Virtual Hide-and-Seek

"Adriana, get on your Zoom!" my mom shouted from the kitchen.

"Okay!" I shouted back. I sat down at my desk after plugging in my headphones. I entered in the meeting code after clicking on the link in my Google Classroom.

"Hi, Adriana, how are you?" my teacher asked.

"Very good. Also really bored." I said, giggling. My teacher smiled. I muted myself and waited for a few minutes while more and more students got on our Zoom.

"Hi, my amazing third graders!" Mrs. Jackson said. "Who's excited for school to go Face to Face again?" she asked us.

"Meeeee!" we all screeched.

"Shhh. Quiet. Okay, to celebrate, let's do a school scavenger hunt..." my teacher said.

"Yay!" my friend Carolyn said, unmuting.

"First, find your backpack!" Mrs. Jackson told us. I bolted up the stairs into my room. I opened my closet and snatched my backpack out, running as fast as I could to get back first. My mom gave me a questioning look as I breathed heavily.

"Scavenger *pant, pant* hunt." I said quickly.

"Oooh, what color is yours, Savannah?" Mrs. Jackson asked a girl with frizzy ginger hair.

"Teal!" she exclaimed happily. Mrs. Jackson nodded.

"What about you, Cameryn?"

"White with rainbow polka dots." she replied earnestly. I smiled through the camera, and as if Cammy knew I was smiling at her, she grinned back. When Mrs. J told us to find a 10 pack of markers, I didn't even have to get up. My cup of markers was right on my desk. 15 minutes later, the Zoom was over, and my little brother, Asher, looked really tired as he sat down for the second time for a Zoom call with his teacher. Kindergarten is hard. I mouthed to him. He smiled a tiny bit as he rubbed his eyes.

"Adri, you have to finish your math!" Mom said, as I laid on the floor with my math book open.

"But mooom, multiplication is SO hard!" I sighed. She rolled her eyes and sat down next to me.

"4×7. Okay, what's 7+7?" she asked. I wrote down 14 in the box to put the answer. "No, no. Yes, 14 is 7+7, but what's 14+14?" she questioned.

"Oh, it's... it's... 28!!!" I exclaimed. Mom nodded, and I wrote it down. Once I had finished all my work at 12:18, I asked if we could have lunch.

"Yup. PB&J?" I nodded, and got the bread, peanut butter, and jelly out. I ate my lunch with Asher, who had nearly fallen asleep on his Zoom, and then put my dishes away.

"Can I play on my tablet?" I asked my mom as I plugged my computer into the charger.

"Yes." she told me. I ran upstairs and grabbed my tablet from my nightstand drawer. I clicked on Messenger Kids to call Cameryn.

"Hi, Cammy!" I said excitedly.

"Hi, Adri. What's up?" she asked.

"Nothing. What about you?" I asked picking nail polish off of my fingernails. She shrugged. "Wanna play virtual hide-and-seek?" I asked.

"Yes, yes, yes!!! You count first." she demanded.

"One, two, three, four, five..." the way we played virtual hide-and-seek was, one of us counted, and the other brought her tablet with her to a hiding place. Then, the counter would finish and guess where the hider is. "Oooh, the bathtub?" I guessed. Cameryn shook her head. "Your parent's shower?" I asked.

"Yesssss! How can you always find me???" she asked me with a giggle.

"I dunno." I said honestly. "Okie, my turn!" I said. I carried the tablet with me as I plopped down into the pantry.

"Hmmm. Your closet?" she asked me.

"Nope."

"Your mom and dad's closet?"

"Nope."

"AHA! The pantry!!!!" she squealed.

"Yep!!!" I said happily.

"Oh, Momma is calling me." Cammy told me.

"Bye!!!" I said, and ended the call. That. Was. FUN.

"ADRIANA!!! Ms. Morka said she wants to talk to you!!!" Asher screamed from downstairs. I ran downstairs to see what Asher and his teacher wanted.

"Hi, Adriana!" Ms. Morka, Aher's teacher, waved to me from his computer screen.

"Um, hi." I said.

"I was wondering if you could do a daily Zoom with five of my students. They're having trouble learning to read, sooo, it would be so helpful. Can you read to them? Please?" she begged. "I know how good you are with the little kids." she said.

"Okay? Okay. I will. When do I start?" I asked.

"Today." Ms. Morka looked quite pleased with me.

"Alright." I said. "So they read to me and I listen?" I asked.

"Yep. Can you start now?" she asked me.

"Yes!" Ten minutes later, a little boy named Grant was reading Who Stole The Cookie From The Cookie Jar. "Good reading, Grant." I said.

"Thank you!" he said with a lisp. His glimmering blue eyes certainly showed he was quite proud. Next I had to listen to Aubree read.

"We want to go on a fun trip! I want to go to the cricus. Teddy wanna go to the say!" Aubree exclaimed. I stopped her.

"Hey, Aubree, it's 'I want to go to the circus, and teddy wants to go to the sea." I told her.

"Ok!" she said, and read it correctly this time.

"Good job, Aubree! I'm very proud of you! If you find a hard word, this applies to all of you," I said, glancing at Jacob, who was picking his nose, "if you find a hard word, sound it out. Say it with me." I said.

"Sound it out." we said together. Suddenly, a parent appeared in the camera of Sadie.

"What are you doing on their Zoom?" the mom demanded.

"Ms. Marka told me to help them with their reading, so I am." I said.

"Why haven't I heard my Sadie talk yet?" she demanded yet again.

"I was listening to the other kids," I told her. "I wasn't to her yet."

"Hmm." she frowned, then walked away.

"Ok, lemme hear you, Sadie!" I said.

"One fish, two fish, red fish, bule fish." she said. I paused her.

"Blue fish." I said.

"Okay."

"Okay." I replied.