Hello there

Is it really Saturday afternoon already? Man, things are just whizzing by me in a flash these days. This past week went fast it seems. Work was crazy as always. I swear there's such a thing as Fall Fever. The boys are being sent down to the office for roughhousing, harassing each other and just generally getting on each other's nerves. And it's only September!! Friday was the day we have every month where we reward the well behaved and fairly studious students. This time we had a Field Day outside. I was in charge of the game where two teams race in a relay where you put your head on the end of a baseball bat and spin around 10 times and run back to your team. That was pretty darn entertaining, watching 12 year olds run around a bat and then attempt to run back, but ending up looking drunk or like they just learned to run. It's pretty funny. Last night I went to dinner with some girls from the school I worked at last year. That was nice. I feel so out of the loop with the gossip and insanity that presents itself every day at that place. Good times. This morning, while my husband was at work, Mason and I went to Old Navy (found a bunch of stuff on clearance!!) and Target (for popcorn, of course! It's become part of Mason's weekly diet). I also managed to get a nap in later, but mainly because my head was pounding like a sledgehammer. Pretty soon we're headed to Mason's babysitter's house for a little cookout. We always have a good time with them.

I guess that's it. I'm sure I would have more meaningful and insightful commentary had I actually written after work any time this week, but this is what you get. Hope everyone is having a great weekend. One more week until Fall Break! And two weeks 'til our Luau! Yippee!

I am among the living

I've just been a little pre-occupied lately, with life and all that jazz...Anyways, here I am. I've heard the complaints (or read, that is) how much of a slacker I've become in the blogging world (you know who you are! you may not have said those exact words, but it was implied), so I am trying to make amends.

Teaching 7th and 8th graders that, yes, Language Arts is important to your life no matter what profession you want in life (even if it's a "would you like fries with that?" job, since you have to at least be able to read the menu and read tickets) is hard work. It exhausts me sometimes. Not to mention dealing with the attitudes and general apathy towards learning. And it doesn't help that the school gave me an unfair disadvantage with my class make up. Case in point.

Here's some food for thought, and you can agree or disagree, but here it is:
I think smaller class sizes makes a difference. I have 19 kids in my 3/4 period class, and they are by far my most well behaved. They work harder, stay on task longer and tend to score higher on tests. My other group of 8th graders totals 28 and there's such a difference. It feels like I have kids that get lost in the shuffle and don't get the attention they need. My biggest class are 7th graders, but I don't think it's fair to compare them to 8th graders. I swear sometimes they are a totally different species. Something drastic happens that summer between 7th and 8th grade. Whatever it is, it's a little scary.

My other point: when a class is dominated by little goof-off boys, trouble brews faster and stronger. My rowdiest class (by miles and miles) is my 7/8 period group. You wanna know the figures? 22 boys and 6 girls. Yeah, that's just not right. In previous experience, I would have said that it works out better when there are less girls (less eye rolling and whiny voices), but I have been proven wrong with the 8th graders (I tell ya, 7th and 8th graders are sometimes like night and day). My girls are the calming force. They just want a quiet class and they want to get their work done. My boys (aside from maybe 2 or 3) are goofballs that think everything they say and their friends say is downright hilarious. And they have smart mouths. And they want to say everything they're thinking (think: a 1st grader wanting to talk about his dog and his neighbor's rabbits and his dad's truck, but with hormones and more random information stored away in a 13 year old's head). It's annoying. Granted, they say something that is actually halfway funny at times, but then I'm giving them leverage when I laugh. I try to keep that to a minimum. It just proves my point that a class full of 8th grade boys is harder to handle than a class full of 8th grade girls.

And I hate that they have banned sugar from the schools. I mean, I don't hate it completely. I'm glad they can't get a a Twinkie and Coke in the lunchroom and call it a meal, but not having the ability to bribe with candy is excrutiating. There have been times in my past teaching experiences that I could have asked the kids to jump through flaming hoops like circus dogs and they would have done it, had there been a Jolly Rancher dangling in their view. Now, I can't use candy during review games or as an incentive for the quiet kids or to give them when I get a good report from a sub (I'm gonna be out on Wednesday for my dad's surgery and I sure wish I could tempt the kids with a sugary treat). It's just not fair.

