C'est la vie

Today was an eventful day.

Third period Jay (you remember him? the boy who used to hate me and who made me dread coming to work some days) told me "you look pretty with makeup on--by the way Miss, I'm going to pretend I'm gay for the whole period," and then proceeded to be as flamboyant as possible for the next hour.

Fifth period two of my boys found me in the office and dramatically complained about how starving they were.  I sent them back to class, then went over to my classroom where Mr. B was teaching his Resource class.  I found my two students sitting in the front of the room with my tea kettle making themselves oatmeal.  I only didn't write them up because it was kind of adorable, and they were participating in Mr. B's lesson while they were waiting for the water to heat up.  I brought them back to class with their oatmeal in their little cups, and JT walks out miserably and says, "Miss, I have to talk to you about something....I took Benadryl this morning and I CANT KEEP MY EYES OPEN! Can I have some oatmeal to wake me up?"

Sixth period my French friend Hindaty came to visit me at work to see what an American high school is like.  Let's just say she didn't get the "typical" high school experience.  We had an impromptu lunch session, where I literally just grabbed students I saw in the hallway and asked them if they wanted to talk to a French person.  They mostly asked her about snails and how to hit on a girl en francais.  She also got to witness my infamous seventh period in all their glory, who asked her if people smoke pot in France and taught her all of their slang words.  Then they managed to cheat their way through several rounds of Algebra jeopardy before I noticed they had found the answers...

Eighth period I worked with Carolyn one-on-one to help her with her Algebra, and she said she understands everything better the way I explain it to her, which was pretty much the highlight of my day.

The home stretch

I can't believe it's been almost a month since I last posted...it went so fast.  The beginning of April was even crazier than March with preparing students for midterms and then having to facilitate all of their testing accommodations.  Midterms week was basically five straight days with no free periods--I was constantly with students or tracking them down to finish their tests.  That Friday we had a half-day so the teachers could finish grading, and JT didn't show up until school was over to finish his midterms (and only because I called him 5 times yelling at him to get to school).

Overall, I was really disappointed with my students report card grades, because I know they can do way better.  I've seen it.  Ironically, the only one of my 15 students who passed every one of her classes for the term was the girl I was referring to in my last post, who got pregnant for the second time this year, and had her second abortion a few weeks ago.  I have never seen her work so hard and want to pass her classes so badly.  I'm really proud of her but also really worried about the choices she's making outside of school, but I'm trying to let her counselor deal with that and just focus on making sure she keeps up her grades for the last term.

Tomorrow's the last day of Spring Break, and then the last term of the year begins!  I went on a trip this break with some of the other teachers and our principal for the guidance counselor's wedding, and I feel like it was a really great bonding experience.  Being friends with people you work with makes it so much easier when work gets crazy--and the next two months are certainly going to be a roller coaster.   I can't believe I'm already almost done with my first year of teaching, it feels like just a few weeks ago I was trying to come up with a title for this blog!

36 school days until Regents' exams...

Dear Students,

Please stop getting pregnant.

Love,
Ms. C

Teachers are master manipulators

I've realized recently that my classroom has become my students' living room.  JT and Jon have this new habit of walking into seventh period and taking off their shoes before they sit down.  The farting continues, and today Jon walked around with his khakis around his ankles (he had shorts on underneath, but still...)  It is really nice to see Jon happy though.  For a few weeks he was in this slump where he looked miserable and slept through all of his classes.  Last week I gave him the most amazing guilt trip ever, telling him, "You know you are one of my favorites, and I really don't want to have to write you up...I thought you respected me as much as I respect you, but the fact that you aren't trying shows me I'm wrong.  You're making me feel like I'm a failure as a teacher."  He looked at me, almost speechless, and sat down and finished the Algebra test he had avoided for three days.  It was beautiful.  I feel like I do a lot of manipulating and mind-games in order to get them to do even a little work these days...


During lunch today I looked up my 7th period students' grades, and literally almost had a panic attack.  After freaking out in the hallway to my co-teacher and the biology teacher, I set up my projector and typed a new Do Now:


"Data set:  the number of classes each student in this room is currently failing:  4, 4, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 4.   Find the mean, median, and mode.  Which measure of central tendency best describes this data?"


