Two of my kidlets brought me a hollow milk chocolate apple with gummy worms inside. It’s not exactly stellar chocolate, but it makes me happy anyway. 🙂
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Tag Archives: school
Owie
My head hurts so much that having my eyes open is painful. Noise sucks. My stomach hurts and I think I might puke. I woke up in the middle of the night because my head and neck hurt so much. That’s a very bad sign.
And I have comp & lit for 2 hours. This is my last lab day of the year with them. Please god, let the time move swiftly…
Apathy.
I’ve never been good at transitions. I get impatient and want to be in the next stage already. The last few weeks of school are being brutal. I’m tired of having to go to bed at 8 so I can get a reasonable amount of sleep. I’m tired of not having much of a social life. I’m tired of getting up every day fussy about having to go deal with even fussier teenagers. It isn’t that I now hate my job, I’m just ready for vacation. I think this would be slightly better if I didn’t spend so much time on weekends working. But that isn’t to be. *beat head against wall*
School is over in 15 more days (including weekends). I have decided to bail on working graduation because I would be hostile the entire time.
Good golly Miss Molly.
The stack of grading is 5″ tall.
I am really looking forward to this being over. When this stack is done I have one more personal narrative essay to grade (due next Friday) and some simple reading quizzes.
Reminder! Grading at my house! Saturday!!! May 26th–I am going to be starting early in the morning because I have to get it done no matter what. Please show up as early as is convenient for you. 🙂
Reasons to love my job.
Today we got to discuss whether or not Lil Kim has in fact had her stomach pumped after drinking too much sperm. That was funny. (If you drink a whole pint of sperm one is unlikely to have more of a problem than heartburn.)
Parents suck.
Ms. A-,
I wanted to ask you since our last conversation if b- has improved. I have noticed he still has a F in the class, and i was wondering what was going on with him. Since he has turned in his writers workshop essay will that help him at all? Since the begining of school B- has had an IEP. I need written proof of how you have complied with his IEP accomidations.
===========================================
Misspellings are not mine. Her inability to capitalize her son’s name properly is also reflected. Your kid has an F because he won’t do anything. This is not my fault or problem. His IEP mainly states that he gets extra time on assignments. I think that accepting anything from the beginning of the semester is enough fucking time to give him.
Stupid cunt. No wonder your kid is stupid and lazy. You enable him.
Continued tension
My 2nd period is angry that I am not accomodating their every whim. They are also angry that I wrote a referral for the kid who called me an asshole. They are going to be furious when they find out that he is getting suspended for five days. This morning I was told that I am a fucking hypocrite because I cuss and I don’t let them. There is a big difference between allowing cussing and allowing them to cuss me out. I asked my aide what she thought of the situation because I have a lot of faith in her opinion. She said that I was giving a lot of criticism but I wasn’t being mean or unfair. She also thinks that calling me a hypocrite is inappropriate and that I don’t deserve it because I give them a lot of slack.
The kid who called me a fucking hypocrite is my big black gang banger and he walked in fifteen minutes late and told me “You better not mark me tardy” because if he gets one more tardy then he gets suspended for five days. I told him that he shouldn’t have been tardy then. He of course responded with, “But it’s not my fault.” Of course not. Nothing ever is.
I anticipate the next five-six days being very uncomfortable followed by near brawls in class. There are about four loud, rude, obnoxious boys who are going to be gunning for me. I’m thinking they may just be kicked out of class for basically the rest of the year. Two of them are already failing and the other two are barely hanging on to C’s. With the suspension the guy who called me an asshole is probably going to drop to a low D because he will be missing assignments and I don’t have to let him make them up. We’ll see how awful he is when he gets back.
I have several juniors who are complaining that it isn’t fair that they have to do a conference for the writing assignment due Monday. Uhm, you’ve had three weeks of notice. You didn’t get it done. This sounds a lot like your problem and not mine. I’m ready to stop pushing on the makeup work. I am setting next Friday as the deadline for any and all makeup work and I’m not accepting anymore this year. If you keep fucking up I don’t care. Take your bad grade. That way I don’t have to accept everything from all the kids who are bugging me.
You’ve made my shit list.
Today a student called me an asshole because I told him that he needed to revise his paper. This is a kid I have bent over backwards for all year. I have let him turn assignment after assignment late. I am done. He gets 0 slack.
Son of a bitch. You DON’T curse me in class when I have been nothing but nice to you.
Luckily, when I explain to 3rd period how angry I am they behave like gorgeous little angels and tell me they love me and appreciate me.
