the little things that put a smile on my face

1. when i walk along with my class up to the classroom through the crowd of other kids, they all smiled at me and said bonjour and waved, and eagerly asked if they'll do anglais today.

2. kids telling on other kids for not behaving well so that i will put a cross next to their names on the board.

the rule is: 3 crosses, they're punished, no more classes. stand in the hallway till the class finishes. they make such a big fuss about this, i usually do this to threaten them to shut up. but i always find it amusing when someone tells me, "maîtresse, il y a __, il a fait __. comme ca." (literally, teacher, xxx has done abc. and this abc can be anything, e.g. eating gluestick or just hitting his own forehead using his own pencil case, minutiae like that. then they acted it out. really funny to watch.)

3. kids asking, whether they should use a pencil or a pen to write their names down on the piece of paper that were given. i was distributing them blank paper to make name tags - leading to a class of self-introduction, naturally. only that it failed. they answer "what's your name?" with "what's your name?" but yeah, thanks for asking, i don't give a toss, use whatever you have to write your name, may it be a crayon or a highlighter. the result was fantastic, they made really pretty little pictures with flowers and the sun and all sorts of stuff around their names. then you really can't read their names anymore. it was just too busy.

4. on the way to their music class, a 6-y-o came up to me and told me that he's in love. "oh, that's nice." i told him. he told me the girl's in ce1 (one year above him, but in the class right next door). then during the music class, he sat next to her and talked so much with her. after class, i went to ask if that's the girl he was talking about, he went all shy about it. so cute.

5. a 5-yea- old fell asleep right in front of me during class.