They sat down and began doing the mean, median, and mode, without even understanding the point I was trying to get across.  When I explained how frustrated I was and how we really had to work at this,  Carolyn looked up at me with an evil little smile and asked, "Miss, you're tired of our shit, aren't you?"  


"Yes, yes I am."


I mentioned to my principal how bummed I was that their grades dropped so dramatically, and she told me this point in Term 3 is a huge slump for all of the students, but it hits the Resource kids the hardest (and she saw this exact same thing happen with my kids last year), so I'm going to try not to stress too much.

No such thing as a day off

My students had a lot of tests this week, and all day Thursday I was bombarded by teachers handing me stacks of unfinished exams and mixed up scantrons with no names on them (because my students, bless them, never ever remember to put their names on things unless I watch them as I tell them to write it), and by students ADVOCATING for their right to take their exams with me, rather than in their classrooms.  This meant that during my resource periods I was doing a lesson with my 8 students while simultaneously trying to answer questions by the 5 other students in the room who were each taking a test for a different subject.

I may be good at multitasking, but no one's brain can handle that much information at one time.  At one point, all of my students were asking questions at once, and a lot of them were being really rude about it, so I just walked over to my desk, sat down, and ignored them for a full minute so I could breathe!  By the end of the day I was feeling really run down and like I was coming down with a cold.

Friday morning, I called in sick.  I'm the only teacher that hadn't taken a day off yet, so I figured it was about time!  By 9am, I had text messages from three different students asking where I was.  My response, "I'm sick, and you're not supposed to be texting in class!!!"  At 3pm, I got a text from my co-teacher, who told me that one of my students (who is her advisee) took her into my classroom because he needed to find the Algebra test that he had completed.  She told me not only did the room smell like sweat, but the tests were scattered all over the floor and she found his in the corner by the garbage!  

A half hour later, I get a text from Cristy, and I asked her how 7th period went without me.

Cristy: "Lol we was loud ms c and CiCi was going crazy and ms h was gettin mad cuz she heard us from her room and dey heard us from the hallway lol."  
Me: "WHAT?!"
Cristy: "Lol, I no, we need u."

As much chaos as there is when I'm there, at least I now know it's worse when I'm not!  

Next I got a text from a student who found out she got an 82 on her global test. I told her I was "hype!" and she responded: "Omg miss, I can't believe you just said hype."

Slang Dictionary, in progress

On the low    =     secretly, unexpectedly

Wavvy    =     cool

Swag(ger)    =    nice, cool, awesomeness

I'm hype     =    I'm excited

Tight    =  angry

That teacher's got me tight    =     that teacher's pissing me off

Shakin my head     =     you're stupid, what are you thinking?, i don't want to deal with you

Diablo!  =  I know this means devil in spanish, but I have yet to figure out why students run around saying this randomly

You're wiling    =   you're crazy

Thats flee    =    that's cool

She's feening    =   she's getting overworked/overexcited

OD    =  very  (as in, "this is OD hard")

Dead ass  =  I'm serious.

"Sorry Miss, I won't be in school the rest of the week..."

It's 7:30am, I walk into my classroom with my two travel mugs of coffee--it was especially hard to wake up this morning.  It's almost a half hour later than I usually get to work, and as always I become immediately flustered by all of the posters falling off the walls, the papers that are everywhere, and the desks that are arbitrarily strewn about the room.  I wish, for the ten-thousandth time, that the teacher I share this tiny space with would help me keep our classroom clean.  No matter how much time I spend organizing, it never lasts more than two days.   I'm now remembering all those times I made a mess after my mom cleaned and she would say, "I can't wait until you have your own kids, then you will understand why this makes me so mad."  In a funny way, these are my own kids.  The only way I could love them more would be if I gave birth to them myself.  Before I can even take my coat off I hear my phone ring: it's a text from Arnelle.  


"I had a miscarriage, I lost the baby. I can't stop crying."  


So, my girls are having babies, abortions, and now miscarriages.  My boys are in gangs, watching their cousins get shot, spending their winter breaks "locked up," missing school for court dates.  I try to remember my most traumatic high school moments.  No matter what I come up with, it pales in comparison to what these kids are going through.  I realize no matter how great of a relationship we have, I will never completely be able to understand where they are coming from.  I've learned never to say, "I know how you feel," because really, how could I?  


