Week 39: June 8-12

090612: Day 176
Tests last year were awesome: the kids shut up and took them. This year, tests mean I have to work four times as hard to keep the lid on. There are two ways of looking at this. One: I’m not meeting the kids where they are, which is only being able to focus for five, maybe ten, minutes. Two: This is a baptism by fire, as they have to learn to take period-long tests now that they are in high school. High school. I take the latter view: I’m helping them man up for the rest of their school lives.

Today they wrote four-paragraph essays in response to one of three questions:

A. Is there too much violence on TV and in the movies? Why or why not? Give 2 reasons that support your answer.
B. Do the police and metal detectors make our school better or worse? Why? Give 2 reasons that support your answer.
C. Should people save sex for marriage? Why or why not? Give 2 reasons that support your answer.

After today, the multiple-choice portion on Monday will seem like a reward.

090611: Day 175
FR is in the SAVE room until the end of the year! And JC is suspended! Bitch, yeah. This means the other students in fourth period will actually be able to focus on their finals instead of the zoo that is the classroom.

Further information on the Dean-B-is-spreading-rumors front: I guess he’s been “spreading rumors” about how Ms. L’s new principal (who worked at our school just last year) and Principal N have bad blood. Is it still a rumor if it’s based in fact? Not that I actually know the facts, being the rumor-mongering bitch I am, but I’m assured of its probability based on what I’ve seen this year.

090610: Day 174
I’m pretty certain that FR said he would kill me if I kicked him out of the room again today. I don’t really think he will kill me—or anyone, ever—but I wrote it down because I’m out to get him. I am only human; kid makes my life miserable. So, he came up to my desk and read what I wrote. Then, standing but a foot away from me, said to my face, “Are you fucking stupid? You fucking stupid?” So I kicked him out. Dean B came for him and I was once left amazed at how Dean B has become one of the only people in the building I trust implicitly.

The drama surrounding Ms. L’s excessing and un-excessing continued today. Ms. L said she told AP A she was nervous about meeting with Principal N because she knew the principal yelled at Ms. RM last year when she resigned to go teach in Texas. So this information made it all around the building and ended with AP D ripping Dean B a new one for “spreading rumors,” Dean B being invited to an audience with the Principal herself and perhaps his receiving a letter in his file for “spreading rumors.” Of course, Ms. L and I heard from Ms. RM’s mouth how the principal yelled at her, so we’re a little uncertain about how Dean B was spreading rumors. But truth is not guiding force at our school.

090609: Day 173
Ms. L’s excessing was rescinded today. Ironically, Ms. L was planning on meeting with the principal today to say she had taken another position. But forget that Mr. B was hired before her. AP A told her not to touch the politics of the thing, presumably because they are a nasty piece of business. Ms. EV and AP A then ominously told Ms. L not to sign anything. This advice has had the effect of making Ms. L freak the fuck out. Neither of us can quite figure out what could happen to her—she has a new position—but this is also the school that broke the contract to un-excess her and wrote a letter accusing Ms. Po of making a false accusation when she did no such thing (see Day 161). Who knows what they could do?

In unrelated news, I had the most awesome Do Now today: the kids had to listen to two minutes of Radiolab that discussed a moral dilemma and apply that discussion to the morality of “Monsters, Inc.” The dilemma revolves around the idea of doing what is best for the individual or what is best for the group—and what to do when the two conflict. For the record, the Radiolab is hilarious and involves some pretty silly sound effects of a train killing lots of people. The kids loved it! Only fourth period wouldn’t shut up long enough for me to play the clip. It was so out of control—again—that I had both JC and FR removed. I am so over the bullshit. If only I could actually tell freshmen to drop out. It would certainly be better for the group if JC and FR never returned to the classroom. Of course, it would be pretty disastrous for them as individuals. But it’s hard not to think their lives are already disasters.

090608: Day 172
I’m showing “Monsters, Inc” today, tomorrow and Wednesday. We all need a break. It’s surprising how much less complicated “Monsters, Inc” is as compared to “The Incredibles.” That said, QF was extraordinarily excited to see the show; apparently it’s one of his favorites.

Seeing as how it’s the end of the year, I figure I should start ending some of the stories I started. LS, whom you may remember from that time she ran away but didn’t really (see Day 122), is no longer on roster. A couple weekends ago she was arrested in Brooklyn and since that time she has been back in a psychiatric institution.

