17 posts tagged “teaching”

I was just reading the March 2008 Ladies Home Journal (I’m behind and lame, what can I say) and there was an article in the My Life as a Mom section by Marion Winik called “Can You Hear Me Now?” about equipping teenage children with cell phones.  It really ticked me off, ot because she advocates cell phones for teens to make sure they are still alive, even if they sound like “zombies” on the phone, but because she simply accepted it as the new way when her son tells her there must be a “black hole” for service at the track or can’t tell you what address he’s at when he’s at a friend’s.  

How is this acceptable?  Tell your kid to tell you where he is, or you’ll take the phone away, or he’ll be grounded, or some other vile threat that will make him do what you want him to.  I understand that age 16 is the time when kids start to spread their wings, yada yada.  But this woman says that having cell phone GPS is like reading their diaries or (*gasp*) their blogs.  I about hit the roof.  When did teenagers get the right to privacy?  Kids who are assured complete privacy know that they can say one thing and do another.  I see it (and hear it) on a daily basis when school’s in session.  My students don’t seem to get that even if they are huddled in a circle that if they don’t speak quietly I can still hear them, so I get all the dirty little secrets that Mom and Dad don’t know about.  

From my kids, I expect it.  It’s obvious not many of them have anyone paying attention to them at all, let alone worrying about invading their privacy, so I don’t expect much there (talk about banging your head against a brick wall), but from a helicopter mom in LHJ who will probably be filling out her son’s job applications when he’s 30 and sitting next to him in the interview?  Plain stupidity.  Too many of these middle to upper-middle class kids find all kinds of trouble that Mom and Dad don’t have any ideas about until they have to bail their kids out of jail, and all because the parent accepted the explanation that “the track doesn’t have cell phone service.”  

Oh, yeah.  Read your kid’s damn blogs - they’re public to everyone else, why should they be private from you?  And know your kid well enough to know WHEN you NEED to read their diary.  Teachers have been taking the slack - “Why didn’t you notice that this kid said something dark in one assignment back in January in the midst of 160 other assignments?”  “Why didn’t you notice that this kid was cutting himself?”  “Why didn’t you tell someone that this kid did a project on a serial killer?”  Well, I ask - where was Mom and Dad and why don’t they know where their kid is?  

*stepping off the soapbox now*

I am counting down the days.  Thursday was one of those days that 20 years from now I am going to recount it and laugh as a foible from my first year of teaching, but I really lost it. 

It's funny how the worst class at the start is your favourite class by the end, and that you hate you favourite class and can't wit to see them walk out the door, knowing - dreading - that you will see them again next year.  So my favourite class turned "I-hate-you-all" class is 3rd period.  A bunch of delinquent ninth graders, of which no less than 5 have been arrested this year. 

We were beginning to watch a movie.  They've just finished reading excerpts from "The Odyssey" and I was going to show the movie - assignment-free - for 4 days so they could have a picture and review before the test.  The movie hadn't been running 10 minutes when the power goes out in the portable.  I send a good kind over to a few of the other portables to see if they have power, and when they do, send him out to get maintenance.  When the maintenance guys get there, they tell me someone pulled the switch on the circuit breaker.  I look at the 2 sitting right next to it that it could have been. 

They both deny, and since I had already started them on questions in the book because the power was out, I told them all to continue working.  Two boys on the other side of the room begin laughing.  Not laughing because something is funny, but laughing because it was disruptive and loud.  When I threatened them with removal, they began farting; a time-honoured way to guarantee a disruption and attention.  Next, the two boys I stared down next to the breaker switch start loudly complaining that they have to do work instead of watching a movie.  I tell them and the rest of the class that because they cannot handle the simple task of watching a movie, they will have to take the test without it. 

Then my little thug starts talking to the kid next to him about how he's taking 4/20 off, getting high that afternoon, "Sure, I know where you can get whip-its," and then when I stand over him telling him that kind of conversation isn't welcome in my class, he says, "Miss you know what they be?"  (The English teacher in me shuddered.)  But when I restated, he told me that "it was his constitutional right to say whatever I want," to which I replied, "It isn't your constitutional right to disrupt my classroom with talk about illegal activities."

His retort: "Miss, some kids throw chairs at teachers......I'm just talking."

I stopped and looked at him, and I must say that I've felt a bit intimidated by students who were mad and larger than me, but this kid was threatening.  So I asked him point-blank, "Are you threatening me?"

"I'm just sayin', Miss."

