Birthdays and Hugs

 Hello again everyone! I got the opportunity to sub at another school this past week, one that I worked at last school year, but this is the first time this school year. I mostly worked with the Kindergarteners and 1st graders this time. I helped two kids finish up their math papers, where they were learning to count squares with dots in them to differentiate between the squares without dots. For instance, there may be 20 squares, but only nine of them will have dots in them. So the kids need to count the squares with dots to find out what the correct answer is. There was one "problem" that confused me, though. There was an image of a christmas tree with birds inside, and two birds outside. I wasn't sure if the kids were supposed to count the birds inside the tree to get the right answer, or count the birds on the OUTside. So I asked the teacher and she said they had to add up all of them. So it was easy for the kids after that. 

Another time, I helped a Kindergarten boy cut out the shapes he'd colored so he could glue them onto a blank sheet of paper, arranged together to make the letter "i" into an iguana. He was pretty bouncy, and it was hard to keep him focused on the project. I guess that's why they had someone scheduled to work with him one-on-one!  

Anyway, this post is titled Birthdays and Hugs because I had two - or three! - unexpected blessings that day. First, while I was helping monitor recess, a little girl I had never met before came up and gave me a hug, then scampered off. She was so cute - her head only came up to my hip! I'll always remember her flowing, multi-colored dress as she ran off. 

My second hug came from a student I know. I was heading in one direction to monitor the students who were waiting for the buses to come, when I heard a voice calling my name from a cluster of kids going the other direction. Surprised, I turned around and saw a boy that I'd tutored last school year! He had taken the summer off, and when I saw him, he was taller than the last time I'd seen him, about three months ago! I told him "Wow, you've gotten taller!" and he gave me a hug. He's in fifth grade now, and still sweet. 

When I was finishing the day with the kids waiting for the buses, a girl with a short pixie haircut and wearing one of those stretchy plastic chokers (so cute!) came up to me randomly and told me that that day was her birthday! I asked her how old she was now and she told me she was eight years old. I told her "Happy birthday!" and she smiled and hurried back to her seat among the noisy, orderly chaos of the room. 

It's the little things that can really make a day subbing at one of the schools special, beyond the simple joy I get from helping the students with their classwork.