John Journal: Lauren J :: End of Kindergarten interview

Who was your teacher? Miss Ringgenberg, Miss R for short

What did you like about Miss Ringgenberg? When she makes a mistake on words she says, "help me sound it out! Like c-a-t." If you don't know how to spell a word and it isn't on the board she writes it on a post it note and gives it to you. She has all the colors of the rainbow post-its. She lets us have bonus recesses if everyone is on purple or pink (a behavior chart that shows they are all behaving really well) and if everyone is on pink (best behavior) we get a prize from the prize jar. The prizes are candy, gumballs, McDonald Happy meal toys, etc.

What did you like about specials? I like gym and I like art and I like library because we get to watch movies sometimes. There are tiny animals in the forest and their parents died because of the gas and so did this little girl except they got this special medicine to help her be alive. That was one of the movies. We played a fun game in gym called running test line. Basically there are two lines on the gym floor and you run from one red line to the other red line and if you don't get there in time you have to stop. Whoever gets to 100 your whole class gets gatorade. If you don't make it you have to sit down and watch. The person who usually won was Addilyn, Owen H, Brandt, Easton or Mason because they were the fastest in the class. Once I won. but it was very hard because you have to run so many times to get to 80 (if you get to 80 the individual gets a gatorade). In art I enjoyed playing with clay. We made lollipops out of the clay. I made a heart out of clay and when it dried up I painted it and gave it to Ms. Phillips (art teacher). At music I am always the first one to raise my hand and we did London Bridge is falling down and I got to make a tunnel and everyone else went through my tunnel. Mr. Klemm (music teacher) will call your seat number and give you a command like move one arm or move one leg to the ti-ta rhythm.

What did you do for lunch? At the beginning of the year we had to sit down on a chair in the cafeteria and we are supposed to talk to the person across from us not next to us. We couldn't turn our feet or faces to talk to the person next to us because it would get too loud. When the rules changed it was better. (There were some weird rules in the cafeteria this year that parents complained about and then changes were made). I would like to buy lunch on corn dog day, or when they would let you choose yogurt and crackers, and also on days with chicken nuggets but never on stuffed crust pizza days. When I packed a lunch I would usually have an orange, squeezy applesauce, starbursts, sometimes grapes, pretzels or goldfish, and banana muffins or bread when my mom would make them.

Who were your best friends? Daphne, Stella (off and on), Caroline, Saffi, Chloe, kind of Charlotte, and all the boys in the class. I sat at the BLUE table at the beginning of the year with Mason, Kaely, Quinn and Jaxon. Then I sat at the ORANGE table with Brandt, Owen C., and Chloe. Then I sat at the ORANGE table again with Owen H., Easton and Addilyn.

What did you enjoy learning about in kindergarten? I enjoyed learning about animals. We got to make crafts about them. I enjoyed a lot learning about doctors because then one day we had a special guest come in and he showed us x-rays and we got to touch an actual bone from a dead animal. We had to wash our hands after. I like to read books with pictures and use my imagination. I liked to illustrate stories too.

What were some of your favorite books that you read this year? Tuesday (wordless picture books), Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon and a book about flowers and bugs called The Grouchy Ladybug.

What did you like to do at recess? I liked to play tag and this game called four square. I liked to play gymnastics or the talent show with Daphne. Sometimes Daphne would chase me and call me mommy. Sometimes Stella would make me be the hamster when she was mad at me so I couldn't talk. Some of the girls in Mrs. Warner's class would tell Easton to kiss me but that was very embarrassing! (Easton has a twin sister who was in the other class and her friends would chase and tease him about Lauren).

Tell me about your field trips. The first field trip was to the pumpkin patch. My mom didn't get to come to that one but on the rest of the field trips she did. On the last one to the farmstead she brought my baby brother too. At the pumpkin patch we got to ride on a carriage because we couldn't pick the pumpkins at the patch because it had rained the night before and it was very muddy. (They picked pre-picked pumpkins). When I came home I painted the pumpkin. It was getting close to my birthday and my mom bought a lot of pumpkins to paint for my birthday party. The next field trip was to high school Environmental Science Lab. We got to touch a lot of animals. I held a tarantula and a snake and it was so big and fat that Mason and I held it together so we wouldn't drop it. When someone else was holding it it got stuck in the bench hole and the high school kids had to pull it out. When we went to Wonderscope my mom got to ride the bus with me and there was a ginormous rock climbing thing and I beated my friend Jacob J and I got to ring the bell twice because I won a lot of times. The last field trip was to Deanna Rose Farm. When we went to the bird area the peacock showed it feathers and made a loud sound and it got everyone's attention!

What do you want to be when you grow up? I want to be a teacher when I grow up and a lego person (a person who builds with legos a lot of the time). Maybe I can be a person who teaches legos. I don't know, maybe you could decide! I want to have a studio downstairs (in the basement) for all my lego stuff.

What is your favorite song? At school we learned "What a Wonderful World," and I like it because it is beautiful and I learned the hand motions and sign language. It was hard but I still did it. We sang it for our parents for Parent Appreciation Day. In music my favorite song goes like this, "My parents took me to the party and they all walked around with fancy cups of tea..."