Valentines Day, the day of love, and when you're a teacher, that love is multiplied by the number of students you have. It's a fun day filled with candy, hearts, hugs and of course a party. Not only was it Valentines day, it was also Exploration Friday.
A little on Exploration Friday first...
At ANLC there is a long standing tradition of community members coming to school 4 times a year to hold classes on different subjects. On these 4 Friday's each child gets to take 2, hour long classes. The kids love it, and I always enjoy seeing what the parents and community members come into teach. During this time, the teachers are in charge of supervising a class, usually in their own classroom, and get 1 Friday off a year. This quarters Exploration Friday landed on the same day as our Valentine's Party. Which made for quite the day!
I have the most amazing group of parents in my room this year. They have planned the BEST celebrations and this one was no exception. I knew that the parents would be there at lunch to set up, but I had a meeting. So I left the door open and hoped that they would know to go ahead and get going, they did!
When I walked in just minutes before the kids, I was in shock. It looked fantastic! They had snacks out, tablecloths, hearts all over and activities ready to go. We started by having the kids pass out valentines and go through all of their goodies. What major excitement that is when you're 8! I've never seen kids so excited about cards and candy.
Once they had a chance to peruse their goodies, we started on their project for the afternoon. They each made chocolate kiss rose buds. Super duper cute! I'll try and get pictures on here for you to see just how cute. They looked complicated, but they were really pretty simple. Once the kids saw how to make them, they were good to go. There was only one little guy who decided to eat the 6 chocolate kisses instead of making them into flowers. At least it was only 1!
That wasn't the end of it though. After some more eating of candy, we had root beer floats. Sugar to the MAX! The remaining part of the afternoon was spent running around on the playground. Hey, can you blame me?!?!
I got cute gifts too. M bought me a stuffed kitten that had chocolate around its neck because "I know you like cats and chocolate, and we were in Target and I told my mom, Mrs. Iaboni has to have that!" The little ones certainly don't only show their love to me on Valentine's Day, which is one of the reason's I enjoy teaching the younger ones. But on this day, it's multiplied...
