I'm not changing the world.

My 10th period class is an elective, meaning I can pretty much teach whatever I want as long as there is some educational value in there. The students rotate electives every nine weeks, so once the first quarter was over, I just recycled the lesson plans. I chose to teach a cooking class. We take a recipe for cookies, brownies, or some other treat. We multiply the recipe so we make enough for everybody, and then we divide the recipe so that we can have each group mix up a bowl of whatever it is. They get a lot of conceptual fractions, and then when it's time to measure and mix, they get that experience too. I send out a letter at the beginning of each quarter, asking the parents if they would like to donate ingredients. I tell them it's OK if they don't want to. We'll just do fractions when we run out of stuff. They usually bring more than enough. I have the student mix and measure and make the dough or batter, and then I pack it up, take it home, and bake it on my own time. It's a lot of my own time and energy and sometimes money, but the students really enjoy it.
This quarter has been a little bit different. We had AIMS testing, my grandma died, I have been out of the classroom quite a bit for this meeting or that one. When we made chocolate chip cookies, I didn't have time to bake them... I stuck the dough in the freezer and told the kids they would get them when they got them. When I am going to be gone from the classroom, it throws a wrench into things because it takes 2 days to mix and measure the ingredients, and it has to be done 2 days in a row. Otherwise the ingredients are left sitting out, it goes bad and the stuff has to be thrown away.
Somebody complained about not getting the cookies. They didn't complain to me. They complained to the assistant principal, who then decided it would be a good idea to put a comment in my FORMAL EVALUATION saying that I wasn't following the curriculum for my 10th period class. Curriculum? Excuse me? I invented the curriculum. Nobody even wanted to see it. Neither administrator at my school, nor any other official, has bothered to come in and observe that class to see what we do. Nobody gave a rat's ass about that class until a parent complained. So the assistant principal wrote in my FORMAL EVALUATION that for nearly three weeks this quarter, I have not followed the curriculum. I am stunned. What actually happened is that I didn't get the cookies baked in a timely manner. Which is something I do on my own time, at night, outside of the school. How does that translate into not following the curriculum?
It's a good thing I joined the union.

An hour at a time

I am afraid to weigh myself. I think this is the fattest I have ever been! I have simply got to do something... I am desperate! I am thinking about getting over the counter appetite supressant. If that isn't desperate, tell me what is! This sugar addiction is insane. Every morning I think to myself, Ok, today is the day! I am not going to eat any sugar or flour today. Then I see something, like a cookie or piece of candy, and in spite of the fact that I really, REALLY don't want to do it, I grab it and shove it in my pie hole. My head starts aching and I feel really crappy when I haven't had any sugar. I'm not sure what to do about that. I think today I will try keeping fruit with me and eating some when I feel like I am about to go over the edge. And instead of thinking in terms of the entire day, I'll go an hour at a time and see how it goes.

Impeach him!

I haven't posted in quite some time. My grandmother died on Monday morning, and the week simply flew by. I had to redo my lesson plans so that a sub could take over for me on Thursday and Friday. I was terribly worried about my mom, although it turns out she did ok. My extended family came in from all over the place and there was just so much to be done. I have a lot of mixed feelings about all of it, but the only part that really matters is that it's over. My mom can have her life back, and my grandma is gone, and I don't have to feel one way or the other about any of it.
I have been thinking a lot about how much I love teaching and whether or not I will be able to do it for very long because of the parents and administrators. I hope that part of the job becomes less and less important, as I work to train myself to get my priorities straight. I have been trying to just take a deep breath whenever something happens that irritates me, like an email from a snotty parent or an unannounced visit from administration. Do those things have to affect my teaching? Of course not! But they will, unless I get a grip. So I am practicing letting the stuff go. Making a conscious decision to say, Self, you have no business getting upset about this piddly little thing. Just take care of it in a calm and professional matter, and then refuse to think about it further.
I just know I can get better at that! And then my job will be so much more enjoyable.
I really like most of my life now. I live in a house, a nice one, with enough money to pay for groceries and a decent car. It's still somewhat a meager existence, but like I tell my kids, this is the poorest we will be from now on. Every year from now on I will make a little more. And spend it. And so on. It's just nice to pay the bills without getting a stomachache. I love my house. I have been working on my parenting skills, and it shows in my children's behavior. Life is good! Now, I can focus my energy on being a good teacher and trying to get the president impeached.