Can you see this in your head?  It's all grainy and black and white?  Okay, not really.  In fact, I doubt this will be the only time I come up against threats I can't prove, but there it is.  I wrote him up, and hopefully won't have to see him for a few days. 

Friday came, and my AP told me that I had a few presents in my mailbox, so I go look.  BOTH farters, BOTH kids who I suspected could have flipped the breaker switch, AND the kid who left w/o permission to go to the restroom: 3 days OSS.  Thank You, GOD!  And Mr. AP.  Thank you, too.  Now that I know I've gotten rid of them, I may show the movie anyhow.

I've had a lovely Spring Break, and didn't get to a single thing that I meant to for the kids tomorrow.  Eeek!  I'll be spending a few hours preparing and grading papers tonight.  And of course, I have my own schoolwork to manage, as well.  I can't wait to be finally finished with my own degree...just one more year to go, although this summer, I have some work to do.

The "internship paperwork is due in about 6 weeks, and I need to take my FTCE professional exam, as well as my English certification exam before I take care of that.  It has been another lousy semester, and I think I am turning into a very poor student when I used to be a great one!  I fully expect to get a C in my "bird course" because the professor doesn't know how to test, and I laugh because faculty at the university don't take the classes that high school teachers must, and write the most horrible exams!  Now that I know how they are supposed to be written, it is glaringly obvious when they are done incorrectly. 

So tomorrow, I'll be doing introductory activities for Pirates! with my reading classes, reviewing for the Of Mice and Men exam with my 11th graders, and reviewing what we've already read and continuing reading of The Odessey with my 9th graders.  I can't wait to finish up with Odysseus and move on to poor Juliet and Romeo...I'm afraid I won't have enough time to finish!  I'll make it work, though.  The problem is that I don't have students who are advanced enough to give them a book and give them reading homework.  Number one, they have been trained throughout their years in school that they do not have to do homework, so I rarely get anything back, and they don't even pay attention and remember when the answers are pretty much handed to them on a plate, so...I don't really know how to handle them.

I finally realised that part of my issue is I cannot correct my missteps in teaching until the following year.  I'm afraid I won't remember, so I am going to try to do a better job of reviewing my own progress for use the next years.

I am 8 months into my first year of teaching with 2 more to go.  Spring Break is next week.  On both counts, all I can say is "hurry up!"

I am so tired I can't sleep.  I am so frustrated with my students' lack of motivation, manners, and responsibility that I only tell them to "fail quietly" if they complain about having to do something (meaning when they see the "F" on their report card, I don't want them to ask me how they got it).  I have given in on my first bit of pressure to change a grade rather than stand by my original assessment only because I don't have the energy.

To top it all off, I am surrounded by such negative energy from all of the people I work with (and with good reason, but...) that I am having a difficult time seeing the positives and optimism, if there are indeed any to be found.

Maybe I'll feel better after Spring Break.

So, here's the run-down I've been dealing with:

1. Teacher/student sex scandal at school involving the teacher buying alcohol for multiple students
2. Fight during lunch involving one of my students
3. One student being arrested (I know, my reaction was, "Only one?" too!)
4. A student being stabbed by a knife in the culinary arts classroom
5. A 9th grade class unable to manage safety scissors with any sort of responsibility
6. a 9th grade student throwing a temper tantrum on the floor like a 2-year-old, on his stomach, kicking and banging the floor with his fists
7. Students who flip out because they have an unexcused absence that affects their exam exemptions that they "NEED to change right now!"
8. Students who don't do anything all semester and the wonder why they got an F
9. Students who have been suspended for weeks at a time, and wonder why they have an F
10. Students who flip out because they got a B and they think they deserve an A

(did I mention I HATE report card day?)

Welcome to my world.  Watch the news; it's Friday so my school will be there.

This fight was in November, and we had another this past Feb... Just so you can get some idea about what it looks like in there, even if the video is crappy :-)

Okay, so I owe my headline to the Tampa Tribune, but I think they'll be okay with me stealing it for the time being.  Yesterday had to be one of the most interesting days I've had so far in my 7.5 months of teaching (has it been that long already?).  This year was the first time my district has had classes on Good Friday.  There was hoopla last year because the Muslim community wanted the holiday of Eid off, and the district finally threw up their hands and moved to a completely secularized calendar.  But students were told all they had to do was get a note from Mom and Dad and they would have an excused absence.  The district had 1/3 of the school bus drivers take a personal day, as well as 40% of the cafeteria workers and custodians, and many teachers.  We were missing 20 out of 135 or so.  But hey, let me tell you how it turned out....

