Growing Pains

Last Thursday, I had two different students coming to me about their teeth moving. Jonah, in traditional Jonah-fashion, faced this new development with excitement and wonder. And being the boy that he is, just couldn't wait to make his teeth move more. Every 5 seconds, he was touching his teeth, touching his teeth, touching his teeth. At one point, I threatened to tie a string to his tooth and yank it out then and there if he didn't get his hands out of his mouth (I practice tough love in the classroom.)
The other little tooth-mover was Cathy. Cathy is small, and while very lovable, also prone to whining, especially when faced with ways of the world that she just doesn't understand. Everything that happens is like the end of the world because she just doesn't know any better. For instance, "I'm hot!" Well, dear, it's because your grandma makes you wear 3 layers of long-johns before putting on your real clothes and then adds a sweater on top of htat. "Tummy hurt." Well, dear, that's really your intestines and you're probably lactose intolerant..just give it a while. "Tooth moving!" Poor gal, teeth are supposed to move. But she was not aware of this, so she was pretty sore about her moving tooth and the fact that Jillian-Teacher was not doing much to fix it.
Friday, 3 students came to school missing teeth! Jonah & Cathy both lost a tooth from the bottom and Aaron lost both of his front teeth. (Aaron tends to be a little out of touch with reality, so his teeth were probably also wiggling on Thursday, and it just never occured to him that something was happening with his body or that he could share it with the rest of us.)
Anyways, as a teacher, this is the first time all year my kids have started losing their teeth. I felt really proud of my little Kinder, losing their baby teeth AND realizing it's not a bad thing, but just a rite of passage into the big-kid-world. My little monkeys are growing up!!!


Jonah



Aaron





Cathy