Fish and Pi

Happy Fall, everyone.

I found out two things the other day: my students listen sometimes and my students don't know what clothes are.

The other day, I was teaching about early American exploration when one of my students raised his hand and said: "teacher, your baby is gone."

Hm...

Puzzled, I pursued the conversation further. "My baby?"

"Yes miss, your map--it's gone."

I had forgotten a certain episode a week earlier in which three of my students were rough-housing with my U.S. map (apparently that can happen). I scolded them by saying: "be careful with my baby! This map is precious." Definitely precious, seeing as the only map-like object Han Al has is a globe that won't stand up and has a fissure through the equator.

Since then, my map has fallen off the walls like everything else at Han Al (the humidity is killer on tape). And my students have noticed. And listened:)

This was a 9th grader. Back in my elementary world, things are not so promising. Two of my students were giving a presentation on the subarctic climate zone. Their assignment was to tell the class how they would survive in their climate zone. So I asked them: "what clothes would you wear in the subarctic?"

And they said: "fish"

This comes from the same student who placed Europe in the Atlantic Ocean on a recent map test.

Miss you all and hope you are enjoying some nice pumpkin pi.