Since I do a Tell-All feature every Tuesday for my other blog, I figured that the best way to get rid of all the teaching-related stuff on my chest would be to follow in like manner over here on this blog. So here goes:
First, with some funny:
*For the last literature unit, we read a book (Freak the Mighty) that dealt with a lot of bullying. As one of their unit assignments, I had them create a "bullying log" for the book, in which they had to summarize the bullying incident, summarize how the main characters handled it, and then state whether or not they would have handled it in the same way and why. One bullying incident in the book is when the two main characters are stuck in a scary part of town in the apartment of these two rough strangers. Both of the main characters are trying in vain to get out of there as soon as possible, but the people won't let them go. When responding to whether or not she would respond in the same way or not, one girl wrote, "Yes, because I alway lie to someone that I have to go home." This girl is one of my English language learners, and I just love her. Her comment made me laugh out loud--a girl after my own heart, indeed.
*Today, several of my students were wondering why I had a bandage on my hand. When I told them it was because I lost a fight with a broken dish, I had the hardest time not laughing out loud at the looks on their faces as they tried to figure that one out.
*During my 3rd hour today, I kept having to remind myself of this cute quote that I pinned yesterday to my Pinterest: "Always be kinder than you feel." What I really wanted to do was scream and yell and pull my hair out and kick the kids out onto the soccer field, but instead I just breathed nice and deep as I cleared off the board and waited anxiously for the dismissal bell to ring already. Thankfully, my loudest hour (3rd) is followed by my quietest and most on-task hour (4th), so it was a much-needed break after that.
*I have less than 3 weeks of student teaching left, and still no job prospects. According to the grapevine, two teachers at the high school might not be hired back next year, so maybe I'll have a possible job opening there, but I'm trying not to get my hopes up too much.
*I started my last unit with these kids yesterday, and I'm pretty excited about it--we're learning about expository writing, but I'm going to make it more exciting and relevant by having the kids create mini-magazines with their peers about the things they're interested in. You know you've struck onto a good idea when not a single student groans after hearing what the new assignment is going to be. (Or maybe they're all too doped-up on Peeps to get my drift, but we'll go with the former).
*When I asked the kids to name their top 3 interests so I can start putting them into their mini-magazine groups, I received the following responses:
-Justin Bieber
-Talking about Justin Bieber
-Waiting til summer
-brushing teeth
-?
-doing my hair
-Dance moms (no idea what she's talking about)
-shuffling (not quite sure what he's referring to?)
-tanning
And then, the #1 most frequently-written response:
-Facebook.
To each his own, I guess.
*Lately some of the harsher realities of teaching have come on, strong and sharp--like hearing about all the problems some of these kids are facing outside of school and knowing that there's little I can do about it. One particular student is especially on my mind: he's one of my brightest and most well-liked, but he's missing weeks of school due to the depression brought on by a very rough home life. I wish I could take him home to live with us (since neither one of his own parents wanted to take him after their recent divorce), but there seems to be so little that I can do. It is because of cases like this that living by the mantra above is so important--I need to be as kind as I can because you really never know what some people are up against.
*So that I won't end on such a sad note, I'll share a funny story that our vice principal shared at the last training meeting. Apparently one of the students had been caught sticking his hand up the vending machine and wrangling out a quarter, which he then used to purchase something else out of the machine. The vice principal told him that he needed to determine himself how he was going to make restitution for his wrongful actions. The student decided to outline his plan in a short letter to the vice-principal, which roughly went as follows:
Dear Mr. [Vice-Principal],
I am very sorry for sticking my hand up the vending machine and shaking it until I got a quarter out. I know that this was a wrong thing to do. The way I'm going to make it better is: First, finish writing this note. Second, bring this note to you and apologize to your face. Third, give you another quarter to make up for the one I took. And last [and this is the winner]: I'm going to be as good as I can, for as long as I can.
Words to live by, indeed.