This was a wake up call for me.  As frustrating as it is when my students have those days (or weeks, or months) where their grades and their education aren't priorities, I have to remember that it's not necessarily because they are lazy or they don't care.  But every now and then they do need a gentle reminder that education might very well be their only chance to make safer, happier lives for themselves.    

Maybe I should become a counselor?

Friday, first period:

Arnelle: "Miss, I have to tell you something later.  Don't worry, it's good and bad."

Fourth period:

Arnelle:  "This is really hard to say." *long pause*  "I think I might be pregnant."
Me: "Well, what makes you think that?"
Arnelle: "I have all the symptoms.  And I didn't use protection.  And you know, I took a pregnancy test from the dollar store and it had two lines on it."


I have FIVE female students.  This is the THIRD one that has been pregnant at some point this year!

Whirlwind

The past few days were a whirlwind!  This is the first chance I've had to catch my breath since Monday.  The week definitely had it's ups and downs, but either way I am looking forward to 5pm tomorrow (If there's one thing I've learned this year, it's that 95% of the business that bars get between 5 and 9 on Fridays is from stressed out teachers).

On Tuesday, my 7th period was an emotional wreck.  It's funny, because now that we're in a new semester, my 7th period is mostly made up of my old 2nd period students, and yet 7th period is still crazy.  It must be because it's the period after lunch, so maybe it's not (entirely) me after all.  Cristy came in crying, because her boyfriend broke up with her.  Dennis and Jon came in looking like they were going to cry, put their heads down, and refused to do anything (I found out later that Dennis' cousin died, and Jon's girlfriend interrupted class to tell me that they got into a fight and that's why he wasn't doing any work). Amy came in freaking out because one of my 3rd period students punched her in the face in gym.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Arnelle rolling down her sleeves and caught a glimpse of a hideous bruise on her arm, which I immediately told her I'd discuss with her later.  Sweet, quiet, focused Steve decided to morph into JT in his craziest form (which I like to describe as being similar to a severely ADHD person with tourrettes having a seizure), saying "diablo" over in over at the top of his lungs, while JT followed along saying a different Spanish word over and over (which Amy told me later was the Spanish word for "vagina.")

Needless to say, it wasn't the most productive period.  I made them all finish their Algebra test from earlier in the day, which didn't take more than 15 minutes, and the rest of the period we sat in a circle and talked, watched old morning announcement videos, and drew on the chalkboard.  It was like one big therapy session.

Yesterday I took four girls (who are not my students, but who I've bonded with while co-teaching their Algebra class) on a field trip to Pearl Paint on Canal street after work before grad school.  They were like kids in a candy store, it reminded me of the first time my Uncle took me there when I was their age, and I realized it was five floors filled with every kind of art supply you could imagine!  I missed the staff meeting while I was gone, but Pedro was voted student of the month!

 Today I had four IEP Annual Review conference, for Pedro, Jay, Monique, and Steve.  I was really impressed with Jay, who is not my most mature student, because although these meetings are incredibly awkward, and although he has told me that he doesn't want to have an IEP or Resource anymore, he handled his meeting the most seriously out of any student I've seen yet.  He articulated everything he struggles with and decided, on his own, that he did want to keep his IEP and even add to his testing accommodations, and talked about how the behavior contract for the baseball team is really helping him stay motivated.  He really, truly ADVOCATED for himself, and I've never been more proud!
 

CELEBRATING!

I finally got my hands on my students' official report cards today.  The way our school works, quarter one and quarter two grades need to average to at least a 70 in order to be considered "passing" for the semester.  If they don't pass for the semester, they don't get the credit and have to make it up either in summer school or take that semester of the class again next year.

Out of my ten students that actually come to school more than once a month, FIVE OF THEM PASSED. I went and searched them out throughout the day to tell them.

Pedro, who has been working SO HARD the past two months, was like "Yeah Miss, I KNEW THAT. I'm nice!"

JT's eyes popped out of his head, he asked me if I was sure about 100 times before he jumped up and down, hugged me, and proceeded to run down the hall screaming "I'm HYPE!" repeatedly. (Sometimes I joke with him that he might have tourrettes, although it's really nothing to joke about, but whenever he starts saying something he says it over and over like a broken record until someone snaps him out of his trance!)

Dasean came into my room to ask for a pencil, and as soon as I saw him I was jumping up and down telling him over and over that he passed all of his classes until he realized what I was saying, and he begged me to call his mom immediately (he is over 6ft tall and acts like he's really tough, but he has a real sensitive side and is definitely a mama's boy).

