-smiles- subHan Allah, CONFIDENCE!!!!!!! -smiles- ( that word needs to be in caps)

al-Hamdu liLlah for confidence, it's a good thing to have confidence.

I'm really glad that there are people who seek to do well in school, not because of the grade, but because of the higher importance of knowledge. Learning gets us closer to Allah, and al-Hamdu liLlah some have the priviledge and the honor of using their knowledge to better assist humankind... that's amazing. Many can have good grades, many can have knowledge, but I find few understand the meaning of it all, and it simply is to help us serve Allah.

I remind my first graders, please don't be good to please me, be good to please Allah.

subHan Allah how I love those students, I love them so much. I'm also amazed at how quickly they learn!

I'm trying to help them increase their speed in reading, and I had them practice 15 high frequency words. I gave them a list to study at home, then I presented them with the same list on the board on Friday. Then I wrote all their names on the side of the board and asked them, "who can read these words the fastest?" ... After repeating the activity about two times so that everyone had a second chance at the words, the average for the class was 8 seconds! Barak Allahu Fihum. Every child's name on the board had how quickly they read the words. They love to compete, they love it!

I do the same with math, I had them in a fun way memorize the answers to different math equations, and al-Hamdu liLlah today we had a Test, and I was so pleased to find that the lowest score was a 19 out of 20. It was the Chapter test the book had, and when I looked at it, I knew my students collectively knew above and beyond what was on there. al-hamdu liLlah, that test was over and out like a trout, and everyone said, "Teacher that was sooo EASY!!!" I would have made it harder, but why not build their confidence? -smiles- Eh, it's a teacher's trick... just for confidence give them easy work, tell them they're great, while knowing that they know more than what you gave them... why give them hard work and tell them they suck? It will make them worse, and hate the subject.. in my opinion anyway. Allahu a`lam I could be wrong with this way of thinking, khayr. If I'm wrong, correct me, please. That's not to say I don't give them challenging work, I do, but I try my best to make sure that challenging means "fun" not "hard."

SubHan Allah, I told the students if they tell me when I make a mistake to make me aware of it and I'll give them a ticket (which allows them to win prizes). Oh my Allah! Do not tell that to first graders!!! -smiles- Every minute, "Teacher, teacher you made a mistake!!" Yes, I'm serious, almost every minute, "you made a mistake!!!" when I call one student by the wrong name, when I accidently drop the marker, when I stumble on my words, when .... Ah!!!! So now, I only allow them to earn tickets for that on Fridays... subHan Allah.

It's so funny, we learned that the exclamation mark means that a sentence has a "strong" feeling, and every single time they read a sentence that has an "!" their eyes become really wide, and they read that sentence loud with exaggeration... it's so funny, subHan Allah. Try it to this word: CONFIDENCE!!! -smiles- subHan Allah.

al-hamdu liLlah for everything, wa Allahu Akbar!