And I'm off my soapbox. Hope this blog fills a special place in your heart until I find the time to write again. There's not a lot of downtime these days, with my homelife (involving a child that I'm convinced is rushing into his "Terrible Two's" early) and my worklife (involving lots of children that are quite settled in to their "Terrible Teens"). So, live with it.

The intelligent anecdotes of a 20 month old...

Here's what Mason has to say about life:

gllllll;;;vv22;;/995cwwwwwashkmmikkkkmmmmmm



Yes, that's the word "wash" in the middle. And yes, he actually typed it..maybe he was telling you all that he just had a bath...Hey, it could happen!

They're not as old and as big as they think they are

So, I took my kids to the library yesterday (we go every two weeks), and something amusing happened. The kids are all wandering around finding books to check out and I come across a pack of my 8th grade boys (I want you to get the full picture: 3 out of 5 of them are football players, and all of them are taller than me) making a bunch of noise about a book. You know what my first thought is? They found something inappropriate in a book and they're all basking in it. But no. I hear things like, "Oh, which one's Bert and which one's Ernie?" and "I like the one in the garbage can. What's his name?" Yes, they are gathered around a Sesame Street book (they keep Beginner Reader books around for ELL kids and Special Ed). I thought about nagging them about finding a book in their Lexile (reading level), but then I decided to just stand there and smile and add some input like, "I remember the show before there was Elmo" and "my favorite was always Snuffy, the elephant". It amused me so. It just proves my theory that middle schoolers aren't too sure all the time if they want to be big kids and get freedom and be treated like young adults, or be little kids and color and read Sesame Street books. And that's why I love them.

Things I'm learning in the 7th and 8th grade

I was reading my friend's blog about what she's learned since she started a new semester of college, and it got me thinking: I'm learning everyday the in's and out's of teaching middle school are quite the experience--even with this being my 5th year teaching. For instance:

1. ANYTHING you hand the kids, there will be some genius that asks, "is this homework?"
2. Some students need a personal invitation to follow directions. Apparently it doesn't apply to them until you walk up to them and say their name.
3. No matter how long school has been in session (we're going into our 5th week), they will make a comment like, "it's so cold in here!" like I suddenly changed the thermostat. It's cold people, get over it! And wear more clothes, for Pete's sake!
4. Apparently even in LANGUAGE ARTS class, using "i", "cuz", "w/", and not using punctuation at all is acceptable. I hate the IM generation!!!
5. Girls are getting away with wearing shorty skirts by wearing leggings underneath. It's just wrong.
6. Boys are determined to try to sneak by teachers with inappropriate shirts on. Case in point. A couple of days ago, a kid had a shirt on that read, "Save your breath. You'll need it for your date," and it had a picture of a blow-up doll. Nice. And he was surprised when I told him he needed to turn it inside-out!
7. Most kids hate reading and writing. Oh, boo-hoo! Get over it! You need both skills to get anywhere in this world! I just wish they'd understand that...
8. 8th graders don't know what proper nouns, pronouns, verbs and adjectives are. Are you kidding me?!?
9. Teachers are required to read chicken scratch. If I have to hold the paper at an angle and squint one eye and hold it at an arm's length, it's illegible!
And the last little tidbit of info I have come to realize is...
10. Middle schoolers aren't much different than my 20 month old toddler: they're needy, whiny, unable to follow simple directions, are downright goofy and have the attention span of a gnat.

Castaway

Here's our little Maxie while we were visiting my parents. Doesn't he look like he's in the sequel to Castaway, and that he should befriend a volleyball and name it Wilson?

Saturday, in the park, I think it was the 2nd of September...

