ahora vamos a contar

(pre-script: the title of this post is to be sung to the tune of enrique iglesias' "enamorado por primera vez", with voice cracking out of emotion)

i have a million thoughts floating around my head right now. i have student awards to write out, assignments that need to be graded and recorded, and report cards. tonight will be spent at home in front of the tv surrounded by papers.

today i experienced my first student-caused injury. i was attacked by a flying pencil, which landed exactly in the middle of my left eye. he who i affectionally call "the pisser" (seriously, in class he's fine and i have few problems with him, all of his issues relate to being outdoors) had just finished organizing math manipulatives and came to the carpet to tell me. i was sitting with another student doing my language proficiency testing and he was waiting quite patiently, swinging his arm back and forth. it just so happened that when i turned to talk to him, the pencil flew out of his hand and went straight for my eye.

i wear contacts and have had glasses since i was six, so objects hitting my eyes has been my longest-standing and greatest fear.

my kids were pretty shocked, i guess since typically the pisser assaults them and not the teacher (that's a joke, people). several of them came to hug me and i sat there frozen with my hand covering my eye as tears streamed down the left side of my face. it took about two minutes for my eye to stop throbbing, after which point i started freaking out about my contact. greatest fear, remember? i had the pisser sit down next to me and gave him a hug since i knew what happened was unintentional, then had the teacher next door look at my embarassingly red and watery eye. she made me see the school nurse. do i wear waterproof mascara? of course not. i looked like an idiot, i'm sure. and my eye still kinda hurts. but holy holy, imagine if it had been the other side of the pencil! worse nightmare come true, just thinking about it gives me the shivers.

now as for this proficiency testing: this shit is tricky. i hate reading off cues and trying to judge whether my kid with a speech impediment should be given some slack when he drops the "s" from a word. even more, i hate it when the language used on the test is super academic, artificial, or my personal pet peeve, uses a dialect that my kids aren't familiar with. a simple word like "abrigo" is foreign to them. stupid tests.

our "jump in the line" choreography has changed every day. wish our kiddos luck tomorrow at the school-wide performance. oh, and i need help! next week, we are having a pajama party to celebrate our kids' reaching their reading goals. what we've got so far is that they can wear pajamas and read books in the dark using flashlights. or something like that. any cute ideas to help kick it up a notch? i also need help coming up with some theme-related snacks.