So I have not had time to update the blog much at all. I have been working about 95 hours a week for the past month and a half and now we are on fall break so I finally have time to update/sleep/reflect etc.! I do not remember everything that has happened these past nine weeks but I will try to fill you in on the main points:
Highlights:
-The first interaction I had at the high school where I teach was with the teacher’s union representative. My roommate (who also works at the same high school) and I went to school about 2 weeks before it started to try to get some information on what we were teaching/our classrooms etc. We did not get that information but we did meet this lovely lady – we introduced ourselves, she laughed, said we were going to get eaten up and we better find a way to look older. Well needless to say she was right. The next week at the “freshman open house” about 1/5 of parents/freshman attended, the general consensus was “WHAT HOW OLD ARE YOU” and then the whole you are going to get eaten alive sayings.
-I am teaching freshman algebra 1, the second week of school I gave all my children a diagnostic to see where they were at. No one passed the diagnostic (the diagnostic was based on sixth grade math standards). So the second week of school I realized that most of my children did not have any concept of number sense, integers, or even their multiplication tables.
-There are constantly fights at school – usually nothing serious, just a couple punches thrown and then the security officers come. But this one fight was particularly bad. A student initially was planning on joining a gang, but then his mom got really upset and the student ended up not joining the gang (obviously a good decision). But the gang did not respond favorably to his decision. During a lunch period, people snuck into the school and really hurt the student, they punched him into glass trophy cases (the glass shattered) and the student ended up having to go to the intensive care unit. So there was a bunch of drama/rumors surrounding that story and who was involved etc. I recently found out it was one of my students (who ended up transferring schools for protection).
-About the third week of school one of the teacher’s laptops got stolen. They had the student that did it on camera but a lot of the teacher’s were not able to identify the student so all the teacher’s had to go look and see if they could. So I go down to the office to watch the video (assuming that I will not know the student) and of course I know exactly who it is – it was one of my students. I really like the kid and didn’t want to rat him out, especially because he was probably stealing the lap top because his family has no money. But I did the “right thing” and told the administrator who it was. Thankfully, he only got suspended for a week instead of getting expelled.
-I do tutoring most days after school for a couple of hours. It is not as effective as it could be just because there are so many kids at it. This one particular day there were about 13 students at tutoring – it was pretty crazy. Three of the students kept on picking on this one boy - making fun of him because he had man boobs mostly. I did not think much of it, but when tutoring was over I talked to the three boys and told them to stop picking on the other boy etc. Well apparently I was not that persuasive, the three “mean” boys followed the other boy home and jumped him. Thankfully, the student was fine but he “snitched” on them so his troubles are far from over. The three boys got suspended for seventeen days so they were absent most of the quarter and have learned next to nothing.
-Grades closed on Thursday. I would say about 60% of my students have D’s/F’s. Many of the parents call and complain/yell at me already so after they see the grades I am anxious to see what their reactions will be.
-Last Thursday a student also brought a gun to school. He carried the gun around in his backpack until last period, when a teacher figured out something was sketchy about this student. After the teacher’s suspicion and notification to all the principals it took the administration 40 minutes to respond (come to the room) – VERY comforting.
-One of my students was really upset about failing my class and still had to make up a test. So I let him come to tutoring during the planning/records day. During tutoring I realized that he did not know the difference between and addition and a subtraction sign. My students are very far behind, but it was very upsetting that he was THAT far behind.
Funny things kids say
-One of my students was throwing up in class (probably not actually throwing up, just throwing up for attention) and another student says to him “your throwing up because you stay kissin fat girls”
-I do not let my students go to the bathroom during class (usually) so after one of my students asked to go to the bathroom and I said no, the student responds “I got shit my ass CANNOT hold” and I still would not let him go then he goes “shit is coming OUT my ass”
-One of my students gets detention EVERY FRIDAY for like three hours. He does not want to stop talking ever. He is pretty funny though and has named himself the “president of detention” so when new students come to detention he welcomes them and tells them the rules. Even though I really like this student I am getting very frustrated that he constantly talks in my class. I tried to call his parents before but they only speak Spanish and had to hang up on me because they could not understand what I was saying. So one of my co-teachers is fluent in Spanish and offered to call this students parents. Right before he called this student was spoken to about talking in detention and how he CANNOT TALK FOR THE REST OF DETENTION. So the co-teacher calls the students mom (speaking in Spanish so I have no idea what is going on ) then they get off the phone and we tell the student again to stop talking etc. The teacher leaves and the student goes “Ms. M can I tell you something” and I said “what is it” and the student goes “He just told my mom I was in jail” haha I guess there were still some language barriers.
I am going to try really hard to update more but as it is I work from 5am-2:10 then I have debate practice/tutoring after school so I end up getting home around 7ish. Then on Saturday’s I tutor from about 10-4 then on Sundays I do all my planning and copying! But I will try to definitely write down more of the funny things they say and do!
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