I apologize for the length of time that has passed since my last update. Above you can see the 20 students that have been consuming all of my time and attention over the past few weeks. We celebrated "fun week" the last week and two days of school. This was field day, which should explain the matching shirts.

I also tie dyed t-shirts for the kids which we all signed on the last day. They put the rubber bands on to create their designs and I did the dying over the weekend. You can see our handiwork below:
The last few days of school brought an unexpected challenge. Our school nurse showed up at my door with 8 days of school left to go and said, "Mrs. Eckert, you have a new student!" I thought this was the reason for the worried look on her face...but there was more. "There's a catch." she said, "He speaks no English." I have to admit at that moment my heart dropped into my stomach and I thought, "I do not have the skills for this." The great news is that this little boy adapted quickly to the classroom and was a willing participant even though he must have been very confused. And as we all played addition bingo together on the second day of school he added the word, "BINGO!" to his repertoire of English words. You can see him in the middle of this picture in the striped shirt. His native language is Vietnamese.
And for those of you who have supported me through this first year of teaching...you've heard stories about the child featured in this final picture. For those of you who have not heard my stories I will tell you this....this child has taught me more this year than I could have ever dreamed of learning. He has taught me how to truly pick my battles. I have learned from him how to just "let it go." I have learned that when a child slams himself into the wall repeatedly going down the hallway, he probably doesn't want to be asked to walk correctly or even to answer the question, "are you okay?" He taught me that for some children the words "good morning" are fightin' words and perhaps should not be uttered. And about three weeks from the end of school he taught me just how funny the words "evil devil" could be when filled in just behind the word "name." And when writing in a card for a teacher who was retiring he wrote, "I will miss you. You were a good teacher even though I was never good."Shortly after writing that message he told me that he was "good now" and could stand next to a friend in line. Hopefully, I've made progress with him this year. I know he certainly made progress with me! Here, in all his glory, is my most challenging child of the year.
I think he's showing his true colors :-) It should also be said that this was pajama day and the question I asked just before I snapped the shutter was "Show the camera your shark." He was, as usual, less than thrilled with my request. I consider it immense success that he actually, begrudgingly, did what I asked him to do. Happy summer everyone!