Back in Business

Christmas break was a very good / much needed break. I didn't realize how good it would be to be home for awhile, catch up with family and friends in person, and get out of Torreon. Travelling around would have been fun of course, dont get me wrong, but having the people around me was great [and in the end cheaper than all the hotels food and travel it would have been. Thanks for the room and board Padres :) ] Plus I got to be one of the first to see my little cousin Sammy's new baby girl! soo cute.
Now school is back in session (since the 7th really), and I'm back in the usual grind. It was good to come back to a three day week, ease into things. Someone had the bad idea that we should bring a toy from Christmas on that Friday though... good in theory, and maybe could be carried out better at a different school or with different kids... not my little hellions though - that caused so many issues.
I feel like my kids are somehow, miraculously(!? bad choice of word?!) worse than before break. We just had parent-teacher conferences last week... interesting tidbit on that: every single female students parent mentioned one girl's name: Queen Bee. 'Something needs to be done about her, my child is afraid of making her mad' She is feared! Thankfully the parents were very understanding and said they will run into many people like her in life but I should just watch out for it, believe me I have been. She can get any girl to do any dirty work she asks. "put this in my bag, hang up my jacket, dont play with her or I won't be your friend" that kind of thing. AND she's 5. Excellent. When she is gone from school it is seriously a 360º difference with the other girls, they play freely and talk more often! So imagine - I have 6 girls and that is the drama between them, now add in 12 boys where at least 3 are demons (said most affectionately of course) and they can cause a domino effect on many others. Makes for an interesting class to be sure.
Today I am very excited because we changed assistants, apparently they do this semesterally so nows the time. The new assistant I have knows more english and is much more outgoing. With my last assistant, the both of us being fairly shy/introverted didn't make for such a good team. Anyways, even after only today with my new helper, I can see a difference. She is also quite helpful with behavior management and thinks up projects to do on her own. Hopefully my students will start to miraculously shape up. Its getting exhausting