Sunday, May 8, 2011

Exspomation and Snobby Teachers

Recently, the neighbor and I got into a conversation about school. Her son is graduating from pre-k and advancing onto kindergarten. She related a story about "exspomation". Her son told her one morning that he needed an object to exspomate at school. He had to bring it in. He finally selected a stuffed leopard and when he held it up for the teacher, proudly saying, "Ms Teacher! I brought my leopard to exspomate!!!" His teacher knowingly said, "Oh!, I don't know if I can ESTIMATE that many spots!" His mother laughed.

The last 3 weeks have been filled with non-stop field trips. I've been to the bowling alley, the museum of science,and various other locations. We are closing in on the last week of school with the speed of a freight train. As we near the end of school and summer starting, I hope that folks will take caution in driving around the streets during the next three months because of all the children who will be out and about.

The bowling alley provided lots of entertainment with a pre-k class. Those children prefer the "zig zag" method of bowling which basically involves throwing the ball at a hap hazard angle, and watching it bounce perilously against the side bumpers back and forth. Its cute to watch them celebrate knocking down just one pin.

My trip to the museum was equally as interesting. I experienced the snobbiest teachers I've ever come across. Teachers, if you take a field trip, please speak to the bus driver and at least make some polite conversation. Also, if you have directions to the place, please just hand the paper to the bus driver and let the bus driver utilize the directions to the best of their ability. Most of the time, I get along with teachers just fine. I've taken this group on field trips before and the teachers were exactly the same. I thought the first time was just a fluke, and that maybe I was imagining that they were snobby. They were actually snobby. One teacher actually physically turned her head away from me whenever I even asked a simple question, and refused to even look at me. She also acted annoyed. On the plus side, I got to drive the brand new bus (less than 500 miles on it) to the museum. The bus had an air ride drivers seat that was really comfortable!!!!

My last field trip of the season was a pre-k class to a teachers house for a "water day". Unfortunately the weather did not cooperate and the children, who were told to only put their feet in the water, were soaked. They had fun anyways. Besides, you cannot simply tell a pre-k child to NOT get wet... on a WATER day... yeah.

Waiting for Summer (10 days!)

The Bus Driver

3 comments:

ms-teacher said...

when I would go on fieldtrips with my students, I always tried to sit in front to talk to the bus driver (but not in an annoying way) and I always had my students thank him/her at the end of the trip.

sorry for the snobby teachers.

The Bus Driver said...

Thanks ms teacher, we do appreciate when you talk to us. at least i know i do. especially when the ride is a very long one. The ride to the museum is 2 hrs one way, and is a very long silent ride if the teachers do not break the monotony.

ChiTown Girl said...

OMG, what the hell is with those teachers?! That's unbelievable!

Like ms-teacher, I ALWAYS sit in the first seat, diagonal from the driver, and make small talk most of the drive. Actually, now that I think about it, it's probably annoying! :( My babies also ALWAYS thank the bus driver. I mean, what the hell!? It's common courtesy!! Sheesh, some people...