I had texted Allie's mom as soon as I found out, and her mother must have texted her while she was in class, because five minutes later Allie burst through my door shrieking at the top of her lungs, hugged me, and ran back out of the room still screaming.

I pulled Monique out of Global, the one class she wasn't sure if she passed.  I asked her if Mr. V told her her Global grade, and she said no.  When I told her she passed, she looked at me and said, "Miss, don't look at me, I'm gonna cry!"

The amazing thing about Monique, who is such a sweetheart (and I tell her an unnecessary amount of times a day how wonderful she is), is that she struggles, but she never complains and works at this slow and steady pace, and is always gradually getting better.  My co-teacher and I call her the Little Engine that Could.  Monique's mother told me today the story behind her "TBI" classification (traumatic brain injury).  When she was in 7th grade, she was hospitalized with "water on the brain," for several months. She almost died, and when she did get out of the hospital she couldn't speak, walk, or remember who anyone was.  It's such a miracle to see where she is today, you would have never guessed she had anything more than a slight processing issue!

I survived my first semester as a teacher!

When I meet someone and they ask me what I do, it still feels like I'm lying when I say "I'm a teacher."  But it doesn't feel as strange to say as it felt a few months ago, and I feel like I'm starting to accept that this is my career.  I went to college to be an art teacher, I accepted the TFA position hoping to be a second or third grade teacher, and I somehow got thrown into a tenth grade special education position that focuses mostly on algebra.  Back in June, when I was first offered the job, I was terrified, and a little disappointed because it wasn't what I had wanted or planned, but I was just so relieved to have a job.  Seven months later, I'm so thankful things didn't turn out the way I planned.  I would have never known how challenging and rewarding it could be to teach sixteen and seventeen year olds with learning disabilities.  I don't see them as different from any other teenager in the school, and although they have one more obstacle to face than all of the other students, I've seen my students work harder and earn better grades than many of the other students in the school.  I have loved getting to know them as people and learning about their hopes and dreams, and I am so excited to help them work towards these goals over the next three years.  It's going to be a long, difficult road, but I am so excited to guide them as they choose colleges, write them recommendation letters and watch them graduate and go off to college.

Semester two starts on Tuesday, and I'll have a few new students and new challenges for sure.  I'm starting off the semester by diagnosing their reading levels, which I've recently realized are terrifyingly low, so my goal is to fit in more reading and writing skills with them in between all the Regents prep we will be doing for Algebra and Global!

Silence

The last time I updated was that really really horrible day last week, that left me crying by myself in my classroom during my prep period.

The next day, I was a drill sergeant.  I was waiting outside my door before the bell rang for 7th period to start.  I refused to let my students in until they were ready to enter silently, and when they did they were greeted with the desks in neat rows, instead of the usual, friendly semi-circle arrangement.  I told them right away that I was in no mood to hear a single one of their voices, and that no one was allowed to talk today.  They were to spend the period doing their work silently, and if they had a question they had to raise their hand and I would help them.  A few of them tried to object or to explain their actions, but I cut them off before they could even get a whole word out.

They worked silently for the rest of the period, and when there were only two minutes left, I stopped scowling and said, "So what is everyone doing for their 3-day weekend?"  They looked at me in shock, not sure if they should answer, and when the bell rang JT shouted out "5, 4, 3, 2, 1..." and they all apologized at the same time!

I talked to my principal about it, because I was being pretty hard on myself that I had let a class of only 8 students get so out of control.  But she told me that I everything I did the next day was the right thing to do (down to the subtle message I sent by putting the desks in rows), and the fact that they responded in such a way (and apologized) shows that I actually do have a good control over them, and that the do respect me.  Otherwise, they would have come in and continued to act the same way without remorse.

By the way, Carolyn had her baby this morning! A girl!

  

Dreaded 7th Period

My seventh period was really horrible, mean, and disrespectful to me today.  No teaching or learning or anything productive occurred in that class.  It was really disappointing because I was on such a high after Tuesday...my co-teacher and I had our best co-taught lesson of the whole year, where I got to bring a lot of art into the geometry unit and our rough 5th period was actually having fun and learning.  Then yesterday we had a snow day, so today was bound to go downhill from there, I guess.

