Welcome back kiddies!

Well, the first day back wasn't as bad as I had expected.  I even let my physics class play with open pipe resonators. (Little plastic tubes that you swing in a circle to make noise).  My fifth period chemistry class went on a field trip so I only had two students.  I guess a week of boredom at home has made them anxious to get back to school to visit with their friends.  I"m saying a prayer that it keeps up like this.

Now the fun begins...

Oh boy.  Spring break is almost over and the kids have three weeks of school left.  Actually, two weeks and four days since the last Friday is Field Day, so no classes.  It will be interesting to see if they are anxious to be back at school or if they are ready for summer to be here.  I'm hoping this next week they will be calm.  I have not been observed by the principal yet this year.  I am supposed to get evaluated twice a year.  I'm betting she will wait until close to the last day of school when the kids are completely unmanageable to observe me.  I have that kind of luck.  Well, wish me luck!

4/20 Finally a break!

Amazingly not too bad a day.  Most of my 11th graders were on a field trip, 10th graders had to dissect a flower and 12th graders took a vocabulary quiz today.  (Tip for new teachers:  Always give a test on the day before a long holiday break just to keep the kids from becoming impossible to deal with.)  Actually made it out of there before 4pm, which was great because I'm starting my spring break by heading north to my family and friends.  Talk to you all in about nine days!

4/19 Friday Eve!!!

So, test tomorrow for some classes.  I had them doing the end of chapter review questions (1-22) and they start whining, "We never learned this!"  I told them we had read the entire chapter and done the vocabulary.  They exclaimed, "We can't learn that way!"  I felt like saying, "I can't grab your hand and force you to write the vocabulary and I can't grab your head and slam it into the book and force the information into your head." But I held back. Then they started, "We don't have enough notes for this open note test."  I informed them that they were welcome to take their books home and write all the notes they wanted to write before the test tomorrow. That shut them up.  Victory!  In the words of another teacher at my school..."You can't fix stupid." Just got to get through tomorrow, then nine whole days before I have to be back!  Woohoo!

4/18 Fred 8's gonna be a writer!

My "lab rat", the student who helps me in the lab, has just submitted an article to examiner.com.  I'm so excited that he had the discipline to write an article and the courage to submit it.  I've been writing for them for about a year now and have gotten a lot of satisfaction out of it, albeit not a lot of money.  I hope this will put him on a path to a bright future!  All the other kids were horrible today, except for my physics class.  We watched an earthquake movie in lieu of wave problems, so they were model students.  Nothing like the threat of math problems to get a bunch of seniors to sit quietly and behave.  I'm figuring these guys out a little at a time!

4/17 Three days until Spring Break

Some days I can't find a single student that I like.  I know it's getting close to the end of the year.  And I know that the kids are just acting like kids do when it's this close to summer vacation.  But, man!  I had one student today who came screaming to me because she made a 69 on a test.  An OPEN BOOK test.  An OPEN BOOK test that they took on Friday and did so poorly on that I gave it back to them to do on Monday to correct any wrong answers!  She's never made a 69.  And I guarantee that her mom will call the school tomorrow screaming just like she did today.
It just seems like these students whine about not knowing anything, then whine when they are expected to learn something.  Lazy I can deal with.  Dumb I can deal with.  But lazy, dumb and whiny make me want to pull my hair out!  God, I hope I can make it through the last eighteen days without telling them what I really think of them!

4/16 After Prom- Before Spring Break. Rock. Hard Place.

I feel like I've survived walking through a hornet's nest.  Between all the excitement about Prom last Saturday (yes, I did have to work it) and spring break coming up next week, it was all I could do to get the kids to get quiet and pay attention to their lessons.  On top of that, someone in the teacher next door's classroom turned the thermostat to heat.  Lucky me, his thermostat controls the temperature for both of our rooms.  I began sweating and had a momentary fear that I was having a hot flash.  I was supposed to take my zoology kids to dissect frogs today (ok, it was supposed to be last week), but I couldn't get them settled down enough to get them to the lab.  No way was I going to hand them scalpels and probes!  Hopefully, tomorrow they will be in control enough to get these frogs cut open.  If not, we are moving on.  I still have to cover reptiles, birds and mammals by the end of May.  This is one of the few times I actually closed my door after my last class and said "Whew!"  I have a nagging fear that this is just the beginning of things to come this week.

