sNO WAY! It's snowing in Texas?

What Ms. Chen does on a snow day:


A foot of snow in Dallas! Thank goodness today was a snow day...no work! I think teachers enjoy snow days more than students...

Thursday morning, I woke up at the usual 6 AM and immediately checked outside my window. Was that - snow? On the ground? Excitedly, I turned on the news to check school closings. Unfortunately, all Dallas ISD schools were open...

So I reluctantly headed out into the cold, lacking appropriate outerwear and footwear. Six kids showed up to 1st period. They refused to do work. Then again, they always do...all they did was complain.
"I should have stayed home today."
"DISD ain't gonna close for nothing."
"Ms. Chen, nobody's gonna show up, we shouldn't have to do no work." "Shouldn't have to do now work?" "We shouldn't have to do ANY work." Well, at least, I guess they've got double negatives down.

Roosevelt in the morning.

Realizing it would be pointless to use my prepared lesson plan on the 20 kids that would show up to my class across the three class periods, I made a quick change of plans (I've become as flexible as silly putty since I started teaching), and whipped up a "fun" writing assignment.

I got 3rd period to work...or at least pretend to work.

All the kids that showed up to 4th period. Rene doesn't like taking pictures. Guess which one is Rene.

The snow kept falling ALL afternoon. Some kids were completely checked out and refused to work, and I didn't blame them. They were sticking their heads out the window, begging me to let them play outside, and arranging a massive snowball fight via texting. ("Ms. Chen, join our snowball fight!" I give them a Look. "Ms. Chen, I thought you were cool," Marco says, shaking his head in disappointment.)

The view from my classroom.

The snow continued to pile up, and by 4th period, they made an announcement that kids could leave early if their parents came to the office to pick them up. With the few students I had left, I gave up on teaching them writing strategies after about 30 minutes of work, and then we just got on the computer and I showed them how to research colleges and financial aid.

I got to leave 5 minutes before school was actually over and my car was BURIED in snow. Kids were throwing snowballs at each other, security was running around, cars were trickling through the parking lot of disgusting, brown slush...it was madness. Driving was horrible. I'm pretty sure most of the people from the east coast think I'm a wimp.

It did not stop snowing all last night. A tree fell outside my apartment.

If I wasn't sick, I think I would have run outside to make snow angels and have a snowball fight. Alas, my poor, old body has been overrun with the sniffles and a sore throat, so looks like I will have to spend my snow day inside, with a cup of cocoa and watching movies. Oh well. :)