I'm back in the blogging business! I've missed writing because there has just been so much to do in the life of a first year teacher. In-between lesson planning, correcting papers (see the attached photo of my living room a few weekends ago), meetings, and paper work, writing in a blog is the last thing on my "to-do" list. However, today I've made some room.
Today was a blue day due to a number of factors. Number one being that it is snowing quite heavily outside. Therefore, the students were very restless with anticipation of school canceling early (which it did not). The weather jumped from negative three to about twenty today. Although it amounts to jumping up the thermometer from "frigid" to just plain "cold," it is still a twenty-degree increase.
Additionally, last night the Packers lost. It was a difficult game to watch after such a successful season. It is hard to imagine a football team having a major effect on the attitudes of so many of your students and co-workers. However, living in Wisconsin, that just comes with the territory. As the green and gold do, so does your Monday morning attitude...even after an NFC Championship Game that should have been won on more than one missed opportunity :(
The end of the 2nd grading quarter is wrapping up on Thursday. Last week, I made a number of phone calls to about twenty parents (of whom I took the liberty of calling in my unpaid time off of school) to update them that their child is in danger of failing social studies in the next week. I called to inform them that their child's quarter success could be gained or lost in a matter of seven days. Many parents were appreciative of me calling, and I've seen improvements in many of these students grades.
However, what really gets me irritated, is when YOU care more about the student's grade more than the student and their parents combined. I called the parents of the five children who are literally failing social studies, and I gave them an ultimatium: that if they turn-in all missed work by today, that I would ensure that they pass with a D-. Two of these students turned-in work (one hands me his missing work and feels the need to inform me that he missed playing video games for a month because of me. I told him, "you're welcome").
One of these failing students told me today that she left it at home "even though I have it done and my parents signed it, I can't get it because no one is home until later tonight. Oh, by the way, do you have another copy of today's homework? I lost it." She was actually pretty tricky about how she told me too... in the middle of the crowded hallway, on my way to class, with three of her friends surrounding her; thus preventing me from giving her a stern lecture. I said if it is not in my hands tomorrow, she fails social studies.
Then, on my way out the door into the cold, the principal comes up to me and says that a parent called him today to say that she's been trying to contact me all week to talk to me about her child's progress (which made me wonder, "Why didn't she just call me up? Plus, what she said is a bold-faced LIE because I left a message on her phone asking her to call me, and she failed to do so... unless the janitor has secretly been taking my phone calls, erasing my caller ID at night, or hacking into my e-mail and deleting all the messages).
I'm 23 years old... do I really have more responsibility than these parents?! It's ridiculous!
On top of that, I have a really cool lesson planned for the students this week. We are going to have a class debate on Wednesday as to whether or not we should have Andrew Jackson's face on the $20 bill replaced with Dr. King's. Students were separated into teams (which I even tried to put students into groups with their friends).
The student's replies to my efforts? "That's gay." I was up until 11:30 at night, planning this lesson, and they feel the need to tell me that my lesson is living an alternative sexual lifestyle. Fantastic.
I sometimes wonder on my 30 min drive home from work... is this all really worth it? What if I were to get a desk job somewhere, where I don't have to deal with irresponsibility, or have to bring my work home, and still make 2x as much money?
Then I remember overhearing a student say to her friend today that, "last night I couldn't sleep. So, I got out of my bed, went to my computer and typed my opening speech for our class debate on Wednesday. I'm so excited!"
Not to mention, "Doctor Hansen" giving me a fist-pound and telling me, "Mr. Anderson, you're such a cool dude!"
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