decompressing

It is the end of week one. I want a beer. I truly feel like it is the end of week two, but not because I had a miserable week one by any means. It was eye opening. It was a learning experience. It was exhausting. It was trying. It was fun. And..it ended on a good note. I have learned, however, that "good notes" in teaching rarely come without having been through the valley of the shadow of death first.

I admit, that might be a little extreme. There was no drastic melt downs, nobody was sent to the big man's office (yet...), and I came out mostly unscathed. Heck, I think a few people might actually like me. I have continued to teach 2 out of the 3 7th grade classes, and I think that I might try and teach all three at some point next week. It's not quite time for me to "take over" yet, but I really love being in front of the class and even if I do not fully plan all of the lessons I want to try and teach all of them on my own.

5th hour continued to drive me up the freaking wall today. It doesn't help that the class is split because it is during lunch. There are 4 lunches, ours is the third. What this means is that we have about 25-30 minutes of class, break for a 30 minute lunch, and then come back to wrap up with about 10-15 minutes of class. It is INSANE. It doesn't help that this is our largest class of the day, it is at either 27 or 28 now, and it is full of nutcases. Seriously. Sleeping boy (who has been participatory in class the past two days--yay!--although a bit odd), a very quirky girl (need to see her IEP to figure out what's going on there), about 4 or 5 students that are extremely loud and disruptive (one of whom a member of our team said has already been showing violent tendencies outside after lunch), and a couple that have absolutely refused to participate in class.

The loud, disruptive ones are also rude (to me and other students) and generally derogatory. Add on top of this that they are 7th graders and cannot follow directions and you have a big hot mess. Truly, I feel most sorry for the kids who are silently begging me with their eyes to get the hooligans to shut up already!!

In the 7th grade classes in general today I was reiterating the idea that everyone needed to learn how to follow directions (a life skill that they should have learned in freaking kindergarten). Yesterday we started a scavenger hunt around the room. The purpose was two-fold; 1) find places in the room of importance (i.e. the filing cabinet that they use to turn homework in), and 2) to copy down fundamental geography terms that we will be discussing in class.

Directions: 1) start at your designated number. 2) write the word and definition. 3) stay in your spot until the bell rings. 3) when the bell rings, move to the next spot in numerical order (if you are at #4, go to #5....yet again, I learned to count when I was...heck I don't even know. But at least in kinder).

Sounds simple, right? El wrongo!!! I have said those directions so many times I think I might be muttering them in my sleep. Somehow we still manage to wind up with traffic jams of students all in one area, students wandering around the room when they feel like it, students coming up to me saying they missed one or their number is off. LISTEN TO THE DIRECTIONS YOU POOR, PATHETIC 7TH GRADER!

5th hour was the worst at this. Add in the above mentioned collection of students all in one class and you have a massive headache. 2 days in a row. Yesterday I felt like I yelled at them all day. The first half of today's class was no different. I said to my CT that they would "learn how to follow directions if it killed me." She laughed a bit and said to be sure to tell her what kind of flowers I wanted sent. Mom, I may not make it to November (P.S. I told her to send a peace lily because they are really hard to kill--you're welcome).

I had a breather and a moment to vent--she lamented my frustration and reassured me I was doing a really good job with them--and after lunch they yet again failed to behave properly in the hallway on the way back to the classroom. Sorry, little sevies, but that means we have to line up like grade schoolers in order to go to and from lunch now. Way to go loud little boy in the front row. You and your rude little friend have caused the entire class to be treated like children.

But, aha! It is calm, strict Ms. P to the rescue. Another short lecture about the importance of following directions. The announcement that from now on we will have to line up, row by row, to go to the cafeteria (this got some groans---yessss!). We will return to the room and start over if necessary (more groans..yesss!). And then...the real doozy. I do not accept derogatory language in my classroom (insert various examples of derogatory language here). Class, consider this your first warning. Any derogatory language from this point on will result in a "time out" or a "house call" from the principal. BAM. They're down for the count.

Guess what? This student teacher won round one. They were absolute ANGELS the rest of class. AND those students who were pissing me off before? Some of the most participatory in discussion. They volunteered to read the definitions out loud, gave examples of some, and get this---I discovered that most of the class at least knows the 7 continents and 4 oceans even if they can't correctly label them. It felt like a small victory.

Then I went on to teach 2 8th grade classes. Not near as exciting behavior wise (although 6th hour will be a challenge--I didn't teach them today), but we are doing some fun discussion right now about rights, responsibilities, social contracts, and the like. They are participatory which is really exciting for any SS teacher. A dull class without any opinions would make for a very long semester in my classes.

The 7th graders are my mountain to climb right now. Especially 5th hour. I felt like I made some progress today and ended on a good note. Sadly it is Friday and it will probably all be lost over the weekend. My CT enjoys my enthusiasm and "rose colored glasses." They aren't entirely rose colored, I can guarantee that. But I can't give up. Not yet at least.

OH..news of the day. There was a gun that went off on a bus that came from the high school up the road from my school. 2 HSers arrested. Lots of my students will go to that HS when they are done here. I graduated with 118 people, and if anyone brought a gun to school it was because they forgot to take it out of the bed of their truck after hunting the previous weekend. You could say I'm having an experience. Still loving it though.

Now off to relax the rest of the night and decompress this weekend.

Disclaimer: No 7th graders were harmed in the making of this post.