The Dark Days of Elementary

I started this post to describe the most hated two days in elementary; Valentine's Day and Halloween. I then realized I missed a couple of other horrible days for elementary school teachers. Altogether there are four days every school year that strike fear in the hearts of elementary teachers.

Number one on my list would have to be Valentine's Day. First of all it's a pointless. It's suppose to be a holiday celebrating romantic love between two people. Instead, in my world it becomes the holiday where parents try to see who can buy the most crap for their kids. At our school all deliveries are sent to the gym until party time. By noon the entire gym floor is covered in flowers, candy baskets, balloons, and every stuffed animal you could possible imagine. There have also been a few instances of jewelry included in those deliveries. I mean really flowers and jewelry for elementary school kids? Another reason to hate the holiday? Candy! Now don't get me wrong, I live on candy 90% of the time. Sugar runs through my veins on a daily basis. But that doesn't mean I want to deal with 20 kids hyped up on it all morning. It's like having a roomful of meth addicted chihuahuas who all need to go to the bathroom. It's not pretty.

Next on the list is Halloween. Another holiday that is celebrated by eating as much candy as you possibly can before puking. Also if you're really lucky and it falls on a school night you get a roomful of kids who stayed up late eating candy and running around town the night before. There's also the chance that a kid might accidentally stumble onto your house during their candy raids. In that case they will then have to tell you and everyone they know that they know where you live.

Finally, the last two on my list; April Fool's Day and St. Patrick's Day. Now don't get me wrong I love a good prank, but these kids just don't get it. Here's a standard April Fool's Day prank from one of my elementary kids:

"Mrs. Honey, there's a spider on your shirt."
"Really?"
"APRIL FOOLS"

Repeat at least fifty more times before the end of the day. Apparently anything can count as an April Fool's joke as long as you yell "April Fool's" as loudly as you can afterwards.

As for St. Patrick's Day? Really? Unbridled pinching of anyone who happens to forget and doesn't wear green. The carnage is hard to take. It's madness!

Before I close, I do want to add one note of happy about Valentine's Day. In my town we have a local family business that has donated a balloon and a small snack pack for each student who doesn't receive any gifts. So in our school everybody gets a little something and nobody goes home empty handed.