One of my students is now going around telling everyone "we made Ms. C cry," even though I actually didn't cry until way after they left.  15 year olds can be such jerks when they want to be.  I understand that they are stressed because finals are coming up, but today was ridiculous.  I felt especially lucky today to have such a supportive staff, because instead of sitting in my room crying by myself, I had four different teachers to go to that made me feel better.  My co teacher even suggested I write them a letter, so I did, but I'm a little nervous about how that is going to go.  This is the first time since I met my students that I am not going to be happy to see them tomorrow.

Advocate, advocate, advocate.

On Tuesday I spent almost the entire period talking about and trying to re-invest my students in the "big goals" of their class...I even had a beautiful poster made on the new poster machine at school (you can print something on computer paper and scan it and it comes out poster-size).  Here's what it looks like:

  

I talked a lot about what the word "advocate" means and different ways the students could advocate for their learning needs, whether it be asking questions or participating during class, or reminding their teachers that they are allowed to have extra time on tests.  We had what I thought was a decent discussion and moved on to work on their grade trackers.  At the beginning of the year they made color-coded line graphs where they graph their grades in each class every week...it is still my favorite thing that I have done with that class and sometimes the only thing I can get them excited to do.  They are very visual and love seeing the slopes for certain classes going up, while the negative slopes often set a little bit of a fire under them.  

Yesterday, my "Do Now" was: In your own words, what does the word advocate mean?  List three examples of how you can advocate for your own needs.

Blank stares.  From both classes.  None of them remembered what it meant.  So I spent another class discussing it with them

Today's Do Now:  In your own words, what does the word advocate mean?  List three examples of how you can advocate for your own needs.

"But Miss, that was our Do Now yesterday."   

I told them that since none of them remembered what advocate meant yesterday, which was fine, that they could do it today.

More blank stares, they forgot again!  I'm starting to see proof of what I've been told, that students won't truly comprehend a vocabulary word without at least 10 exposures to it.  Spent another 20 minutes trying to explain it...

Eighth period I sat with JT during Global, which I do every once in a while because I know he sleeps through that class 95% of the time.  I was helping him with a worksheet, and every prompt I gave him he responded with "the answer is it's time to go to sleep."  One question asked about how Enlightenment thinkers inspired the French Revolution, and I was explaining that these philosophers inspired people to stand up for their natural rights.  

I watched JT write down, "Enlightenment thinkers inspire people to ADVOCATE for their rights."  He looked at me and smiled and said, "See, you think we don't listen to you, but we do." My reaction was so absurdly over-the-top-happy that the global teacher looked at me like I was insane.

Tomorrow's Do Now?  In your own words, what does the word advocate mean?  List three examples of how you can advocate for your own needs.

"Miss, what are you taking this so seriously for? Most of us aren't gonna go to college anyway."

Carolyn's due date is January 26th, right in the middle of finals week.  All of her grades, which weren't amazing to begin with (but she was trying), have plummeted and she's been missing a lot of school for doctor's appointments.  It really hurt me to hear her say that, because she was always so positive and it just shows how discouraged she's gotten.

I also found out that the network is adding requirements for graduation.  I have a bunch of students in situations where they are already not on track to graduate in four years, I can only imagine what will happen now!

First day after vacation...

7am, I walk into my room, expecting--dreading--the disaster that I left the day before break. I am greeted instead with a gorgeous shiny room with the desks all in rows.  The custodians waxed the floors over break and were nice enough to rearrange my desks.  Seconds later I get a frantic call from my co-teacher asking me to check her room because she overslept.  I expect it to also be shiny and beautiful, but I walk in and find 30 desks shoved in the corner, all the technology unplugged, and the bookcase and filing cabinet in the center of the room.  After rushing to rearrange everything, I thought the rest of the day would be just as hectic.  Then I remembered our students, and how they use every excuse possible to stay home from school.  Apparently two weeks off wasn't enough for them!

Period 1: 8 out of 25 students showed up

Period 2:  2 out of 5 students

Period 5: 12 out of 27

Period 7: ONE STUDENT.

Needless to say, the rest of my day was pretty easy!  January is going to be rough though, because it is "winter session" at grad school.  So Mondays and Wednesdays I have class from 5:30 to 8:45 and all four Saturdays of January I have class from 9am to 4pm.  Plus online sessions, and the hour+ commute to class...not the most exciting way to start off 2011.