4/13 Prom Weekend

Sometimes it's good to teach the higher grades.  All the junior and senior girls and most of the junior and senior guys checked out early to prepare for prom tomorrow.  I had about three classes that had enough students to do anything in.  Two of those had a test and the rest either watched a science movie or just hung out.  I am doing a favor for another teacher and working prom for him.  So now I have to get dressed up tomorrow and stand in the parking lot from 2:30pm until whenever they let me go home.  Just ruins my Saturday.  Oh well, he owes me now and I have morning bus duty coming up.  Hehehehehe.....

The only bad luck so far on this Friday the 13th was that my little plastic desk chair broke today.  Luckily, I had just gotten out of it before it broke.

4/12 I'm a pushover for a guy in a wheelchair

Well, my blow up and write up of Fred 7 didn't last long.  He stopped by this morning before school began to explain that he was not "throwing" the desk. He explained that he was just trying to get it over some backpacks in the floor.  Now, in the back of my mind, I know he threw it on purpose just because everyone else was making noise.  However, he looked so contrite in his wheelchair, and he is usually a very well-behaved young man in class.  So, considering I've given my other write ups numerous warnings before writing them up, I decided to repeal his write up.  Only problem was, every time I went to the principal to get it, she was gone.  Hope I can get it tomorrow morning before he has to go to ISS.

4/11 Holy Crap! We're out of Coffee!

I kinda figured it would be a rough day when I arrived at work and there was only one pot of decaf coffee and no regular coffee.  To make matters worse, the decaf ran out after I had only had one cup. I handled it with amazing calmness...until 6th period.  That is the class of athletes.  The one class where the kids are hard to get on task and who a few of you have already been introduced to (Freds 1,2,3).  Needless to say, they came in like Banshees.  One student, who broke his leg and is in a wheelchair, came hopping in while someone else came flying in behind him in his wheelchair, crashing into the desks and making all kinds of racket.  Then, the students started moving desks around, loudly.  I told them to keep the desks in a straight line.  After a couple more loud bangs of desks into each other, I yelled for everyone to get seated and quiet.  My broken leg kid, Fred7, picked up a desk and tossed it out of his way.  When it crashed onto the concrete floor, I had had enough.  I sent him to the office and wrote him up for throwing the desk across the room.  I wanted to write up a few more, but I had to actually start teaching at some point.  Hopefully tomorrow, the coffee pot will be full.  If  not, I may go home sick.

4/10 Field trip for seniors

I was so excited that the seniors were going to a job fair today.  Not only would it give me a couple hours to play catch up with grading papers, but the students would be able to see what's out there job-wise.  Turns out there's not much out there.  Students told me that it was mostly Mary Kay and Avon, but they got some really cool cups and toys.  My two hours to play catch up fell through when I found out I had to cover the classes of the teacher going on the field trip.  Figures.  Didn't know what to do with them, so we watched Rango...again.  That movie is getting so old.  And I still don't know how it ends!

4/9 Countdown to Spring Break.

Well, the Easter holiday is behind us and the students and teachers returned to school today.  Apparently, it was senior skip day, so I only had four students in one senior class and six in another...and one checked out during class.  Lesson plans shot for those guys, so we watched Rango.  Thought about creating a really hard test and telling them tomorrow that they missed it and need to make it up.  Haven't decided if I will get them or not.  Well, in the lab, the mouse is gone and I still haven't gotten in there to clean.  Had to post grades, enter lesson plans into computer and type up an incident report about the lab fiasco.  Didn't get out of there until after 5pm.  Hopefully, tomorrow I will get the lab cleaned up.  Still have to set it up for frog dissections.  The only thing is...all I can think about is one week and four days until Spring Break.  And I know the kids are doing the same thing.  It's bad enough when the kids don't feel like doing anything, but when I don't want to do anything either, it's hard to stay focused.  I just hope I can hold out!

