Tuesday 10 -- School Memories

Today I decided to link up to Tuesday 10 at Mom2MemphisAndRuby.  (By the way, I'm super-excited to be hanging out on her sidebar this month.)

This week's topic is school memories.  As you might imagine from the schoolhouse-theme to my blog, I have a few of those memories. The problem is that they happened a long time ago.  (Remember from my Bucket List post that I'm old:  next year will be my 20th high school reunion!)  Here I go back into the far-reaches of my brain to dredge up some old recollections.

10 - Chicken Pox
I actually had chicken pox twice.  Once was in preschool where I'm pretty sure I caught them from one of my classmates.  We were doing some kind of circle game and she had a couple spots on her hand.  Mine was a fairly mild case.  I caught them again in 3rd or 4th grade and had a big outbreak.  I think I might have missed the last day of school and then shared them with all of my siblings.

9 - First Grade
I had the fun privilege of starting first grade at the same time as my aunt.  She was a brand new teacher and I was a student.  She taught first grade for many years before finally "graduating" to third grade.

8 - The Hobbit
My 3rd grade teacher read this classic to us.  I won a gift certificate to a local bookstore from the school-wide reading competition and bought this as well as the first of The Lord of the Rings trilogy.  Another aspect to the reading competition was earning the chance to spend the night at the school.

7 - Challenger Explosion
I was in 5th grade when the principal came into the classroom and said that he had a short video he wanted to show us.  We knew the Space Shuttle was launching that morning, but hadn't heard what had happened to it, so we all sat there excited to be watching a movie, then in horror as it launched and then exploded.

6 - Young Woman of the Year
Today this program is known as Jr. Miss.  For a few years the name was changed to put the emphasis on it being a scholarship program, not a beauty pageant.  I had seen some of my older friends go through the program, so I decided I would participate during my junior year.  My experience wasn't particularly noteworthy, but I did make many friends, increased my poise and confidence and won a scholarship for my efforts.

5 - Newspaper
Much of my high school experience revolved around the newspaper staff.  I was on the editorial board my junior and senior years with various responsibilities: Entertainment Editor, News Editor, Business Manager.  I spent many late nights and early mornings getting the paper ready to go to press.  Our staff had a lot of fun with trips into town for food and just a general camaraderie. I also worked for our local newspaper and then continued on to work on the college paper for my freshman year.  At one point I had decided to teach journalism, but then reverted to my original elementary education plan.

4 - School bus
I always rode the bus until I started working in high school.  My senior year was also my youngest brother's kindergarten year.  On that first day, my parents decided they wanted all 8 of their kids to ride the bus (our district had all schools with the same time schedule, so high school and elementary rode the same buses).  We were all lined up in our driveway and trooped across the street to file onto the bus.  It was the one and only time I rode the bus that year.  The rest of the time I drove our old monster van.

Snowflake by MarieH Designs

3 - Snow days
Every year we hoped for snow days.  Our district was usually the last one in the valley to cancel, so we spent many mornings listening to the radio while we were slowly getting ready, hoping to hear those magical words that our district had cancelled.  As a parent now, I dread those same words, knowing that means my kids will be hyped-up and probably up at the crack of dawn in the morning.

2 - Teaching
From the time I entered Kindergarten, my career goal was to become a teacher.  I always knew what I wanted to be when I grew up -- a teacher.  I did lean toward an engineer for a year or two, but came back to teaching.  I founded a Future Educators of America club my senior year.  When I went on to college, I changed my focus from secondary education to elementary.  I had many experiences teaching in classrooms through practicums and my student teaching.

1 - Freedom
Nowadays, school means more freedom for me.  All I have left at home is my little Bugaboo during the days.  We don't have to stick to any particular schedule, we can go on playdates or shopping trips without needing to be home for a bus to drop off.  My days can be as full or as lazy as I want them.