Birds And Butterflies Are Free to Fly Math Store

Fact: 50% of my students LOVE math;

Fact: 50% of my students are bored with math and are in a position of already "knowing it all." 

Fact: one teacher against two FULL-TIME students; with even one student battling said teacher about just "doing" math; even for a few minutes (you know, because it's "BORING") can result in not only a boatload of lost time during the day spent in "arguing," but this can also result in what little creative energy said teacher possesses, being sucked right out of her, often leading to frustration and fatigue!

Said Teacher does notice a pattern here: when the 50% of non cooperative students are in non cooperative-mode, this tends to correlate after maybe a weekend or more off; coupled with  perhaps a late night, resulting in sleeping in late and starting school later in the day.  So of course, this would tell me, that perhaps the parents REALLY need to knuckle down that bedtime routine (we tend to value our family time--tremendously--as do the kiddos--so for example, yesterday, they played with their neighborhood friends, pretty much all day, while J finally finished repairing our boat!!!!!! and I organized our recipes (again) and did some grocery shopping and a boatload of laundry--you get the picture--mom and dad had to catch up, which didn't result in our normal weekend goal of hitting the beach or taking a bike ride with the kiddos--and the kiddos definitely feel this---they want their mommy and daddy time!!!! )  Anyway, we wound up staying up past 11 with a movie (ok, they were in bed, J couldn't sleep, so they came down just to hang with us, as we didn't hang at all yesterday).  SOOOO, the girls and I, of course, slept in...again, ate late, put laundry away, did the dishes, then started school, after 11:30am.  See the picture?  I guess it's time to have a parent-teacher conference to discuss this matter, as it is affecting the ambition of 50% of the students on days such as this.  At least there is a pattern.  

However, this all gave birth to, our math store!!  What fun?!!  I can change out the price tags, we have money, as seen, in a tray (ordered from Pottery Barn Kids)---we can learn about addition, subtraction, money, counting change, finances, budgeting, banking----see where this is going?  Later we can even throw in more "complicated" elementary math skills!  Our math store will be reserved for the "non cooperative" days, to keep it fun and fresh!

Wish our store luck....you know, with the economy, and new business start-up failure rates and all!