4/5 Stormy Weather Expected

With Spring Break and Summer coming up so soon, it's always difficult to keep the students engaged in learning.  The warm weather hasn't helped much, either.  Of course, when you throw in a long weekend with Friday off, the natives get downright restless.  Well, either that or sleepy.  I trudged on, until the school got a little panicked with the weather situation.  Apparently, the Texas storms that had such bad tornadoes, are heading this way.  The principal turned off the bells and then sent everyone to lunch about an hour early.  Students got very excited thinking they were leaving early - but, surprise! - we left at the regular time.  Looks like the jokes on the students this time!  LOL

4/4 Doughnuts are here!

I am so sick of having these doughnut sales for a fundraiser.  I think this is the third one we've had this year.  I can't buy them because I keep preaching about the importance of eating healthy and how junk food is poison.  Lucky for me that enough people around school do buy them...and share them with me. :-)  Of course, it makes it very difficult for me to explain to the students why, if I'm eating so darn healthy, I can't seem to lose all this weight.  (I usually just tell them that I'm staying this weight on purpose.)  Think they believe it?  Hopefully, all doughnuts will be gone by tomorrow.

4/3 Chemistry Olympiad results

I'm still in a state of shock, so forgive me if I ramble.  A couple of weeks ago, I gave my chemistry and physics students the chemistry Olympiad pre-test.  I honestly didn't think they had a shot of making it past the preliminary stage, but I did want to see just how far behind we were compared with the rest of the nation.  Plus, it gave me a day of not having to do lesson plans.
Well, today the results are in and TWO of my students (Freds 5 and 6) have been invited to compete in the National Chemistry Olympiad!  The funny thing is:  the smartest student in school was the main reason I agreed to give the test.  I figured that he had a shot at making it, or at least of getting a scholarship out of it.  He was not one of the students invited.  I'm still puzzled by that.  But, what's even more amazing is that only ten students in the whole state get to compete in the national level and two of them came from my school!  Here, I thought we were so far behind the rest of the world, but apparently we are doing just fine...or it could be my amazing teaching ability has increased their intellect in science.  Yea, I think I'll give them that "you would be nothing without me!" speech so that if one of them wins, they will feel inclined to thank their favorite teacher.  (NOTE TO SELF: You are the best science teacher ever!)  This might be the only opportunity I have to say that. LOL

4/2 Fred4 Doesn't Like Me.

Have you ever had to be around someone who just absolutely hates you?  And they go out of their way to let you know it?  I have a student like that.  Last semester, I almost wrote her up for some drama she tried to pull when I wouldn't let her go to another teacher's room for a novel she had left.  I got her out into the hallway and she burst into tears.  I talked to her a moment and gave her another chance.  However, ever since that incident, she has taken every opportunity available to make little digs and comments to try to hurt my feelings or make me feel bad.  I assume that she was so humiliated when I called her to the hallway that she hasn't gotten over it.  The fact that she did it to herself, doesn't seem to register.  Anyway, I usually ignore it and move on.  Which is what I did today.

  Our word of the week is compassion.  Each teacher is supposed to have a mini-lesson on it.  I put up quotes from famous people and discuss them.  Today's quote went something like "People who don't feel compassion do so because they don't like themselves.  If they make friends with themselves, then compassion would flow out of their heart and mind."  Something like that.  I asked the class if they agreed with the saying.  Fred4 chimed in that she did not agree with the quote because if she didn't like, oh for example, me (snickers can be heard around the room), she would still like herself just fine.  I started to corner her as to why she wouldn't like me (hypothetically, of course), but didn't want to put her on the spot, so I replied something about how people who like themselves would typically feel bad when they hurt others and how usually when people are mean to others, they are simply reflecting what they are feeling inside.  Then, because I didn't want her to think I was speaking to her personally, I continued on with our lesson.

Every year, you get at least one student who thinks she is allowed to do whatever she wants, and when she is told no, she becomes impossible to be around.  Fred4 is mine.  Luckily, she learned what I will do when pushed and hasn't crossed that line again, but it still makes me feel sad that she is only nice when it suits her.  I feel very sorry for her when she gets out in the real world and realizes that she is not queen there either.

On a happier note, only two weeks and three days until spring break!