Deluge and Delinquents.

So...Ex-Cyclone Debbie started dumping her rain on us at about 3.00 am and has not stopped since. (It is now 16.30 pm).I was teaching again today after spending two days with Toerag and Fidget but today I was in another school north of the town.I arrived at 8.00 am and the Principal was on the phone as it had just been announced the all schools in South East Queensland were closed for the day. She was inundated with calls asking if school was open, which it was, as our area is the Darling Downs.I went down to the Happy Feet room ( a misnomer if ever there was one) and met with the class teacher. I had asked for the planning the day before and didn't get any except an email saying she would be in school to explain what I was to do. It all seemed pretty easy and straightforward with them having to complete Easter Booklets in their desks and a variety of Easter craft activities as well as a bit of maths and phonics work.Children started arriving but one Mum decided that she was going to take her child back home anyway due to the weather. The child, a girl, promptly threw herself on the floor screaming. The mother picked her up and carried her out kicking and screaming while the child whacked her mother with her fists. It was not a great start.Then the Pains arrived (Big Pain and Bigger Pain)... two brothers who I remembered from my last visit."Sing the frog song" said Big Pain coming up to me..."sing the frog song.""Maybe later," I said, "if you're good for me and listen and get some work done.""Sing the frog song," he repeated staring blankly at me.I had a sinking feeling about the day and this was before Jye, the boy with ADHD, arrived.In the end I had only eight children, two Preppies, four Year 1's and two Year 2's.I had a Teacher Aide, Ms Z, who was to work with the Prep children, according to the class teacher and my planning.I set the Year 1's off ordering numbered Easter eggs and sticking them in their maths books while I worked on addition of two digit numbers with the Year 2's. Bigger Pain was one of them and he worked really well on it. Even Jye was engrossed in his work.I had nothing to do with the Preppies as Ms Z set them off on their task and then sat at the back smiling at her mobile phone which kept on intermittently pinging. Soon afterwards she disappeared and when she came back discovered that one of her charges had done his work completely wrong.After that session they were free to work on their 'Easter Booklets' which were basically a variety of colour by number worksheets stuck together.Big Pain was not motivated by this and began to run about and make silly noises while Bigger Pain laughed at him. Ms Z reappeared and I asked her what normally happened when he was uncooperative (ie bored) and she whisked him out of the room and we didn't see him again for another 45 minutes when he came back all sheepish just before Morning Tea.I had a duty at Morning Tea and because of Debbie (the Ex-Cyclone) we were stuck indoors. I hated it. It was chaos in the Parade room with children rolling under desks and balls whizzing across the floor. Ms Z had the TV on and was watching the 7 News."I've had a text from a friend in Brisbane and it is really bad there. They are sending people home from work."Back in the classroom after Morning Tea we had to do some Phonic work which turned out to be a 'Colour by initial letter' activity. When that was finished we were supposed to do a 'Colour by middle letter' and a 'Colour by final letter' activity but I'd had enough....enough of the colouring it was mindless!We set about starting some of the craft activities, making a Bunny hat and an Easter basket. It all seemed much more exciting and interesting and yet I had not expected Ms Z to take over like she did.She cut out everyone's head bands for them so they didn't have to use scissors but I grabbed some of the Bunnies and handed those out for the children to cut out....but she took some of these back and cut them out for them. I was saving the Easter baskets for later but she hole punched the paper cups, added the pipecleaner handle, wrote their names on the bottom so all they had to do was decorate them with stickers....all the while answering texts and even answering a phone call.We had it all done in about 3o minutes and I was wondering what to do next when she said"You can get an Ipad now boys if you want."That wasn't on the planning.Of course Jye, Big Pain and Bigger Pain loved that....and I relented as I had utterly lost the will to live and it was keeping them quiet.The class teacher was in school doing some planning and popped back in."Oh, we only did one of the 'Colour by sound activities'" I said and then we went onto the Art activities.""Oh, well maybe you can do another one later," she said.'I think not!' I thought.I had another hellish duty and lunch break and this time there were children practising recorders badly as well as all the other chaos. Someone brought in some cakes and Bigger Pain immediately grabbed two. I made him put one back."But I've already licked it, " he said grinning at me. I was very close to knocking that grin off his face but thought better of it. I also met his brother....'Huge Pain' in the Junior class who told me that there were seven brothers all together plus two sisters. It did not bear thinking about.Ms Z left at lunchtime and I had another Teacher Aide in the afternoon. As all the craft activities were finished I asked if they would like to play some games. The 'Delinquents; wanted to get back to their Ipads but I insisted they play the games and they enjoyed them, in fact it was the most fun we had all day and the only time I felt completely in control. One game we played was meant to encourage listening skills and they had to be really quiet. They did really well despite the constant pinging of the second Teacher Aides mobile phone."It's just Ms Z texting " she said, "she thinks school will be closed tomorrow."I couldn't bloody believe it! Ms Z was even interrupting the afternoon sessions and she was at home now!I let the 'Delinquents' back to their Ipads for the rest of the afternoon. I didn't care anymore I just wanted the day to end.One of the Year 1girls wanted Bigger Pain to take her to the toilet. I'm not stupid. I made her go on her own."It's only Preppies that need someone to go with them" piped up the little Prep girl."Why do you need someone to go with you?" I asked."Because of the toilet snake," she said."What's that?" I asked."A red bellied black snake," she said." Well, it won't be around today in this weather," I said."No, it had it's head chopped off," she said, " by the garden man."It was finally time for the end of the school day. The class teacher came back to help see them off and she said that the Principal was expecting an important 'Conference Call' at 3.00 pm.When the call came we heard that all the local schools were closed tomorrow. Tomorrow was actually the last day of this term anyway so now everyone is having an extra days holiday.I know it has rained all day here but honestly it was nothing new to me when you come from the North West of England. It is probably going to be a lovely day tomorrow now as Debbie heads back out to sea but there has been flooding and perhaps as the water flows off the land they expect the flooding to increase tomorrow. Perhaps that was why they decided to close the schools but why make the decision as the school day ended as most of the children had gone and meant the schools had to phone round all the parents at the end of the day to warn them of the closure.Doh!So the Easter holiday has started here and so there can be no more school for a fortnight.I am pleased about that.