Wacky third-graders are wacky

I mentioned a while back that I was teaching a class on artistic masterpieces in the third-grade classes at Norah's school. Well, since the school year is over, my responsibilities are over, and I had a grand time. The kids seemed to enjoy it, too. When I went to Norah's school on the final day of school, a bunch of kids wanted me to sign their yearbooks. One of the other parents who was there said, "You're like a rock star!" Yes, probably because my maturity level is about at the same place as a third-grader's. But that's neither here nor there!

The teachers had the kids write thank-you letters to me (this year, the kids learned how to write letters, which is charmingly quaint in the 21st century), and they were quite the hoot. Here are some of the better phrases and other such stuff in the letters:

First, this very nice child began her letter this way:


Yeah, that's my daughter. I laughed and asked her why she addresses it to "Mr. Burgas," and she said, "I was trying to be respectful!" Norah is awesome.





At the bottom of the paper, there was an owl wearing a beret and holding a paint brush. Most of the kids colored him in, but some, as you can see, went a but further.



"I'm saying one of the funnyest because my dad is the funnyest." I'm sure his dad will be happy his son didn't throw him under the bus.













Both teachers helped the kids out by giving them ideas about what to write about, and as you can see, Norah's teacher happened to mention that I was on time, which the kids ran with. Norah's teacher had a wry sense of humor, so I like to imagine she was joking when she said this, but I've learned many things about kids in the past decade, and one of them is that elementary school kids don't get sarcasm. She may have meant it, but if she didn't, the kids wouldn't have made the distinction. But hey - I was on time!



This girl always wanted to know if the artists were married, if they had any kids, and how they died. When we were in training for this job (we had to get trained, you know!), the trainer said that kids always wanted to know those things. I said it was going to be hard when every artist ever is either gay or had many affairs and they all died of syphilis, but such is life. This girl was exactly what the trainer was talking about. She was obsessed with knowing those things!



This kid is talking about Rene Magritte's "Le Mariage de Minuit", which freaked more than one kid out.



A few kids said I was loud, which I guess is a good thing? I've always been loud - you couldn't grow up in my house and expect to get a word in if you weren't loud, and I've been so ever since. So sue me. Hey, I can project! We're not supposed to express our opinions about the art or the artists, because the kids at this age tend to follow suit, but I told them that I do not like Jackson Pollock, and this kid agreed with me. I have a higher opinion of kids than a lot of people, and many of the kids loved the Pollock I showed them even though I told them I hate his art. Kids have their own brains!



I'm not sure how scared I should be! This kid is pretty cool, though, so I think I'm safe.

So that's third-graders being kooky. I could never teach elementary kids because they would drive me insane, but I do think they're awesome. I'll be back next year, and we'll see if they still like me!