**Attention**Attention**

Wow, it's been a long time since I've been able to update! School and life have been so very busy these past few weeks!

I was working my tail off to prepare my students for the district-wide writing prompt, several tests that they have taken, and report cards come out next week!! The end of the first nine weeks is in TWO days! I have been teaching for nine weeks! But I've only been teaching for nine weeks?!

I am beginning to figure out exactly why I love teaching, not just the idea of it. Every single day in my classroom is different- good, great, bad, awful. I'm learning so much about teaching that I already knew, but putting it in to practice every day has been such a learning experience and taken the art of teaching to a whole new level. I was formally observed on Thursday the 6th.

Classroom management/behavior problems have been my biggest struggles and it seems as though they occur daily. Students test me and my team more than I ever would have thought. I would have never done or said these things to my teachers- if I had I'd be deformed right now. The Lord has been really working to make me the most patient person on earth.

There have been several altercations, all seeming to happen at lunch. Honestly, they are more humerous than scary! A few weeks ago, the teachers were all sitting with the lunch detention kids after most of the students had gone out to recess. We were monitoring those that chose to stay inside that day while eating our lunch. We looked up and two boys were standing in between tables, arms out- swatting at each other. Not hitting or slapping, swatting like two cats and missing each other every time. Two hormonal boys, elbows at their sides, swatting with just their hands. Funniest thing I've seen in a LONG time! Looked something like this:

Then, they were told to go outside to recess if they wanted to play around, because that certainly couldn't be considered fighting. One of them went without being told twice, the other snaps off his ID, stomps to the door, and starts running across the teacher parking lot towards a main road. Thankfully, he stopped on a patch of grass before he got there because he was out of breath. The other teacher that had duty went out after him since I had to stay in the cafeteria, but that was quite an eventful lunch.

There have been funny and frustrating stories every day, but I couldn't imagine being anywhere else.