I'll admit that this practice bothered me a bit. I resented kids being absent from class. Yes, parents asked for work ahead, which I didn't have ready. But parents were apologetic and I was understanding.
One day one of the kids was talking about going away so I said, "You've got to bring me back a present." The kid was uneasy and didn't know what to say. So to ease the anxiety I quickly said , "Bring me back a newspaper." I got a funny look and the kid said "Sure!"
Sure enough when the kid came back he proudly delivered my present
Now it so happened that I did a newspaper unit with my students. We looked a newspapers and I had them find parts like "national news, humor. classified ads, editorials etc. Some days we were knee deep in paper. They were also given a choice of many different writing exercises. Then there was always the tour of a newspaper to see how the real thing was put together.
So accidentally I knew what I was doing when I asked the kid for a newspaper.
I asked the next few kids for a present. They'd bring the paper and we'd pull it apart to see how it was put together. The kid always got his time to tell about his newspaper or his trip.
Then I got, "My Dad's going to Russia. Would you like a paper?" Sure! I got a few Russian Pravda's. Now we couldn't do much with them. It was just fun to see one.
So over the years I amassed a great collection of newspapers in the bottom of the closet.
When I retired I hated to put them in recycling.
I'm not sure who had more fun with this or learned the most. "Me or the kids!
It was one of those offhand moments where it turned out profitable.
 |
| My gr sevens from a long time ago. |