It's a cabaret, old chum

Life is no picnic right now. It may be a cabaret, but it is certainly NOT a picnic. I know we all have ups and downs, roller coaster of life, yada yada and etc. My roller coaster goes any lower, and I will just refuse to get out of bed one of these days. The day can't start if I don't get up, right?
I just dread going to the closet to find something to wear. I quit drinking a few months ago, which took some doing, let me tell you. Something had to take the place of all those hops, and it turns out chocolate donuts are a pretty good replacement. Which is all fine and good, except that now none of my pants will go over my huge ass! My AA sponsor keeps saying ONE THING AT A TIME, and I agree, except that pretty soon I'll have to either buy new clothes or go to work naked, and believe me, none of us deserves that.
I've made two horrible discoveries over the weekend, the first being dulce de leche syrup from those wicked harpies at Hershey's. The second is karamel sutra from my two best friends, Ben and Jerry. How can I NOT eat a pint of this and wash it down with a quart of dulce de leche syrup? *sigh* I don't tend to wish misfortune on anyone, but I think I have a resentment building against whomever came up with those two things.
Which brings me to step four, another reason it sucks to be me right now. I take a fearless and thorough personal inventory, and actually write down everything that I am scared of, ashamed of, angry at, or is in my way of being a rational and productive human being. By the time I am finished, I will need to compile it alphabetically, like a volume of encyclopedia. I don't see how I will ever finish, as I do things daily that have to be added in, like telling one of my students that eventually somebody was going to kick his ass, and actually using those words. Then trying to apologize to the child's mother but coming off sounding more like she deserves a good ass kicking as well. Which she does. Where's my pen? I better add that.

Laugh of the Week

This letter of resignation is by far the best I have seen. You've simply got to read it.

What's on your IPod?

I like how my ipod mix is so eclectic, but this morning I was thinking how nice it would be to have a different ipod for every mood. I could color code them, so that when I wake up pissed off, like this morning, I could pick the red one and listen to music from Green Day and Alice in Chains. Then, when I felt like calming down, I could pick the blue one and listen to Ruth Brown and Mindy Smith. Or, if Apple was really cool, they would let me push a button on my ipod and tell it what kind of mood I was in. I could have a green button to say, "Hey, get the lead out, I'm going for a run" or pink for "I want girl voices and nothing else." I would need purple for "Don't even think about playing anything but Neil Diamond. I need a good cry." Wouldn't that be the shit?

But I'm changing the world, right?

Yesterday a couple of my 10th period students were passing around a picture, pointing at me and then the picture, and giggling. I was helping four students measure out flour for chocolate chip cookies (my 10th period is a cooking class) and dropped what I was doing to investigate. I confiscated the picture, and might have even thought it was funny if these particular students weren't making my life COMPLETELY MISERABLE! One of these students in particular is making me think I really don't want to be a teacher. In between rolling his eyes, calling me stupid, retarded, and whatever else comes to mind, and bullying the rest of the class, he manages to squeeze in calling me racist because he happens to be the only black kid in the class. I am a teacher, for christ sake, not a whipping post... his mother, of course, maintains that the problem must be me since I'm the one that keeps writing all the referrals.
I don't get paid enough to put up with this.

AIMS

Our state standardized test is coming up next week. Yesterday we had a staff meeting to prepare for administration of the test, which must be done according to a very specific set of rules. We had an entire packet of information to go over, which of course we only got halfway through because my principal is very cool in that he has staff meetings before school. That way they must end at a certain time. No group of people will sit there and waste time asking stupid questions that have already been answered ten times like teachers. Believe me. I have lived it.
One of the pieces of paper we had was a list of questions one may ask oneself to make sure ethical testing procedures are being followed. The list included questions like, "Am I using sample test questions because they cover the topic we are currently addressing, or is it only to prepare students for the test?" The list went on and on, and I got the impression that we weren't really supposed to be using all of the sample test questions, practice questions provided by the state, and all the other junk I was given, unless it was part of the lesson I had already planned.
Here is my problem: I have devoted several entire lessons to preparation for the test. I have a huge beef with people who complain about teachers who spend time preparing students for this test. If the state insists on using high stakes testing as a measure of student growth AND teacher competency, then nobody has any business telling me I cannot do everything in my power to make sure my students do well on that test.
The state looks at only one thing to decide whether or not I am doing my job as a math teacher: Test scores. The outcome of this one test determines what the state will think of me as a professional. The hours, blood, sweat, and tears I have spent teaching these little creatures to be human beings DO NOT COUNT. The only thing that counts is how they score on this test.
Does that mean I give up and teach them only things that will be on the test? Hell, no. For most of the year, I go about my days teaching them the things I think they need to know, based on my knowledge of their curriculum going forward in school. Basically, I prepare them to be 7th graders. But for about two weeks before the AIMS test, we do nothing but prepare for AIMS. I use everything I have been given. I use everything more than once. I drill the students. I make them repeat chants after me so that they will remember what to do when they get stuck.
I will give them gum and hard candy and juice and fruit during their breaks. I will have them write encouraging messages to each other in chalk on butcher paper covering the walls before the test. I will mother them and coddle them and believe in them. Because if the powers that be want to judge me on how my students perform on this one test, then what they really want is an assessment of how my students test. And that is what they shall have.