I had 10 kids all day.  Four in 1st period, 1 each in 2nd and 3rd periods, 2 in 4th, 2 in 5th, and a big fat 0 in 6th.  Since I have 7th off, I left at 1 pm.  We have around 2100 kids, and we had 250.  I don't know how many signed out by the end of the day, but there weren't 250 kids there when I left. 

We watched the news, played Guitar Hero and Dance Dance Revolution, played Cranium, and figured out riddles and brain teasers (current events, critical thinking, debate, music, PE, and analysis...see?  It wasn't a wasted day!).  I just couldn't believe we wasted taxpayer dollars to keep schools open for this. 

A meeting has been set up by the Tampa Tribune for the teachers of the county to say what they are having issues with with the School Board and the administration.  It is at 3:30pm tomorrow (Thursday 6 March) at their offices in downtown Tampa.  Which kind of sucks since many lower level teachers won't be able to make it because the school day ends after 4 for many of them, and it takes about 1 hour to make it from New Tampa to downtown during rush hour.  I'm heading out early, as my conference period is the last period of the day, to be able to make it. 

I thought it would be a good idea to lay out (for myself) the things I wish to bring up or see brought up:

6-period day:

This has me completely worn out.  As an English teacher with essays and papers to grade, I find it difficult to get everything done in a timely manner.  Students constantly ask for their grades and I have to say, sorry…next week.  I am a grad student, and my nights are reserved for homework and classwork, while my weekends are for grading.  Sounds like the life, eh?  

My lunch period is 15 minutes  for cafeteria duty, 20 min to eat and have a sit down, and 15 minutes to get ready for my afternoon classes because I don’t have my own classroom and have to actually empty out my bags and switch out material.  My conference period is occasionally wholly taken up by parent conferences, signing papers, writing referrals, and/or filling out progress reports.  There’s no real planning or grading time integrated into the day.  And I try to take just a few minutes for myself so that I can hear myself think after being with kids all day.  

I never got to experience the heaven of a 5-period day.  But it is badly needed, even if it is just so I have more patience for my last class of the day.

Administration that backs the teachers up:

I had a student come into my 4th period class late with a pass, saying that she had been sent to the office on a dress code violation because she had a sliver of stomach showing.  Personally, I wouldn’t have worried about it, but, technically, it WAS a violation..  The AP just told her to go back to class, but her teacher told her to come back to her with the pass signed so that she knew the student had gone.  The student told her the AP hadn’t done anything, and the teacher replied, “That’s what’s wrong with this school.”  I’ve had similar issues myself where the administration doesn’t take care of what we send students down for.  

It takes away the little respect the students have for us.  I have students who have told me “Miss, you’re fine without your glasses,” and called me “baby” as if I was their girlfriend, but in that really condescending manner.  I’m pretty liberal in what I allow, I think just being younger, but that kind of thing even presses my buttons.  The APs don’t even take those kinds of things seriously (which I consider borderline sexual harassment and downright gross coming from students).  

Some respect from the school board:

I haven’t been to a meeting yet.  I’m still trying to keep my life from careening out of control during my first year of teaching, and I consider myself pretty damn resilient.  But I’ve heard stories.  Teachers that have been cut off because the board no longer wants to listen to what they want to say, cutting comment periods short,  flat out disrespecting teachers, as well as battling amongst themselves with raised voices like 2 year olds.  If they can’t even respect each other, how will they respect us – those who implement what they plan?  We have the teaching experience to note whether what they plan is reasonable in a classroom environment, and yet those suggestions go unremarked upon.  I’m not really sure what they are trying to accomplish: trying to make themselves look better (they aren’t succeeding, by the way) or to educate the students in a more beneficial manner (they really aren’t accomplishing this, either)?  

Besides….look at this (from the Board's Web site):

Jennifer Faliero (Chair): B.A. in public relations
Carol Kurdell (Vice-Chair): B.A. in Human Development
Doretha Edgecomb: (bless her heart!!) M.A. Reading Education, Grad Cert in Ed. Leadership w/44 years of teaching junior high English
April Griffin: no degree listed (??!!!)
Jack Lamb: B.S. in Elementary Ed & Ed.D in ?? from Syracuse U.
Candy Olsen: MBA
Susan Valdes: High School Diploma
Maryellen Elia (Superintendent): M.A. in Ed (from U. Buffalo??...didn’t they teach her anything?) and M.P.S. in reading, as well as Grad Cert in Ed. Leadership, but VERY sketchy on years taught.

So 3 people on a board of 8 with any education degrees, and 1, maybe 2 who never went to college.  Lovely.  How could they have any clue what needs to be done in a classroom?

