Don't ever underestimate a 4th grade sense of humor.

Today was my first day with a new group of 4th graders coming over to swim as a part of a PE unit. 4th grade is fun because they remember me from the third grade unit and I can have a little bit of fun joking and messing around with them. Some of them can tell when I am joking before I let them in on it, but the ones who think I'm serious give me some great reactions when they finally realize what's going on. For instance, when I go over the facility rules, I like to say things like "Did you see the no smoking signs in the locker room? We caught a third grader last week smoking cigarettes under water and we had to call the police."

Sometimes I even tell them I don't actually know how to swim but I have read lots of books about it. It takes them a little while to put it together and see my sense of humor for what it is, but they always get it by the end of the week.

Today I was lining the class up and making them stand like soldiers while I wrote their names on my chart. One boy, a really skinny little blonde guy, was playing around like his arm had a mind of it's own. While the rest of the class was frozen really well, he would move his right arm up, and then act like he was trying to hold it down with his left.

I thought I was being clever when I put on my best Texas tough guy accent and said "Son, I'm about to bite that wiggly arm off! You better keep it still!"

I am not kidding... he looked right at me, looked himself up and down, and then said, "Oh well. At least I'm fat free."

HA! I am gonna make it a point to email and ask his teacher if the hyper little bugger is that quick witted all the time. His parents must be proud.