Saturday

a day in the life
By MissDee
A Typical Tuesday or Thursday:
640a-645a: Arrive at work with coffee. I bring some for our 4-year-old teacher and our cook, both of whom I am close to.
645a-700a: Eat breakfast, chat with cook. She has severe allergies to certain foods along with issues with her neck from a car accident. I help her with lifting heavy cans and draining fruit (if needed), along with setting the tables.
700a: Clock in, ready to start my day.
701a-815a: Hang out in the gym, playing with the kids, signing children in to their attendance sheets. Enjoy games of tag and catch with our 5-year-olds. Monitor a child with severe asthma, checking on him every so often to make sure he isn't wheezing. I get a lot of hugs from two girls in our 5 year old class, N and A, who, along with E and M, play the shadow game with me, where they follow me everywhere, giggling every time I turn around and make a silly face at them. The four girls have a contagious laugh and give the best hugs!!!
815a-1030a: Provide planning time for teachers, assist teachers with their morning, assist office staff, depending on what my boss would like me to do that day. Joke around with boss about different things; she teases me about different things, such as my love of hip-hop literature, which she refers to "smut books", and tells me that I am one of a kind, and the center would be lost without me.
1030a-1200p: Provide lunch for our morning preschool program. When lunch is over, we wash our hands and faces and clear the table. While we are waiting for our friends who may not be done, we play a game of "I Spy" or sing songs. Once everyone is finished, we tiptoe, gallop, skate, ski, etc. to the cubbies, where we get our backpacks and jackets (if it is an outside day) Enjoy more hugs, games of tag, catch, and monkey in the middle. C, age 5 and 4 feet tall, plays tag with me, and tells me he loves me. I get on his level and he gives me a hug, knocking me over in the process. Chat with parents as they drop off for PM kindergarten and pick up their children from AM kindergarten. The gym is loud with 5 year olds, yet so much fun!
1200p-300p: Break other teachers, myself, depending on what the schedule is for the day, or help out in office.
300p-345p: Hang out in the 4 year old room, where we read a story and sing songs. They love my "silly voice" and are engaged in the book I am reading with voices that resemble the character and the emotions. After our story, we head to the gym. I play the 4 year old version of volleyball with I, who throws the ball to me and I show her how to bounce the ball, scoop it, and hit the ball back toward me. She is getting there, and giggles when I hit the ball across the gym. She throws the ball back to me, and we go back and forth with the ball. M and the boys play soccer, which I nearly trip on the floor.
345p-600p: More office work, help out in other classrooms, send other teachers home for the day, start closing the daycare. Sometimes I am done early myself.

My job is great and I love the children, along with their families. My co-workers are awesome! I am exhausted at the end of the day, and I look forward to coming to work the next day, because I had so much fun the day before....


19 comments:

What? said...

A four year old teacher, and he or she
is drinking coffee. A little young don't
you think:)

I said...

Well, if you're getting up that early to work, I would be drinking coffee too.. even if I was only 4 years old =]

CoffeeDrinkingMissDee said...

What: Our.4.Year.Olds.do.not.drink.coffee.Our.4.year.old.teacher.who.gets.there.at.6:15a.drinks.coffee.and.she.is.26.years.old.

LEARN.TO.READ.BEFORE.YOU.COMMENT.

put the coffee down said...

Ummm...I believe the pps were just joking. Calm down there, no need to be condescending towards others because you didn't understand their sarcasm.

Nanny E said...

I can honestly say that I have never heard of hip hop literature..sounds slightly intriguing!

MissDee said...

lol Now that I read it again, I can see why ppl would ask if 4-year-old are drinking coffee.

Nanny E: "Hip-hop" literature is "street fiction". It's like "The Wire" in book format.

I said...

Maybe you didn't notice the smiley faces. We were JOKING. Wow. Calm down. If I seriously thought your 4-year-olds were drinking coffee, I wouldn't have made a sarcastic comment about it.

christine said...

Every time my mom watched my children for me (and it was morning)they enjoyed a rare treat of coffee with Gramma... very sweet with many ounces of cream and too many sugars! It was not something I would do for them at home and they often begged and whined "But Gramma lets us have coffee!".

MissMannah said...

Wait, you work 11 hour days? Do you do this everyday or is it only Tues and Thurs? (If this is blatantly obvious to everyone else, I apologize for being so slow on the uptake.)

I enjoyed reading a daycare DITL, especially because you have so much fun. I've thought about submitting mine, but it would be too gripey because my school is going through a horrible low-staffing transition time right now. Everyone is on edge, especially the children. Not a pretty picture.

missdeemiltownssupastar said...

Mannah: I did 2 11 hour days with an hour break on Tuesdays and Thursdays this semester. The cool thing about working there is that 4/10's with an hour break is an option.

What ? said...

Thanks, I said. Miss Dee needs to
Learn. Punctuation. And. Learn. Proofreading .
She clearly states the teacher is 4 years old.

Tanya said...

I am still waiting for my "Day in the Life" post to be shown. I spent about 45 min. on it and submitted it a little more than a week ago. It's a day in the life of working alongside a work-from-home parent. I think you guys will like it.

Florentina said...

I wrote one too and it hasn't shown up. I think the blog administrator probably gets a lot of these and doesn't want to clog up the columns with too many of these. She probably wants to maintain the variety on this blog and only posts the good ones.

MissDee said...

What: Apparently you have never worked in daycare. "Our 4 year old teacher" refers to the fact that the teacher (Miss Libby who is 26, btw) works in that classroom and at our center.

MissMannah said...

I don't know why it is so hard to figure out what "four year old teacher" means. It is just a simpler way of saying "the teacher who works in the classroom full of four year olds." What is just trying to annoy you.

MissDee said...

Mannah: Well, my English teacher would have understood what I was trying to say...

Annoyed said...

MissDee,

WE ALL GET IT. We were joking & trying to give you a hard time. Re-read the first 2 comments. Notice the smiley faces. Do you understand sarcasm?

I said...

I almost corrected What?'s comment until I saw her smiley face & decided to play along.

Also, I have a BA in English AND work in a daycare and understood perfectly what you meant.

I said...

YES, I wrote both comments (above). I wanted to add a 2nd part.