Springboard Curriculum:

I don’t understand how the district can implement a curriculum with no data about whether or not it enhances learning.  It seems like this is the Board’s quick fix.  I became a teacher partly for the creativity it demands, and they are taking away the fun part of the job.  Mostly the only reason most people do it.  The whole reason teachers need degrees in their subject matter and pedagogy.  I feel like them putting this into motion means they can’t ask me for more training with the district because any person with 2 brain cells to knock together could do it.  Why bother asking for people with NB certs or masters degrees?  I’ve had a few substitutes who can hardly speak English, but even they can work a photocopier.  With all the extra demands on my time from the state and the district to take care of classes for teaching ESE and Reading (neither of which I knew I would be doing – and I really didn’t take them voluntarily) – even while I am working on my MAT in secondary English education – that those aught to stop since they aren’t really required to do the job.

Thank god I’m out of this hellhole in 2009!!!

I was having my reading class do exercises in their workbook on Monday, and because it's 1st period and they're either wound up or tired, I let them play it out for a few minutes.  This group of tenth graders are probably my favourite, and they like me well enough, even though they dislike the work so much that "Miss, can't we have a free day?" is a daily question.

So Monday, a girl on the far end of the class (I'll call her Keri) was looking through a stack of pictures, and I was looking over her shoulder saying, "That's how I remember looking at photos.  You guys usually flip through your digital camera...I didn't think you even knew about photo processing!"  They laughed of course...I'm only 26, but they think I'm about 60.  The  pictures belong to a little girl (size-little, not young...I'll call her Jo) on the other side of the room, and a photo of a dog came up and the girl looking at them pulled it out and handed it to me.  Cute dog, and there was another one on the pile, so I took the whole pile and started looking through them.

I see a photo of Jo and a girl I don't recognise drinking out of glasses...something that looks suspiciously like beer.  So I said, jokingly and unfortunately in front of the whole class, "Is this BEER you're drinking??" to which she promptly replied, "No, Miss!  It's apple juice!"  Keri tried to grab the stack away from me, but I walked away with it, still flipping through the pictures.

A dog drinking from a martini glass of the same liquid, and then another shot of Jo and ANOTHER girl drinking out of glasses (with foamy head quite apparent) standing next to a counter full of empty beer bottles.  EEK!  I said, "Since when does apple juice have head?"  And the kids laughed.  I gave the photos back to Keri and told her to get to work.  Jo, too.

And for the past few days, I've been wondering what to do about it.  I finally decided just to call Jo's dad instead of taking it to guidance after talking with another teacher.  Her dad, as it turns out, has been a recovering alcoholic for 3 years, so it's a bit of a touchy thing for him, but he took it calmly when I explained.  He said he was glad I called him instead of her mom, since she was more likely to flip out at Jo, and he was calmer.  I know he cares...he's called the school in the morning before becaue Jo had a boyfriend he was worried about and was afraid she was cutting classes.  So I got a phone call from the office just asking if she was there.  I think it's a good thing, and just from talking with him, and hearing Jo talk about him, I think he'll handle it well.  I told him I hadn't said I was calling, but to feel free to tell her that I was the one who called.

Anyway.  A different teacher, when I explained, was a little shocked I had done anything.  I mean, we hear the kids talk all the time about the drugs they do and their parties.  If we did this for everything we've heard, all the kids in the school would be in a guidance meeting 2x a week.  But SEEING it is different than just hearing about it, and I didn't want to let that slide.  She's only 15, and if she ended up in a ditch next week because she was driving home with drunk friends or whatever, I'd probably go crazy from guilt knowing what I know and never saying anything about it.  Plus, the whole class knew that I knew, and I don't want them to think they can bring be photos of their binge parties. 

God, what a mess.  But I'd rather she hate my guts for telling on her than have her dead or in the hospital for alcohol poisoning.

Have you ever known someone who just HAS to have the last word in everything?  Every statement made to them or about them needs a reply?  It makes me laugh. 

I come across this with my students constantly.  If I say, "Stop talking," they don't actually stop talking, they start talking more!  They say, "But Miss, I wasn't talking!  I was just asking him for a pencil!"  As if that isn't talking.  Or even better, "Put that cell phone away."  I hear, "Miss, I was just texting my Mom back."  Yeah, right.  There's no responsibility, only excuses and finger pointing.  If the kid would just close her mouth, and put her cell phone away, instead of protesting, "That wasn't me!" even when it clearly was, she wouldn't be in half as much trouble as she got herself into.  Will they ever learn?