I AM a teacher...hear me roar.

"You look like a teacher."

It may have been my professional work attire or the fact that he remembered me from children's church, but I chose to believe it was because there was something about my aura that screamed "TEACHER". That made my heart warm a bit and settled the butterflies in my stomach.

It was the first night of teaching AWANAS. Middle school AWANAS. I think the butterflies were there for good reason. Middle schoolers can eat a person alive if she's not careful.

AWANAS stands for something that I can't remember, but basically it's a Bible study program for elementary and middle school students that runs on Wednesday nights at my church. They eat, play a game, and do a Bible study together.

This first night I had a lesson planned but I didn't intend to actually need it. I wanted to lay some ground rules and get to know my students. I had them write out three things about themselves on index cards. Rule #1 was created. No flying objects. I then read the cards aloud and asked them to guess who each card was describing. No difficulty in this activity. I should have thrown in my own card to mix it up. I was pleased when the first thing one student listed is that he is a Christian. Pretty cool.

After that, we laid some ground rules. I let them suggest the rules. They are old enough to know how they want to be treated in a classroom. They got all of the major ones that I would have listed, even if they were written a bit differently than I would have said. One rule says "don't yell at the top of your lungs." I quickly added to not yell at the bottom of your lungs either. They laughed at my pitiful attempt at a joke. Success!

I almost forgot to pray at the end, but other than that, the meeting went well. They didn't even complain too much when I gave them homework for next week. I'm excited about this opportunity to teach. I think it flows in my blood because I just feel so much more at ease when I'm in the front of a classroom watching students think.