I Made it.

I made it through my first year of teaching. Here's my last day in (mostly) pictures.

Such a pretty, sweet girl. She transferred in and I didn't have long with her, but she was lovely.

Love these guys. The one on the right was the most respectful, lovable, smartest kid around. The one on the left gave me a run for my money on the days he didn't take his meds for ADHD (some days, I had to remind myself that it would not be in my best interest to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze). But on his good days, he made the bad days worth it. The one in the middle was just a good kid whom I adored.

You wanna talk about a smart kid with a future? This is him. This picture looks so awkward because my hands are wrapped all the way around his skinny (tall, tall, tall) body. But he's great.

These are two more sweet kids that I will miss. I love how he's looking over at her while she looks at the camera. I'm glad to have this sweet picture of them.

This was one of my favorite students; he has Asperger Syndrome, which was always challenging in a classroom environment. But he was so passionate about Star Trek and fire fighting. He drew me pictures and told me (over and over and over) about the latest episode of whatever he watched on the SciFi channel the night before. Before the ceremony yesterday, he held up his hand like in this picture; I shaped my hand the same way and gave him a high five. He said, "Ok, you weren't supposed to do that." I asked him why not and he said, "Vulcans don't give high fives." I asked him if we could invent the Vulcan High Five, and he said, "Well, I guess so." He was not impressed with my attempt at being a nerd. (I asked him about his lovely vest, and his grandma knit it for him; how cute is that?). Oh, and in my yearbook he wrote, "Live long and prospere." (spelling is his).

I have more pictures to post; scroll down.