I am sad to lose her. She was creative and literate. Her favorite subject was English. She completed all her homeworks with a high level of effort and proficiency and absolutely destroyed tests. Her short story, involving two girls fighting over a shoe stuck to the carpet with gum, was inspired and violent.

Sometimes kids are fucked up beyond your reckoning before you even meet them.

Week 9: October 20-24

081024: Day 37
Last year, I met maybe 14 parents total during parent-teacher conferences. I read the Norton Anthology of Poetry to keep myself amused in the downtime between conferences. I ate almost all of the cookies I made.

This year, we had something like 35 parents show up over the course of two days. We sat at the four tables in the back of Ms. L’s room and talked to parent after parent after parent with almost no break in between. We put out cookies and snacks at the beginning of the conferences and looked up two hours later to find all the goodies gone and the trash can busting out with napkins and cups.

Listening to my coworkers–and myself–I was proud. I work with amazing women who are truthful and compassionate and dedicated to supporting their students. I’m sorry for the parents who didn’t take the opportunity to sit with us and discuss their child’s school life. Hearing our conferences, it’s hard to believe that they can’t make a difference.

081023: Day (and Night) 36
Sweet crap, parents. Ms. P, Ms. P, Ms. L and I divvied up our kids and each called 20 or so parents to remind them of parent-teacher conferences. It worked. We sat down to talk to parents at a little before six o’clock and didn’t stop at all until ten after eight. Ms. L talked until nine–a half hour past the end of conferences. It was awesome, both in scope and consequence.

The number of kids who look almost exactly like their parents kept me privately tickled as I explained the poor choices many students make in my class.

DD’s mother (with whom I had the most awkward phone conversation ever) wasn’t sure where he was instead of being in class to take my test earlier in the day because she was fed up with him and had dropped him off at his grandmother’s the night before. Maybe his dad came and took him–she wasn’t sure. She wasn’t sure. Aside from that, I thought she was quite lovely, actually.

Spoke to two mothers of boys who never–truly, never–come to first period English. I don’t know exactly how those conversations lasted more than two minutes, because I certainly don’t know anything about the kids. You know, because they don’t show up. Ever. But still, the mothers kept talking.

Oh, and then there was the pain of meeting GL’s mom. GL has not adjusted well to high school. He is terrified daily and won’t even say hi to his teachers. Our other kids try to talk to him and be friends with him, but he won’t say one word to them and actually looks terrified if they speak to him. But he’s sad he has no friends. Ms. L and I watched his mother turn from encouraging to mad as shit (her word) because GL hadn’t turned in any history homework yet. But her anger was dispassionate: she seemed like she was trying to make herself mad enough to really yell at him. For our benefit (so we would see she cared?). She told GL that she wanted to “jump across the table and strangle him,” and it was unconvincing but terrifying. Clearly, the kid needs more therapy than we can provide.

081022: Day 35
I expect a certain amount of chaos in the classroom the morning after I return from a day off school. It’s usual to find books strewn about, handouts left on desks, and the desks themselves scattered about the room. Last year, my sixth period seniors stole all of my candy one day I was out, which was disappointing but not entirely unexpected.

So, I wasn’t surprised to find chaos in my room: my fake flowers were falling down, the desks were everywhere, books left on the floor, desk and heater, etc. But I also found one of the stupid little toys on my desk underneath the lawn chair, a desk covered from edge to edge in blue pen scribble, my candy bucket empty (though I told Ms. L to empty it and eat the candy, in order to prevent my kids from doing that–I wonder if she did?), and my bouncy ball stolen.

So far this year, my kids have stolen 10 or so overhead markers, uncountable pens and pencils, and my purple math pencil that Ms. V gave me for my birthday last year. The loss of pens and pencils I take as a given–I bought a lot to compensate for this–but the overhead markers, my bouncy ball and my math pencil kind of piss me off. I have to buy new overhead markers, and those fuckers are expensive. I know my kids understand the difference between “mine” and “yours.” Why can’t they apply that knowledge so I don’t have to spend more money?

081021: Day 34
I played hookie, and it was good.

I made peanut butter squares and peanut butter cookies and chocolate chip cookies to get ready for Parent-Teacher Night, except the peanut butter squares are just for me and Jeff. Yum.