Okay, that's a weird subject, but I couldn't think of anything else to title it. Anyways, I'm sitting here in my parents' house, waiting for dinner. We came down last night to visit, and tomorrow we'll head to the in-laws'. Thought it would be a nice weekend to see the fam, since it's a longer weekend. We've had a nice visit already. We went in the pool this afternoon and Mason had a blast. I'll try to post a picture when we get home. And I got in a nap and I went with my mom and aunt to their Target this morning. It's been nice to just relax. Yeah for no school Monday! And yeah for next week being shorter because of it!!

Friday went fast, because we had yet another Early Release Day. Of course teachers had the special opportunity to sit in meetings within their departments. My Language Arts one was a bit of a waste of time, but at least I got some journals graded as I sat there. I still have some more to grade, along with Thursday night's homework. This is actually the first time I've taken work home this school year. I find myself very productive, coming in at least an hour before school starts and having lunch and my Prep Period together. Progress Report grades are due by the end of Tuesday, so I thought I should get cracking on getting this stuff graded, so I'm not down to the wire on Tuesday. If I wait, then something drastic will happen and I won't be able to get it done and then I'll get reamed for not getting it done in time.

Well, dinner's about ready and I guess I should get back to being social or something. Hope everyone has a great weekend and doesn't have to work Monday!

Ehhhh

I am whining. I've had a headache, pretty much off and on since late Sunday night. I don't know if it's allergy related or stress related or what it is, but it's painful and annoying. I actually stayed home yesterday, to rest and hopefully get rid of the pain in my head (which caused more stress, because every teacher knows that it makes you a little uneasy to leave your kids in the hands of someone else). I returned to work this morning, and found that I only had an actual sub for ONE PERIOD today. Apparently the rest of the day was covered by teachers during their Planning time. That made me feel a little bad. But my guilt quickly turned to grouchiness when I realized that only one of the teachers that covered my class actually followed my lesson plans!! I guess some "couldn't find" my lessons (even though they are in the front of the room on my overhead), so they showed some Alice in Wonderland movie. Great. So, we had to play Catch Up today, and try to cram two days into one. Yippee. And all the while my head was playing games with me. I felt better after school, so my husband and Mason and I went to Chili's to celebrate the fact that tomorrow we turn in the keys to our old place, because it's all clean and ready for inspection. Yeah!

So I took some allergy stuff and I pray to God that it helps. I certainly don't want to be up all night again and obviously I can't trust that things would be taken care of if I called in sick. Wish me luck.

We're back in business, people!!

Yay, we've moved! Finally! It feels so good to be here, where it is actually a HOME and we actually have room to move around without bumping into each other everywhere--well, right now, we have boxes every which way, but at least there's potential for open spaces.

About 10 people from church showed up yesterday and helped us move. Now, granted, the move was only .8 of a mile down the road, we were still impressed that the entire loading and unloading of the moving truck only took about 3 hours. We have a lot of crap! But at least now we have a garage and a storage shed and a crawlspace above the house to keep it. And we were able to get a lot of unpacking done since yesterday morning. I mean, hey, the tv and computer are hooked up, so what else do you need? Mason's room's getting there, the kitchen's pretty much done and the living room just has odds and ends that need a home. But we're here and we're settling in quite nicely.

Mason loves having the extra room to run around and ya ard to explore. Max is more than excited to have grass to pee on. And the cat, well, she's adjusting. Normally she takes well to change and being taken to different places, but she is still unsure of this place. She walks hesitantly along the wall and pauses to check out the room before going about her business. She also meows randomly and has this shifty-eyed look like she is plotting her escape. I'm sure she'll get over it, but it's funny to see.

Well, it's back to work tomorrow. I need to go try to rest, as I didn't sleep well last night (not the issue of a new place, just allergies kicking into overtime). So goodnight.

The pride of lions is packing up their den..

We move in a day and a half, people!! Our place is in such disarray and we are sooo anxious to get out of here and spread ourselves out a bit. Can't wait til Saturday...

Today was okay at work. I'm not sure my little conversation with my little class clown's mom really helped. He was his normal self today. He did, however, earn himself a third lunch detention. This time, it was for not being where he was supposed to be. Him and two of his croanies were way past the bathrooms and opening a side door. They didn't have much reason for it, besides that they "wanted to see the rain". Whatever. So, I told them that they lost their bathroom priveleges for tomorrow and I handed them all lunch detentions. Nothing serious, but hopefully it's enough to stop them from doing it again. We'll see.

