FIELD DAY!!!

Now I'm working at the good ole' Summer Enrichment Program at the University of Virginia. I have seven eighth grade boys that are personally under my supervision, but I get to deal with all kinds of kids between the 5th and 8th grade. They are all gifted in one way or another and they sometimes manage to surprise me with what they can do. Sunday was field day for the camp and before we got them sweaty and wet (along with some of the counselors)they had a pep rally where the suites were paired up. My suite is the 320s (we live in the dorms at UVA), and we were with a corresponding suite in the girl's quarters. Most counselors created team names around alliteration and unusual animals and let the kids do a cheer or song based on a pop tune or the old standby "We Will Rock You" by Queen.

However because I like to be different, engaged, and a rebel, I had my kids and the kids from the other suite come together under the theme of Paraguay. They created a banner celebrating the country's rich history and traditions, opening with a skit of one of my campers wearing a German general's hat and wondering where he could go since his country had just lost WWII. Another camper came out and told the beleaguered German that Paraguay was waiting to offer him a home and he was overjoyed. Then the banner was unfurled and a cheer was led by another one of my boys, John, who wrote the thing himself (though no one believed it):

Alright Paraguayans, raise a din,
'Cause this land-locked beauty is here to win!

We'll stomp you, kick you, shoot you in the knees,
Your puny lands with sea access, we'll seize.

From the canopies of Asuncion,
When we bomb you with artichokes,
You will be gone!

Look out Uruguayans, you're going down,
Upon your patheticness we do frown!

Your demise we'll weave upon a loom,
Upon you we'll spread the tablecloth of doom

Go Paraguay!