Next roller coaster.
This morning I had some less than happy stuff and I felt like shit. Then I heard a song on the radio and felt like maybe I was being stupid–I should just appreciate what I have and get over being so needy.
But then I went to work. I’m having a lot of trouble with the basic nature of teenagers. I would like to punch many of them. The attitude, the laziness, the sarcasm, the satisfaction with being ignorant…
I’m feeling very angry about the kids who are blaming me for their failing grade. Excuse me motherfucker you want to repeat that?! I very very rarely feel like this. I love my job. But today stupid teenagers are making me very angry. “What do you mean we have an essay due on Monday! I was absent! It’s not fair!” “Well, seeing as the assignment was posted on the board for three weeks and we started the assignment at the beginning of the semester I don’t think you get to claim any hardship.”
Fucking bitch. I am not fond of that whiny little shit. My swearing is a bit excessive today. I need to just stop talking.
Not the best day ever.
I woke up at 4:30 this morning. I think I woke up so god-awful-early because I was anxious about Noah leaving. My beloved is on his way to Texas. There he will have a less than fun conversation with his parents about the level of involvement (none) they will be allowed to have with our kids. Given that everytime they call his father asks three or four times, “So! Any big news?” I think they anticipate kidlets about as soon as we do. And uhhh yeah. Unfortunately they won’t be involved and we think it is best that they know that before they find out I am pregnant. Because telling them over the phone, “Yeah–we’re pregnant! Oh, and by the way, my mother is abusive and she isn’t allowed to meet my children” would really suck. I don’t envy him this trip. My mother has already been told that she is not likely to be allowed any contact and if there is any at all it will always be supervised heavily.
This stuff is depressing to think about.
I had to sit in the sun for an hour at a teachers appreciation rally. I now have a nasty headache. Ick.
I am home teaching today from 4:30-7. It’s not exactly my idea of a good time though I guess it could be worse. The kid is ok and I’m enjoying what we are doing for history and English. I even feel smart cause I understand the geometry! 🙂
So it’s not the best day ever. It’s also nowhere near the worst day ever so I’m not *really* complaining. 🙂 As much as I already miss Noah, he is coming back on Monday. He loves me and is doing something that is about us building a life together. I’m a big girl. I can handle it.
AND my Julia is going to be here this weekend. I get to spend time with her. It’s always so wonderful to see her. Maybe this time I can manage to not be a freakin spazz. Sometimes it is hard loving someone when things aren’t equal.
Assignment
We are reading One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in the junior class. I’m trying to get them to understand the general cruelty of the nurses and the orderlies so I went searching on the internet for something that would be applicable. I discovered the Milgram Experiment (google it if you like, I’m not cool enough to imbed URLs from the web client) and thought A Ha! So I found many websites with interesting information and I tried to figure out how to present the data to the kids.
What I had them do was fill out a questionnaire on how much cruelty they believe they would be willing to mete out, then how much they believe other people would mete out. Does it matter if an authority tells you to? Why would someone do as they were told? And a few other questions I can’t remember.
Then I handed them the reports about the Milgram Experiment, but see…. I was sneaky. Before I printed the information I formatted it to have big gaps between paragraphs. Then when I printed it I cut them out into strips. Then I mixed the strips up. The kids have to put the paragraphs together in order so that they can read the reports. So not only are they getting nifty information but they have to do problem solving and work in a group for collaborative learning. Then once they have it all together they have to respond to the information and we are discussing it. Sweet.
The kids are doing fabulously well. Of course they are whining about working–but they are working. 🙂
Just so it’s been said.
May 26th we’ll be grading the writers workshop papers. Grading them is easy and actually kind of fun because we mock the children. Last batch we came up with: “But why Ryoko, why?” I mean… what could be better than that? To sweeten the deal: I will supply food and booze. 🙂 It’s actually kind of fun doing it with people and it goes relatively quickly. And just think, you will be saving me a significant amount of time. 😉 You don’t have to be an English major to grade these you just need to follow a rubric and be able to spot gross grammar mistakes.
Edited to reflect the Saturday date. Oops.
Student poem
Procrastination
Well it is 1:00 Monday morning and here I am writing my
poems why must I always procrastinate
it only leads to bad things I can’t stand it
and yet time and time again I always am here
doing my stuff last minute
I guess you can compare procrastination
to masturbation
it is awesome until you realize you
screwed yourself.
I busted out laughing in class. It’s awesome.
