Halloween Chronicles


Halloween is a fun day, though only if you're a kid. If you're a teacher, it's a day that you want to pass as quickly and quietly as possible - keep them calm before the mega-sugar rush... Classroom preparations for the day began a few weeks in advance, with the teaching of the ever popular "Looking for Dracula" call and response action chant. The kids love it! It's a Charlotte Diamond adaptation of "Going on a Bear Hunt".......in case you're familiar with that one! As well, we learned other Halloween songs and poems, and did Halloween worksheets. The big day finally arrived. I put on my original my costume - in case you don't know what I was supposed to be from looking at the photo, I was a bag of jellybeans - don't worry if you didn't recognize what I was - no one else did either, though they thought it was cute once I told them! To make my costume more 'real', I carried a bag of real jellybeans with me and handed them out to the kids (only one!) and adults alike. The day was pretty chaotic, and to keep the "natives" from getting to restless, I planned a 'stress- and sugar-free day, which included circle time, with stories, songs, and our daily yoga and meditation, followed by Halloween colouring until recess (oh oh, one of the parents brought in some SUGAR in the form of spider cupcakes - what could I say?............"NO SUGAR ALLOWED?????"), and then, the month end assembly. This was extra fun for my class as we sang "Five Little Pumpkins" and I then we did "Looking for Dracula" for the whole school as well as invited guests. Most people participated in the fun of the Dracula hunt, holding their imaginary binoculars up to their eyes, putting in their 'fangs', shining the flashlight on the imaginary Dracula body, and 'running' for their lives, back through the scary lake (into the row boat and row!) and the spooky swamp (put on your rubber boots!) to the safety of home. One fellow I looked at with my 'binoculars' during the performance refused to get in the spirit of things by looking back at me with his imaginary 'binoculars' - he is the dad of two of my students - he sat there and stared at me with a frozen and serious look on his face......hmmm, I thought, have I gone too far with the theatrics??? Oh well, I didn't look at him again with my 'binoculars'!! The hunt was a great success, as was my imaginary phone conversation at the end of the performance, with the local dentist, Dr. Lehr, asking him to come with his chainsaw to cut off the huge fangs of our imaginary Dracula! The rest of the day consisted of continued pacifying of the kids with movies....though classroom movies are never really quiet events - there's alway fighting and arguing, rolling around on the floor, requests to colour, turn the lights on, turn the lights off, go to the washroom, strolling out into the hall..........! The big event of the afternoon was going through the haunted house set up in the gym by the highschool kids. We let the kids go through in small groups of 5. Many of the little ones made it to the door of the 'house', and freaked right there - they wouldn't even go in, but ran back to the classroom, screeching in terror. Many of them were brave enough to go through, as did I, with one group of kids. The mother of one of the kids I went through with was part of the haunted house - she writhed up out of a cardboard well to wail at the kids as they went by - this kid, who, minutes before had been crying in terror and wanting to go back, saw her mom, and rushed over, crying, mommy, mommy - so much for the terror! After they all went through, and after one little girl had her meltdown because she wanted to go through again....and again, and mean Ms. Jay said no as there were lots of other kids waiting for their turns, we watched a movie until the longed-for bell rang for the release of home-time, and the end of the day. Intelligently, our school takes a pro-D day on November 1 - that releases us teachers from the worst of the post-Halloween sugar-high. Unfortunately, the sugar induced highs and lows continued for the rest of the week. Some generous grandparents even came in at recess on Thursday with their box of left-over candy and handed it out to all the kids - to my horror!! Noooooooo! But the week is over, and though the meltdowns and hyperness continued until Friday, hopefully Remembrance Day will set a calmer and more peaceful tone for next week!