that if the parents care what grade their students get, they'll get after their students to get it done.  If they want my help, they'll ask me for it.  I shouldn't have to harp on them constantly at school.  I'm not saying I never talk about it.  I give them lists of missing work at least once a week and there's a reward activity each Wednesday for students who have everything turned in.  It's the chronic non-workers that are killing me.  I have about 8 of them.  Do I keep them in from every recess and hold them back from every special?  Or do I figure their parents can deal with it and move on to other stuff?  I want to let the parents deal with it, but I also know that they won't ever stand a chance of passing a test if they never do an assignment.  

Everyone Else's Mother Said Yes

Started off the day with six students absent.  


I wish I could have been absent.  


My husband just came in and said it felt like a Friday.  How nice for him, it feels like a Monday all over again for me.


Ok, I stand corrected.  He told me today that what he meant by it felt like Friday was that the two days felt like a whole week.  We were in the same boat, so tonight we did some restaurant therapy and went out to dinner together.

What they understand

Yesterday at church I helped out in the nursery for a bit.  We sang "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" which was lots of fun.  Of course this led to some discussion of noses and one little boy said to me; "My Grandpa says my nose is ugly."  What a thing for a grandfather to say?!?!!  I told him I thought his nose was just adorable.
Later on, I got to thinking, this child is 2 or maybe 3 years old, does he even know what adorable means?  I wonder if he thinks I told him his nose was ugly too?

Kids Say the Darndest Things

I was reading through some journal entries the other day.  Yes, I read the journal entries of my students.  They know it too so it's not like I'm invading privacy.  They shouldn't have an expectation of privacy in an assignment they do for school.  
One of the boys wrote something very interesting.  The topic was "Things I Don't Like."  What he said he didn't like was when people took his glasses from him, put them on and said "Wow! You really can't see."  He compared it to someone taking away someone's wheelchair and saying "Wow! You really can't walk."  
Good point.  Not bad coming from the 12 year old.