First First Week

Entry posted by Guest September 10, 2005

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So I made it through the first week of school. It was interesting, to say the least. On Tuesday I was told that since I am department head (which I just found out I don’t get paid for, by the way) I had to make 35 copies of the pretest for each teacher by Thursday. That meant that I had two days to make 210 copies of a 26 page document. Plus, the collator on the copier was broken so I had to hand collate them. Ah, the joys of leadership. I get to teach both 7th and 8th grade English again this year, so I have about 15 students this year that I had last year. After the bell on the second day of class one of them came up to me to ask me to settle an argument she was having with a friend. Her friend had had sex with a boy while she was on her period and didn’t use protection, but thought that she couldn’t be pregnant since her period didn’t stop. My student thought that her friend was an idiot and I confirmed that she was. This proves, once again, that my students are superior in every way to other people’s students.One of the other students I have this year that I also had last year is a very low level kid. He tested in the first percentile on the state test in sixth grade (I don’t have the scores from last year yet). He is three points too stupid for special ed (I am so upset about that, I can’t even tell you), so he will probably fail everything forever since he doesn’t qualify for extra help or pullout classes. He failed my class all last year and so I thought he wouldn’t exactly be keen on having me again. However, one of his other teachers told me that he was really excited that I was his teacher. You could have knocked me over with a feather. Maybe if I work really hard I can get him to a D this year. It is one of my many goals.We have two counselors at our school. One of them quit this week. Scheduling should be fun. And by fun I mean freakin’ terrible. We are the only school in our area that can accept kids from No Child Left Behind. This means that we can expect a ton of students to transfer into our school in the next two months. Unfortunately, we haven’t yet enrolled all of the students who are supposed to go here, and we are already almost at full capacity. I’m glad I’m not a counselor. Or an administrator for that matter. On a positive note, he came to my room to say goodbye and told me that it was a joy to watch me teach. That made me happy.Also, for those of you who read my rantings last year, the school psychologist with whom I had a run-in is no longer with the school and neither is the teacher who shoved the students. I am pleased. I wish I could take personal credit for it, but I don’t actually think either one happened because of me. Hopefully the new people will be better. We have a new nurse too. She gave me band-aids and rubber gloves, which is good because one of my seventh graders somehow managed to stab herself in the finger while taking her pretest and dripped blood all over the desk and her test and herself. Now I know that rubber gloves are all powdery and gross feeling on the inside. Blech. Next week is the real actual first week of school (where I get to teach instead of explain rules and give pretests). Stay tuned for an exciting new episode of De Teaches English, wherein De actually teaches English. Ooooh, the excitement!

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Mezrabad 148

Posted September 10, 2005

He is three points too stupid for special ed (I am so upset about that, I can’t even tell you)

What the FRACK? He not smart enough for Special ED so they make him stay in the regular classes? That makes NO sense!!! I fume with you.

On a positive note, congrats for the praise you've been getting! My wife teaches and I know it means a lot to her when someone takes the time to compliment what is essentially a huge part of her identity. At least you have something to smile about as you make those 210 26-page long booklets.