Rappin Ronnie

One activity we have for phonemic awareness is Rappin Ronnie.When we want to change the initial phoneme to form a different word, Rappin Ronnie comes to class. Rappin Ronnie wears his cap sideways, of course, and he has a big, gold, dollar-sign necklace.  The beats are laid down and the rap begins. 

"My name is Rappin Ronnie and I am here to Rhyme

You can rap with me every single time

Don't be a nerd. Say the word

Here we go. Let's start the show"

Rappin Ronnie then calls the initial sound the students will change by saying one of our sound/spelling cards. "I'm a pilot flying in the air, I'm a pilot and I don't care!" Then Ronnie calls and the students respond, "I say dark, and you say  . . . . . . . ." and students yell, "PARK!" --repeated a couple times. There is dancing and arm waving. I new this was catching on when I overheard a group of first grade buddies with this exchange: "I'm a pilot flying in the air! When I say loop, you say . . . . . . . ." Now that's FUN! Don't tell anyone.

School Stories: St. Patrick

On March 17th a couple students rushed in to see if I was wearing green. I wasn't wearing green and a boy said, "Mr. Urmston, you're not wearing green." He then showed me he was wearing green. He was wearing a white tee with green trim and green lettering. The lettering said some random team name like "green flyers, maricopa little league." The other student had on a green camouflage sweatshirt and plaid shorts which included a green stripe amidst the blue. I asked "Why are you wearing green?" He quickly replied, "So nobody will pinch me?" I proceeded with "Why would they pinch you?" "Because I'm not wearing green". I quickly got out of that circular thinking and said "Where I come from we don't pinch people if they don't wear green. We give them a dollar?" Now I had him thinking. He didn't have a response to that. I could see he was thinking-- "do I really have to give this guy a dollar? I don't have a dollar. Maybe if I don't answer he'll go away". I thought I'd let him off the hook and said " You're wearing green because it's St. Patrick's Day. You don't even know who St. Patrick is do you?" The student indignantly replied "Yes, I do!" I said "No you don't." He was so confident with his next reply that I started to doubt my challenge. Maybe he knew about all of the Saints and now I've insulted him. So I asked, "OK who is St. Patrick?" His answer? "He's Sponge Bob's friend in Bikini Bottom." Now that's FUN!!! Don't Tell anyone.