Well, Mason is trying to drape my head with one of his bibs, so I gotta go. I shall write again when we have relocated. Ta ta!

A Revelation!!

I went to the principal this morning before school started, and talked to her about the trouble I've been having with my 7/8 Period block. I felt like there was a handful of boys that were affecting the dynamics of the class, and it was making me feel really tense and unhappy. I have been dreading that group of kids pretty much every day since the first week of school. I mentioned one of the names of the kids that's been giving me troubles and the principal said to call mom. Apparently mom is real supportive and if that didn't work, I could send him to a teacher he had last year. It's all about making an example of one of the students, so the others will be afraid. Very afraid. So, during my planning time today, I gave the mom a call. She was there, and guess what? Her son was out sick today, so he was there when I called. She said she would talk to him and she appreciated me calling. I'm always intimidated by calling parents, because it's a crapshoot--you never what kind of parent you'll get on the other end of the phone. Luckily the odds were on my side and she was happy to hear from me.

And with that particular student out today, something amazing happened: the class was wonderful!! I was so pleased! All this time I thought that 5 or 6 of them were the cause of the problem, when all along it was just this one student who was inspiring the others to be doofuses. It was so peaceful today. The kids even commented that it was quieter with him gone. I didn't say much about that, but I did say, "well, whatever the reason is, I appreciate it." I was even so pleased that I lessened their homework. They worked dilligently on this vocabulary assignment that pretty much took the entire block, that at the end I shortened it and told them it paid to be well behaved. I walked out of there with a smile on my face. It was one of those "Aha!!" moments. The disruption in class centered around one student. That's not hard to deal with.

Let's hope when he returns tomorrow, he gets peer pressured from the others to be good. Or at least the talk with his mom does what it's meant to do.

A new moment in the history of teaching

So, I went to open my classroom door to release my Period 3/4 class at the end of class, and something very strange happened. The handle turned, but it wouldn't open. It wouldn't even budge. I thought, "Hmmm...maybe I locked my door on accident," but then I realized I hadn't locked it, and even if I had, it wouldn't lock the inside. A couple of my 8th graders of course took a shot at trying to open it. A sudden realization came over me: I was locked in my room with twenty-two 8th graders!! I calmly (at least on the outside) called up to the office and informed them of my predicament. The lady working in the office laughed and sent down the custodian. She tried unlocking it from the outside, but to no avail, the door was still shut tight. She told me through the door that she would go and get tools and try to jimmy the door open. At this point, the kids have figured out that they're gonna be in my class awhile longer. And there are mixed emotions about it. Some were excited to be missing their next class, some were afraid that they would miss work in their next class, some were paranoid that there could be a fire (or at least a fire drill) and we couldn't get out, and some were just curious of how we would get out and how long we'd be stuck in there until that happened. I had no answers. After the custodian realized that she couldn't make progress on her side of the door, she goes into the room next door and climbs through the ceiling and drops down an Alan wrench and tells me to try to mess with the door. Yeah right. I am not at all mechanically inclined. But at the moment I start fidgeting cluelessly at the door, a maintenance man from the district is on the other side, messing with it. The kids are getting antsy and hyper and I am so ready for them to leave. Thank God it was my lunch and then my Planning Period, so I didn't have any other kids coming. Oh, and while all this is happening, teachers and students in the halls have noticed the commotion and are walking past and peering into my room with a dumbstruck curiosity, like we're a new breed of caged zoo animals that were just released to the public. Great. Kids were looking in, and I could hear teachers giggling to themselves--probably glad it didn't happen to them. To make a long story less long, the district maintenance guy climbed through the ceiling and ended up taking my entire doorknob off. From start to finish, this entire hassle took just about an entire extra period. Needless to say, as soon as that doorknob was yanked out, I was practically pushing my kids out the door. I had had them 3 periods straight and couldn't have been more glad for the whole fiasco to be over.