I spent hours on the bed reading Clown Girl, which people on Goodreads seem not to like but has me completely enamored.

We got cable. Our cable woman sounded exactly like Paula Poundstone and had a manicure. She was awesome. I proceeded to waste the rest of the day coloring my flocked monster poster with my tiny crayola markers and watching TV.

081020: Day 33
KC (see Day 19) has been doing pretty well in my class the past couple weeks. That doesn’t mean he’s being good, per se, just that he’s being good enough in fourth period. Fortunately for him, his good behavior saved him when Dean B brought him to my door at the beginning of the period.

Dean B was quite excited and ready to take KC on down to room 144, our in-house suspension and SAVE room, probably because KC was talking smack at him and just generally making life in the hallways hard: “Ms. G, you want me to take him down to 144? I would love to . . . I’ll be on this hallway all period. If you have any problems at all, I’ll be happy to . . . ” etc., etc.

I couldn’t in good faith send KC away, though, because he’s been doing his work in my class and kind of containing himself–only one or two dolphin screeches a day.

Week 5: September 22-26

080926: Day 21
The rain kept students at home, or made them late, or caused them to leave early. I can only imagine how the disaster of organizing binders would have been magnified if my classes had been fully attended. I do not know how to be clearer than to write a list of the order the papers go in, hold up a sample binder and walk around helping students find papers. Yet, my students could not organize their binders. I’m sure there’s some sort of processing difficulty, but this is also a giant listening problem. Again. How long will it take for me to teach them to listen?

080925: Day 20
I gave the first test of the year, but fourth period had to miss it because the principal called an assembly during fourth period for our students. On the elevator to the assembly, the elevator operator threatened to pull a knife on BB. I am actually inclined to believe BB, as many other students heard the operator and report that “that guy is always saying stuff like that.” I managed to get a phone number out of BB–his aunt’s, because his father’s doesn’t work right now–and then I had BB write an incident report so that we can deal with the problem appropriately. I have a more than adequate amount of empathy for the elevator operator: I can imagine how many kids shit talk him every day. But you cannot say inappropriate things to students. You particularly cannot say inappropriate things like that to students who are in special education due to their emotional problems. Our assistant principal has the report in her hands and is following up with the assistant principal of security.

I hope something comes of BB’s report. Despite my desire to kill him on occasion (empathy, again, for the elevator guy), if I as his teacher do not advocate for him now, he may drop off the map for the rest of high school. So I advocate.

080924: Day 19
I am quite the sadist. Yesterday, KC made my 4th period English unteachable for the third day in a row. Allow me to quote from the email I wrote to assorted assistant principals and administrators:

Friday, Monday and Tuesday–three days in a row–KC has made teaching my fourth period nearly impossible. His behavior today is representative of his behavior every day in my class. Today he entered class on time, but would not sit in his seat and stood in the doorway. He refused to take off his hat, even though I asked multiple times. After the bell rang, he continued to stand in the doorway and refused to sit down. When he finally sat down, he began to make loud screeching noises, pretending to be a dolphin. When I say loud I mean just shy of ear-splitting. He continued to put his hat on and then his hood on and I had to keep asking him to take them off. He then wandered around the room, asked to use the pass, and banged on the lockers at the back of the room when he returned to his seat. During this time he took no notes in my class and took a marker from a cup on my desk. He proceeded to use the marker to draw on one of my posters. When I asked him to return my marker, he became defensive. He told me if I tried to have him removed from my classroom that he would “tell Ms. N [the principal] you hit me and you stole my marker.” He then made a remark to suggest that he had done something similar with Ms. P–told the Principal on her–but Ms. P has no memory of this event.

The principal kindly emailed me back and we set up a time for KC to meet with her in her office. I was gleeful when I got a security officer to remove him from his sixth period Spanish class and walk him down to the principal’s office. Gleeful.

080923: Day 18
This is funny for many, many reasons. The most obvious is the effect that dyslexia had on the word “hellboy.” Even funnier, however, is that TT has so much anxiety and fear that he has only started smiling in the past week. And by smiling, I mean kind of, maybe smiling a little in my direction. Sweet, yes. But hellboy?

080922: Day 17
My feet have stopped hurting. Strange how it only took a couple weeks for the nerves in the balls of my feet to die again.