I so hate it when they fart...

I have a student who thinks he is a genius. His mother thinks he is not only a genius, but a faultless genius. He is so clever that he stole the teacher's manual and got his mother to believe it was an accident. He just cannot fathom why I insisted on punishing him. It happened a while back...
A few months ago, I was engaging in a friendly rivalry with another sixth grade teacher. Our classes were in competition to raise the most cans for the food drive before the holidays. Well, the other class won. Not to be outdone, I waited until his class was somewhere else, and then I took my class in his room and we stole the trophy. We left a note cut out of magazine letters that said, "Bring 27 chocolate bars to Ms. P's room if you want to see your trophy alive." Their response was to come in while we were gone and trash my room. They took the legs off of the desks, hid things, etc. We came back, and one of the things they had done was take all the math books out of the desks and put them in the cabinet. It was time for math, so I told the students to get a math book, once they had put their desk back together. In that same cabinet was an extra set of teacher's manuals. The teacher's manual comes in two volumes. This student siezed the opportunity, took one of the volumes and put it in his backpack. An accident, you say? No. The teacher's manual is at least 25% bigger than the student volume. Impossible to mistake for a regular book.
Fast forward a few months... This very clever student's mother found the teacher's manual in said student's room. She "threw the book into the garage," (?! the nut doesn't fall far from the tree) where according to her it remained for another month or so. Of course, the student wasn't using it or anything. One day last week, the student brought the book to the office after school. He told the office manager that he had been issued the book in the beginning of the year. Said office manager called me to tell me she had the book, and ask where he might have got it. She told the student to go home. I went to see if I had all of my copies, and sure enough, one of the books from the cabinet was missing. Things started to click into place... I have been arguing with this kid for months about not showing his work on his homework. I have been taking points away, begging, pleading for him to show his work. It all of a sudden makes sense!
The next day I talked to the assistant principal about how to handle the situation. He immediately called the student up and questioned him. The student eventually admitted to taking the book and said he used it for one homework assignment. Remember, he is a genius. Student ends up suspended for two and a half days, and mother writes me an email asking me to call her.
I called her, explained how and when he got the book, told her it could not have been an accident, and then told her about how I have been asking her kid to show his work. She was upset about the punishment, thought it was too severe, and said she thought going to the office and being interrogated was enough punishment. I said something along the lines of, "He stole that book out of my room. It isn't really about what he did with it. He took something that did not belong to him."
She said, and I quote, "I guess I just don't understand how him having that book translates into stealing school property."
I was literally stunned into silence for several moments. I told her that was where we disagreed, and I was not going to ask for the punishment to be reduced, which was what she wanted.
So, long story long, Friday was the kid's first day back to school, and I swear he must have been farting on purpose. I know it was him because of the look on his face. About the third time it happened, I took my "Lovespell" body spray that I keep in my desk for just such occasions, and sprayed it liberally around him and his desk. He stopped after that.
Using farts as revenge is just horribly fascinating to me.... the mentality that goes along with that is frightening. I mean, what does he think to himself? "I'll get her... I'll just fart in class and she won't know who did it, and she'll have to smell my farts and I won't get in trouble.'
Genius.

The Flying Dutchman

I chaperoned a trip to the opera last night. It's the first opera I have ever been to, and I have to say it might have been the last. I am going to try not to judge the whole genre by this single experience, but HOLY SHIT! The students finally fell asleep during the second act, for which I was eternally grateful because then I didn't have to listen to them complaining about how bored they were. My feet were killing me because the idea of going to the opera in high heels was just too irresistible, I could not pass it up. Now, don't get me wrong. It was terribly exciting before the opera actually started. People were coming in dressed in tuxedos and the most glamorous gowns. My daughter wore a beautiful beaded gown, low heels and her hair up and every time I looked for her I thought she was lost, because I kept thinking, Where is Emily? And who is that lady that keeps following me?
And then I would realize that was my baby, all grown up. It sucks to be jealous of your own kid. Anyway, the music was beautful, the orchestra was great. The opera was in German (oy! such an ugly language) and there were subtitles projected above the stage. I kept laughing because the subtitle would say something like, "I am coming for you, my dear" but the singing just went on and on... how can it possibly take that many syllables to say that sentence??
So, that was my opera experience. One of the other chaperones went to Phantom of the Opera and she said it was NOTHING like this, it was action packed and wonderful. So maybe I will give it another try before I decide I don't care for opera. All I can say is, don't go see the Flying Dutchman unless you are trying to punish whoever you bring with you.