AuburnChick's Adventures

I’m finding myself getting lazier and lazier as the school year marches closer to its end.

I only have three pictures from the week.

Let me think why…

Hmmm…

Most of my students had attended MIST (Muslim Interscholastic Tournament).  The bus did not pull into Podunk, USA until 3am, so most of the parents gave their children permission to stay home and sleep.

I, being the planner that I am, knew this, so I took it easy on the five high schoolers who did show up.  Their minds were mush.  Two of them slept in class, and I did not have the heart to disturb them.  One of them, my tenth grade guy who has my class last period, slept so hard that he did not even hear the bell ring at the end of the day.  I couldn’t bear to wake him, so I left him sleeping in my class.  I just turned out the light and gently closed the door.  His parents teach at the school, so I left word with the principal and made my way home.

My 6th graders were not old enough to attend MIST, so we had class.

They are reading a biography about Abd al-Rahman Ibrahima, a West African prince who was captured during a battle, shipped to America, and sold as a slave.  He tried to explain that he was from a royal family, but his master had paid a lot of money for him, so there was no way Ibrahima was going to be allowed to go free.  He worked as a slave for forty years before friends, sympathetic to his plight, petitioned the President to act on his behalf.  Finally, Ibrahima’s master agreed to free him, and Ibrahima returned to Africa.  However, he died before ever finding his family.

It is a very sad story.  The kids love it because Ibrahima was Muslim, so it is a story they can connect to.  One of the things that teachers have to do is help their students make connections.  This is what all of us, in essence, must do to better comprehend what we read.

On Tuesday, my high school students still weren’t quite with it, but I still tried to teach them.  We began a unit on social injustice, and I outlined Marian Anderson’s story.  I found footage of her singing in front of the Lincoln Memorial in 1939.  While her style of music was not our favorite, we discussed the relevance of that performance.  My plan is for my students to research a social injustice and, specifically, one person who worked (or is working) to eradicate the injustice.

My 6th graders did something really cute on Tuesday.  I think that, for whatever reason, the second week back from Spring Break had caught up to them.

After they finished their ten-minute Silent Sustained Reading, I sat down with them to continue our discussion of the biography we had been reading.

Well, those sweet students looked at me like they just were not into the lesson.

As a teacher, you quickly figure out when kids are spaced out.

One of the students asked if they could read the entire class period.

I looked at them, looked down at my book, and looked back up.

“Yes, I think that’s a great thing to do today.”

“Really?” they asked.

Someone said, “You’re not April-fooling us again, are you?”

teehee

Nope, I wasn’t.  I made a split-second decision and ran with it.

They read all class period and were happy as larks.

Sometimes you have just got to go with the moment.

On Wednesday, my 9th-12th grades had their Seventeen Second Miracle book discussions.

I love Wednesdays!  I love hearing their answers to the questions I present.  I love hearing their stories about things that they have done or that others have done for them.

BigTimeGleek wrote an excellent review of the book on her blog.  She did a great job of explaining how it is affecting her life as well.

I think my favorite thing about this book study is reading my students’ reflective journals.  Most of them (cough) are doing an excellent job in assessing their feelings after they purposely do things for others, but more importantly, they are describing how they feel when others treat them in an especially kind manner.

This is life, people…or at least what life should be like…looking for opportunities to serve and recognizing when others have served us selflessly.

Meanwhile, my 6th graders were ready to resume the story we had been reading.  My decision the day before to allow them to read had been perfect.  They came to class refreshed.

On Thursday, I administered vocabulary tests…

I think I’ve said, a time or two, how much I love Vocabulary Test days.

I’m a little bit evil.

I’ve earned the right.  heehee

There’s something delightful about the hissing sound of brain cells frying as they try to remember the vocabulary words that they should have absorbed into their bodies but put off learning until ten minutes before the test despite all warnings by a “certain” teacher to study a little bit every day.

*cough*

Now, I’ve gotta tell you that Thursday was not a great day for me.

Oh, you’d think that vocab tests are easy, and I agree.  However, one of my classes that shall remain nameless decided to give me a very, very hard time.

I was stressed.

This class continues to beat me down, and I feel like Rocky Balboa after he’s been pummeled.

I also had a lot of work to do after school…grading and progress reports to finalize…

I was very depressed after school, but my friend, Jane, helped me feel better.

When I arrived at school on Friday, I was back to my regular self.

I worked with my students on the storyboards they are creating for their Seventeen Second Miracle movie projects.  The storyboards are due tomorrow.

Friday should have gone smoothly, but of course, it didn’t.

That same class mentioned above (cough) decided they weren’t done with me.

I had ammo, though…

Detention slips.

Although I did not write anyone up, I have a sneaky suspicion that I will have to this week.

Sometimes, a teacher does all he or she can and then has to resort to extreme measures.

I’m done playing.

I’m putting on my high-heeled shoes and getting VERY serious (although I thought up to this point I had been).

I refuse to allow two or three students to spoil the opportunity for other students to learn.

Discipline is such a tough thing when you are a teacher.  I’ve had a couple of parents tell me to “overlook” stuff, but you just cannot overlook disrespect and disturbances that halt the learning process.

Sigh.

I hate being mean.

Oh well.  Such is life, eh?

I was so glad when the final bell rang on Friday, and I did not stick around to chit-chat.  Out the door I went to spend time with my fur babies…the ones who don’t care about anything except being fed on time and being loved on at least a gajillion times a day.

Pele decided, though, that he’d had a long week too…

He looked as tired as I felt.

There’s no rest for the weary, though.  Lesson plans and rubrics awaited me…

Onward to Week 34.  I sure hope it goes by faster than last week and is filled with less drama too.

Filed under: Teaching | Tagged: Seventeen Second Miracle, teaching |