Has this ever happened to another teacher, ever, in the history of teaching? I've been locked out of my room, but never locked in.

Puke

So, Mason hasn't been feeling all that well since last night. He had diahrrea, but otherwise was acting fine. This morning, more runny poop and he didn't want to eat. At lunch, once again, no appetite. I gave him some milk and crackers and we all headed to the store for some things. On the way, I hear these gurgling noises coming from the backseat. I look back, and there's vomit coming from his mouth and nose. We veer the car over and wipe up what we can, and then rush home. Yum. It was everywhere on him and his carseat. He needed a bath and every part of the carseat needed to be scrubbed, washed and sanitized. He's still not really wanting to eat, and he apparently doesn't like Pediasure.

This was one of those incidents that they DON'T tell you about before you have kids...

Dave Matthews Band in South Park??

I don't know where this came from, but it's pretty funny.


I especially like Dave (on the left)! Enjoy!

Fine tuning

It's Friday again. Yippee! This week was a little rough, as the kids have become comfortable with the classroom and each other and have decided that it's okay to talk when I'm talking and read their library book when they're supposed to be working. Sigh. I've written some lunch detentions (which as a whole, they don't seem too phased by), and I'm sure many more are in my future. I know that discipline is my weakness. I'm trying to work on it, but it's hard. I'm lazy and don't like dealing with attitudes and crap. I did, however, tell a girl today that she needs to get her attitude in check, and that I AM IN CHARGE (even if she thinks otherwise) and that she needs to keep her mouth shut. She's a teenage girl with an attitude and that smart-allecky smile that makes me grit my teeth. I knew it was coming. And she won't be the last. I know what I was getting back into, with snotty girls and class clown boys, but I still don't like it. And I suppose I never will. Oh well.

I had a boy tell me yesterday that he loves me. And he's not special ed. He's what we will now call The Charmer. He smiles this cutesy grin and says some charming thing and expects that he won't get in trouble. Apparently it's worked in the past with his previous teachers. Anyway. Yesterday, I'm passing out some papers and he says to me, "Can I tell you something and you won't get mad?" (which immediately alarms me. What in the world is he going to tell me that I might get mad about?) Then he says, "I love you." I stopped handing out papers for a second, then I said something like, "why did you feel like telling me that?" And he said, "because you're my teacher and you teach me things and I love you." Uhh, okay. I guess he thought that would keep him in the clear for the school year to come. Sneaky.

Have I mentioned lately that we're moving in a week?!? I am so anxious, but a little stressed about it too. It feels like there's still a lot to do. It will all get done and soon we'll be settled and this tiny tincan of a place will be behind us--smoking, loud, partying neighbors and all. Yeah!!

I guess that's it for now. Mason's fussypants for no reason, so I must go. Talk at you later.

Happy Belated Birthday, Alize'!

I mentioned the birthday party we went to this weekend. I was looking at the pictures, and I thought that she deserved to have her picture on here. So, it's better late than never (even if her birthday was actually a week ago!)!

Busy

This weekend zoomed by. Friday, I was glad it was the weekend. Didn't do much. Yesterday, we went to a birthday party for the little girl that Mason's babysitter is adopting. It was a lot of fun. She got a Cabbage Patch Kid, with yarn hair!! I remember those!! It was very nostalgic. Then, we brought Mason home for a nap and we napped too. Oh, and my husband took the dog to get groomed (we just discovered a place down the street that does the bath, nails, ears and teeth for $10! Totally worth it!). After that, we went back out and took some stuff to the new place. It's so fun to go there, because we get more and more excited about moving. I'm not really enthusiastic about unpacking boxes, but I'll get over it. Then, we dropped some stuff off at Goodwill and went into town for dinner. It's a neat little brewery right in the middle of downtown, so we walked around a little afterwards. Mason enjoyed being on the square, running around in the grass, and they actually had SQUARE DANCERS at the square. Yep, I said square dancing. There were old couples promanading around and the old ladies had on poofy dresses that looked handmade. It was pretty awesome. Free entertainment. Today, we went to church and helped out in the gazebo out front and took Mason home for a nap. I took that time to take care of some school stuff. Later, we met Mason's babysitter's family for lunch (as we pretty much always do on Sundays). Then, we went to our new place to unload some stuff, and to Fry's for groceries. After that, I packed some boxes of stuff in Mason's room. At the end of the day, we went over to some friends' house so my husband could get some help making a nightstand. Mason and his future girlfriend played some, but they're still fine tuning their sharing skills.

