Ice Cream

Wow, four out of my last five posts concern food. Annnnd who can guess what Bekah's missing about America?

Today, though, I feel that I'm justified. For class today, Alison and I taught the 6th graders the past tense, along with a handful of new location words: museum, post office, train station, restaurant--and ice cream shop. For our game, I wrote a bunch of little paragraph-long stories about people, detailing where they go during the day, and then asking "Where was _(person)__  _(time)__?" The first kid to raise their hand and get it right won a point for their team, which was, in this case, illustrated by earning the picture of the people they answered right about.

Here's an example about "Joe":

Today is Monday. In the morning, Joe eats breakfast at home. After breakfast, Joe goes to school. After school, Joe goes to the ice cream shop with his dad. Then, they go home and eat dinner. Where was Joe Monday after school?

 The answer, of course, is "Joe was at the ice cream shop."

And Joe wasn't alone in going to the ice cream shop. He was joined, in these stories, by Isaac, Luke, Isabel, and Chloe. Add to this the fact that "ice cream shop" is part of the new vocabulary we're learning (read: endless repetition), and that, to keep kids' interest, each class today included asking the kids their favorite ice cream flavors. Add to that the fact that today was in the 90s F, but "felt like" 102F, thanks to the oh-so-lovely humidity.

Then maybe it'll make sense as to why I'm writing about ice cream today.

After dinner, I decided I just had to have some. I tried to fight it, tried to remind myself that it's bad for me and expensive here, but it was no use. I did at least talk myself down from my original plan (Coldstone Creamery not far from here!) and decided to "just go and see" what they had at the local grocery store.

And the local grocery store, wow! It's been closed all month for renovations, and man did they renovate! It's like a whole new store, and it definitely feels more Western--larger isles, a greater variety, wider open spaces; though I know it's impossible, it actually feels bigger, too. And they had ice cream. Strawberry ice cream. In a carton. It's not the same, of course (made me suspect this is actually what they used for my shake the other day), but it was cold and it was creamy and it was DELICIOUS on a hot evening.

I can never seem to help myself from getting brainwashed by my own lessons, particularly when they urge me towards what I want anyway. But, really, is that so bad when it means cold ice cream on a 100+ degree day? I think not.