The first problem was the weather. Hot, crazy, sunny. By the time they walked from the school to the park all the kids were hot and thirsty. I drove down and I was hot and thirsty. I had brought extra waster for all of them, and they dove into it. We missed the instructions on how to do the whole thing.
The gist of it is this: We had eleven stations (including a water/bathroom break) to visit ... a ball & raquet thing, a sack race, an egg & spoon (we skipped this, because really, our class is full of hellions who are not civilized, and we decided that eggs + A was NOT a good mix) a soccer relay, a frisbee/hula hoop thingy which we never figured out, a water/sponge race, football relay, a tire race, ... and some more. I think we might have skipped a few.
One problem was that there should have been an adult at each station to explain the race and help maintain order. But there wasn't, because of testing at the school. So the teacher (or, in our case, the sub) had to read the instruction to figure out how to play the game.
The other problem was the children. They are an exuberant bunch to begin with, and they had a sub, because their regular teacher was out because the doctor said she had to stay out of the sun. That, and a couple of the children are ...difficult. A6 was wailing on everybody. P6 was ... defying every direction. More water made things a little better. C5 was moping because the games all had balls (boyish) and it was hot.
After the first 6 stations we had a water break.
Then two children from C5's classroom were removed from field day and brought BACK to the elementary school, which did make things easier. With A & P gone, there was less hitting (OMG, the one child was BAD) and more following of directions (that child just makes life difficult when you are trying to keep track of everyone). Phew. After they left things did get easier. Then we could get down to playing. PLUS we had the helpers!
But. We were hanging out, trying to keep them under control, keep them in the shade. There was an awful lot of whining from ALL the children about how hot it was, how thirsty they were, and how hungry they were. It WAS hot. Lunch was later than their usual lunch time, but we couldn't eat early because the hot-lunch kids' lunches hadn't been delivered. We had already drunk a ton. Finally, lunch!
After lunch, more play on the playground, then I took C5 & M6 home.
PS, I won the sack race.