Much yay
Today I get to go in three hours late without having to bend the rules because I am an honest and straightforward person. So screw you to all of my dishonest colleagues. (Rant maybe forthcoming on that one.)
This morning I got all of the prep work done for the next few days that has been making me nervous. Sweet.
Today, I checked the bank account and saw what would have been once upon a time a staggering amount of money. At this point it isn’t staggering, but it is certainly plenty so that my darling husband could be out of work for months before I would worry even one iota about him finding a job. My salary is enough to keep us afloat and we have a beautiful cushion for just about any “just in case.” Oh, and the only debt we have left is the mortgage and my student loans due to me masterfully managing our money and paying off a rather large amount of debt in the past six months. Go me.
Yesterday I got to see my lovely Sarah, though only briefly, and she presented me with the baby clothes she has acquired so far. The fact that I am not the only one joyfully anticipating me getting pregnant lets me feel a sense of family and attachment I wouldn’t have believed I would get. Thank you Sarah; thank you for being my family. Eight more weeks until I stop taking birth control. The days are flying by…
Including today I have 31 more days of educational opportunity remaining with my kidlets. But that includes finals and weird schedules and I don’t see any of the individual classes that many times. Really I only have 22 more days with each individual class. Eeeek! Must get through this book! But I have a good solid unit plan in front of me and I am confident that I will get through it and my babies will do well.
Life is really good.
Cue panic attack
I have been working on cleaning my desk. This is an eternal process. But today I start home teaching a kid who is at home for medical reasons. And uhhhh I have to have some paperwork for this.
Paperwork? You mean like the kind that sits on my desk randomly in piles? Like the kind that I was industrious and I cleaned up? ….
Oh.
My.
God.
It took about 15 minutes of freaking out and making a big mess but I finally found it stuck in the middle of some random binder where I take attendence. What in the motherfuck is it doing in there?!
Thank you God for not hating me today. This was almost bad. Mostly because I don’t have any other access to the kid’s address…
Torture? Or making smart usage of my resources?
I am making my really neato on-top-of-everything 2nd period aide read The Hobbit with us so that she can grade the reading quizzes. 🙂 I’m making the test and we are talking about acceptable answers to the questions, but it really streamlines everything if she actually knows the book.
Did I mention that she now updates my gradebook and the school websites for parents to see? I worship this girl. I do check her work, but it takes me about 1/20th of the time to briefly check over that it would take to do the work myself.
Stupid kid.
Ok, I had a kid plagiarise hard core. The whole first page of his paper is blatantly not his work. I spent a while freaking out because I *hate* dealing with this kind of thing.
I asked the kid to stay in during break and said, “So… what is your favorite work by D.H. Lawrence? Kate Millett?” because he had referenced them in the first page. He said he didn’t know who they were. I asked him where he did his research then and he said, “Oh! Wikipedia! I wanted to make sure I wrote a good background on the literary criticism before I got into this book.” *face palm* I explained to him that large scale quoting of other work is plagiarism and illegal and that he has to fail this assignment. He nodded and just said ok.
I can’t give him a zero. He’s an idiot, but it doesn’t look like he meant to be doing something bad. I’ll give him a 50% and call his mother to explain.
Called mom. She understands and is being very supportive. Yay!
Mmmmm tasty grammar
No wonder my students think I am weird. This is the grammar test. (On the actual paper I give credit to the author but my footnotes and stuff don’t transfer to lj well.)
Very emotional day
And not even for me. I have had three kids come to me to pour their hearts out and ask for help/advice/wisdom. I’m being as gentle as I am capable and taking them to people with more authority when it is a good thing. It means it has been a day for lots of personal disclosure, “You don’t know what foster care is like!” “Well honey… actually, I do.” “You don’t know what it is like to be the only white kid in a neighborhood and have lots of people want to beat you up.” “Well honey…. actually, I do.” Then there is the kid where his parents have told him he is getting thrown out on his 18th birthday so he is trying to determine his options for getting out of high school early so he can get a job. I understand that situation too. *sigh*
It’s one of those days when I feel like despite how difficult my job is–I am where I am supposed to be. Not many people have had my experiences and I’m glad that I can help the kids.
Lost in my head
Disneyland was good. Spending time with my baby is fantabulous. Tired. Busy. The next few weeks are going to be killer. I’m going to beg grading assistance on 4/29. It’s going to be frightning by then. I can do it, but I’m going to barely sleep for the next two weeks. Between grading and planning… I feel like I’m drowning. But! On the bright side, this is the last hard core push for the whole year. 🙂