I'm a southern girl to the core, and my boyfriend and my students don't let me forget it. Yesterday A.J. pointed out how strong my accent gets while I'm on the phone with my parents and that it sticks with me for a while after. Today my kids laughed about me going to Kentucky. I'm beyond excited for the 5-day break, and it's got me thinking about how much I miss the South, the Carolinas.

What do I miss most? Well, the little things count don't they?

I miss my family so much it hurts every day. I miss the hair curling humidity and rolling hills. I miss Bojangles sweet tea and the hangover-cure chicken biscuits. I miss Sunday family dinners at my grandparents house, Bar 2004 in Copper Beech, Carolina Bagel and tripping over the bricks on the USC Horseshoe. I miss The Daily Gamecock, suburbia (at a minimum), men holding doors and "bless her heart"s.

I miss flip-flops being worn any day of the year without being met with dubious looks, coats held off until Christmastime, and coozies all over the place.

I love Saint Louis. I love where I took my life for this turn. But I'm longing for a little time back in the South ... when I make that visit ... well, to be continued ....

Today I woke up with a little anti-pep in my step. Wonderful weekend + short work sheet = Not in work mode. I know I should be super happy about the short week, but it just makes me anxious! Plus, cold windy Mondays without the sun give me a little case of the grumps. For the reason that Mondays often hit me with a giant cloud, I've decided to turn it around with a weekly Top 10.

This week: Top Ten Student Successes from the last week.

1. One non-reading student both read and correctly spelled 20 sight words (another low reader did the same, with his first 100% on a spelling test since meeting him last August.) My used-to-be-nonreader has never showed more confidence. Win.

2. All 14 students ACED their Study Island multiplication assignment today in the computer lab, 3 even getting an A on a division assignment.

3. Center Routine 1-2-3 rocked my kids' socks off. 1 - Stand in ready position 2 - Point to your next center. 3 - Walk without touching. Wonderful.

4 - Successfully executed small group guided reading sessions with all of my groups.

5. One of my students (who I've had since last year) successfully identified all 26 letters, their sounds, and the word that they identify with (beginning sounds). He was beaming as he showed me.

6. Another nonreader student who used to get b and d, m and w, x and z mixed up - got it!

7. Complaining that I wouldn't let them take home their multiplication books home to finish for homework.

8. EXCELLENT spelling test session for the second graders. So proud.

9. One student who kept struggling with multiplication (he didn't know what to do because he has behavior troubles after lunch, and he would just add them) had the lightbulb today when I showed him using tickets how to build and break apart groups (multiply and divide). He then got a 100% on his assignment.

10. Best seating chart ever.

Sometimes the smallest leaps are the biggest. A letter mastered, a sound discovered, a word recognized

My kids are rocking my socks off today after what can be called a rough week to the core. (The roughness, by the way, has nothing to do with my children themselves, but rather the circumstances for which I joined TFA in the first place.)

So I walk in today after a day of ZERO raised voices from my end yesterday (score!) and a determination for two solid days of nurturing voice in a row. And then I look over my kids' homework, something I am not so good at doing on a regular basis. What I saw were the most creative, adorable stories. The assignment was for students to pick at least 5 spelling words and write a short, creative story.

I'm sharing a few of these now for two reasons. 1) Kids are adorable and their silly and creative ideas are too much to not share. 2) I look at what my students were writing with a year ago, and I'm amazed that they are creating full stories linking words together that only share prefixes as their commonality.

Here are their stories: (dun-dun)

TT - One day we went to the park. I was kind of UNHAPPY about all the trash we saw on the ground. I was very UNCOMFORTABLE about being there, so I decided to REACT. We began to look for a RECYCLE bin. UNFORTUNATELY there was not one. Then we all realized (vocab word) that it was a MISTAKE. The park crew was cleaning and blowing trash to be cpicked up. We all just laughed.

ZG - Once upon a time there lived the craziest man. He had a daughter and a son. He went to school to UNROLL the chair. He had to REACT and he MISLEAD the kids to the basement in the school. He made lots and lots of MISTAKES. He MISSPELLED all of the spelling words. He was an UNKNOWN man. And he had to REWRITE all of those spelling words. When the people started to UNLOAD the board (we have a promethean board now), the children said, "HUUUUUUUUUUUU!" They started yelling, "I want to measure my muscles! I'm UNHAPPY with you flower! We DISAGREE!!!"

CM - One day a man named Jack was UNHAPPY because he lost his puppy. A man named JOHN said to him, "Do not search for your puppy," but Jack DISAGREED. He was DISHONEST with himself because the puppy wasn't lost. He was very DISCOURAGED because he did not find his puppy. At the end, he UNROLLED his sleeping bag and his puppy was under the bed!

JF - Once upon a time a boy named Muppy was in a spelling bee. He MISSPELLED DISHONEST and DISAGREE so he REACTED like he was UNLOADING boxes.

These both cracked me up and impressed me in many ways. For your entertainment. Soon to come, the video I shot of my kids reading a Native American play called, "Pushing Up The Sky." Be excited.

PS: This post is titled "Let's Go Gamecocks!" because a couple days ago when my kids were being loopy in line to the gym, one of my students started clapping his hands and chee