First Grade

First Grade
First grade. I was so excited. No more half days of school. No more sitting on the ground in a circle. I finally got a chair of my own. I got to put my own pencils, crayons, and glue in my own desk. Hot lunch! What could be a better time in a kid’s life? I waited all summer before first grade for the day when that little paper would come in the mail and tell me who my new teacher would be. And finally, one day, it did. Mrs. Sweet. Didn’t the name sound great? I was so excited to meet her! She was a new teacher at my school that year. I just knew she would be just like her name.
I had butterflies in my stomach all morning as I got ready for school that first day. I wanted to look my best so Mrs. Sweet would like me. My mom drove me to school and walked me to my new classroom. I gazed around the room, and there she was. Mrs. Sweet! Well, to be honest, she wasn’t quite what I had pictured. She was not pretty at all and wore glasses. I was sort of disappointed. But, being the mature first grader that I was, I would wait till I had met and got to know her to make any final judgments.
School was almost as great as I thought it would be. I loved my desk and everything in it. Did you know that if you stuck a crayon in your Elmer’s glue and shook it up everyday, and then put it back in your desk till the next day, it would change the color of the crayon? I learned that in the first grade. I also learned how important it was to have all those cool folders my mom let me pick out. We would build a sort of wall around our own desks to ensure that no one would copy off our homework. There were cheaters back then too, you know. And just about the best part of the day was lunchtime. I loved it! My favorite meal was taco salad. It was the best. I loved how we all got our own carton of milk and we could choose if we wanted regular or chocolate. I always chose chocolate you know. I also really liked lunch time because we had to sit in alphabetical order. I got to sit by Jamie Hageman, which was great because I had a big crush on him.
Well, I think my problems in the first grade all began because of Jamie Hageman. Every month or so, Mrs. Sweet would change the seating chart. I was pleased when I finally got put next to Jamie. I was a pretty shy kid, but I wanted Jamie to like me, and in order to do that, I had to talk. So talk I did, until one day my name was spoken loudly. “Sarah.” Uh oh. That was Mrs. Sweet talking and she didn’t sound pleased. “You are supposed to be working and not talking.” Then she walked over to the chalk board and put my name on it. She had the gall to put my name up next to all the bad kids’ names. I was so humiliated. How could she do this to me? Maybe Mrs. Sweet wasn’t quite as sweet as I had expected.
Time went on and I mostly got over having my name on the board. I was a happy little kid and still loved everything about first grade. I especially liked when we had work sheets to do at home. I remember a particular time when I had homework and the girl up the street, Maggie was babysitting me. I looked everywhere for something to write with to do my homework. To this very day, you can still not find a writing utensil in that home! Well, I finally found one of those old school yellow pens that writes in yellow ink. I wrote my name on my homework and began. Maggie, who was in the fifth grade, came over to me and asked if she could help. I told her no, that I could do it. She continued to pester me until I finally gave in and let her do my work. I thought nothing of it until the next day when I turned it in. Mrs. Sweet called me to her desk. Uh oh. What now? She somehow knew that I had not done my own work and called me on it. Great, now Mrs. Sweet thought I was a trouble maker and that I was dumb. This year was not turning out how I had planned.
Every winter in Aurora is so cold and snowy. As a kid, I loved it. I loved to get out of school and walk home in the snow. One particular afternoon, I walked around the corner of my school to head for home and POW! a snowball with a rock in it hit me right in the eye. It started to swell even as I ran back to tell Mrs. Sweet. I knocked on the door till she answered it. I told her what had happened and was waiting for her to feel so bad for me. Instead, she told me to go home and my mom would take care of it. I was so crushed. I cried the whole way home; not only from the pain in my eye, but the pain of being rejected by Mrs. Sweet. I hope she felt guilty every time she looked into my huge black eye!
It was always funny. Every time I brought paper work home for my mom to fill out, and it asked for the name of my teacher, she always put, “Mrs. S W E A T.” That’s right, Mrs. Sweat. She’s not the best speller. Luckily she or my dad would always catch it and they would laugh. I didn’t think it was funny though. That was my teacher they were laughing about, and for some odd reason, I was still loyal to her. Until one day. From the very beginning of school that day, I wasn’t feeling very well. I told Mrs. Sweet and asked if I could go see the nurse. She said, “No, not right now. Wait till after math time.” So I did. Well, math time came and went and I was feeling sicker. I asked again. And again I was rejected and told to wait till after lunch time. I did. Lunch came, I drank my chocolate milk, and then we got back to class. I was feeling even sicker now. I told Mrs. Sweet and again she told me I was fine and to wait till after reading time in the library. I did. I was so sick I couldn’t even listen to Mrs. Hadden, the librarian, (who was not a nice lady herself) read us a story. When we got back to our classroom, I didn’t even sit in my chair. I ran over to Mrs. Sweet who standing in the doorway, and I shouted, “I’m gonna be sick!” And I was. I threw up chocolate milk all over Mrs. Sweet’s ugly shoes. She looked like she was ready to throw up herself. She ran me to the nurse. Along the way, I threw up three more times. Take that Mrs. Sweet. Maybe if you had let me go to the nurse when I asked first, you’d still have clean shoes!
On the last day of school, we all got to take a picture with Mrs. Sweet to always remember her. I didn’t think I would have problems forgetting Mrs. Sweet. Anyways she pasted the picture on a piece of construction paper and wrote a little note to each of us. On my card, she wrote, “Remember the happy times.” Remember the happy times? What the heck was that supposed to mean. It’s like she thought I was some depressed old lady. Hello, I was six, and up till then, I had never had a bad day in my life, nor met someone I didn’t like! What psycho teacher!
First grade was mostly what I expected. Overall it was great; I had green glue, my own, private desk, and yummy lunch every day. Mrs. Sweat was the bummer of the first grade. Sadly, I think she didn’t end up teaching at Dartmouth Elementary for very many years.
Sarah 2004