Whew. No wonder I'm not sure where the weekend went. It was a pleasant weekend, but it went too fast. As always.

10 days until my birthday!!

I've had this blog pretty close to a year. I can't believe it. If you look back at August of last year, I had an entry entitled, "6 days until my birthday!" (Wow! Check out the pictures of Mason on the entries!! He was so little!!) I guess it would have been cooler to wait until the 15th and write the exact title again, but I figured I'd forget by then. So there. You have more time to really think about what to get me and you still have time to get it to the post office!! JK I'll be 28. Two more years until the
DREADED 3-0. Holy moly...

And I pause for a big sigh of relief...

The first week of school is over! Yeah!! I'm always more at ease once the first week is over. I know most of their names (need to work on nicknames for them, for the sake of the blog though), I know the routine, I am getting the hang of planning for two different grades and everything is coming along. And I actually don't mind those huge giants they call THE 8TH GRADERS. They're bigger. That's it. They're still silly kids with bodies full of hormones and they still like to talk when they shouldn't be, and they are little whiners at times. No biggie. I've been there, done that. And my 3rd/4th period is quite pleasant. They are quiet and do their work. I know it's the first week of school, so I'm not getting too excited, but I was still impressed.

I am so darned happy to just be teaching Language Arts again. I am in my element. No more science or math or social studies. I get to make kids read and write. And there's not much you can accomplish in life if you can't do either of those things. So, I feel that my job is pretty cool and important. Yeah me! And no more grading math or social studies or any other crap that I don't care much about. I get to give journal entries, word searches and writing assignments. And next week, we start our first novel. In 7th grade, I'm really excited, because I've decided we're going to read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (it's actually a book on the 6th grade Honors list, but none of my kids read it last year). And then I plan to show the movie in class at the end. Pretty awesome. We're gonna read The Call of the Wild in the 8th grade. A good book, but not Narnia.

So, in conclusion (or as previous students of mine have written in their conclusions: "I hoped you liked my paper on..." or "This is the end of my report..." or "This is the end of my report..."), I am enjoying being a Language Arts teacher again, and I actually hope to stick around longer than a year this time...

It's good to be home

It wasn't a bad first day, but it was very exhausting--mentally. I came in an hour before I needed to, putting up last minute posters and getting things ready. And even after extra time, I still felt butterflies doing jumping jacks in my stomach. I hate that feeling. I just felt nervous, because it was my First Day of School too.

I met my kids today, and I have to say, it should be an interesting year. My Homeroom (1st/2nd period) are 7th graders and they don't have much to say. Yet. My 6th grader from last year is in that class, but I tried not to pay him extra attention, as I'm sure it would embarass him. He seemed to adjust quickly to the public school environment. I saw his mom this morning and told her that I'd take care of him, and I still plan to. I just feel like I need to keep my eye on him and make sure no one runs him down.

Our Anniversary Day was really nice. We drove an hour and a half north, and went to the teacher store there (romantic, I know. but we don't have a decent one here) and went to their Target (because it's nicer and has a Starbucks) and went to the movies. "Pirates" was really good. Definitely left it a cliffhanger for the 3rd...

Let me explain the picture. While at Target, we bought Mason an Elmo chair, because he loves Elmo (even though he's never even seen Sesame Street), and he loves sitting and watching "Veggietales". But most of the time, Mason just climbs on it and tries to put it up on the couch. And our dog Max thinks it's his own lounge chair. Had to take a picture of it.

Well, we move in less than 3 weeks!! With school starting, I feel like I'm going a million miles an hour. So, bear with me if I don't write for awhile. Ta ta.