I am a level 72 Lock

Ok, you might have been wondering where I've been. Mostly in Azeroth or Stormwind and lately in the Borean Tundra. I've been playing World of Warcraft. Ok, playing a lot of Warcraft. I don't watch TV anymore and my book reading has dropped off but I can say I've really been enjoying myself. I'm in a guild with people I respect and like and love playing with people all over the country. A huge society of geeks. The drama with the ins and outs of personalities in the guild can be annoying but I'm also amazed by the simple kindnesses that I see from strangers. It's probably kept me from going absolutely crazy while trying to get through another year at my school. Yes, my name is Greatlady and I'm a level 72 Warlock. Until Thanksgiving break that is, when I hope to get to level 75.

Grades-to D or Not to D

Received a phone call from my favorite AP yesterday about 3 of my students who averaged out to 69's for the year. Kinda embarrassed about it because I thought I had double-checked that. He was actually apologetic because some glitch in the grading system did not average out the final grades for us. Pretty sure I can add multiples and divide by two however. Obviously I can't since I missed these kids' grades. See, we are highly discouraged from giving a 69 or even a 68. In all honesty, I typically bump the kids up that one point. One kid is Sped and I am OK with moving her up because I've seen progress from her. The other two have gone from pretty decent B/C students to failing this past semester. They are both in the same class and so hormonally driven to aggravate each other that they managed to antagonize the whole class. Both turned in their last project a week late which I reluctantly gave a 50 instead of a zero because it was a week until school got out. Both were given chances to do extra credit. Both were given study packets for their final exam which they both bombed. I don't know what other classes they failed or what good repeating the semester will do them but I just couldn't tell my AP to give them the point. He has been an extremely supportive AP and altogether nice dude. The fact that he called me to ask about it speaks volumes about some of the differences between suburbia-land ISD and Dallas ISD. He may even have to catch from flak from some parents who were duly notified with three progress reports and a phone call. Sometimes parents are quite civil and understanding until they actually see the grade on the report card. Hearing the word, Failing, on the phone seems to have less of an impact than seeing the grade on paper. My emotional "Love the Sinner not the Sin" part was saying that the easy thing would have been to just give them the point. My critical-thinking "Thou Shalt Not" part was saying that they didn't work for it or even learned the material enough to earn the point. I am second guessing myself today but I guess when I sub for summer school in July I might find out for sure if I made the right decision. Won't they be happy to see me.

Swan song for a Helluva Year

My family refers to the past year as "a helluva year". My whole focus the past couple of months had just been to get through the school year w/o committing myself into the Parkland psych ward. Yesterday the last exam ended at 1:00 with grades due by 4:30. Hope everyone showed up, hope the front office didn't send out multiple emailing about how this kid or that kid should be marked failing because of absences, then NO, never mind, he has suddenly made up all 2,065 absences he had by sitting in the front office for two hours making up his exam he missed while being suspended for throwing food during the three lunch period long food fight.....If that made no sense then imagine trying to finish grades while being bombarded with contradicting emails. Anyway, I walk my paper grade validation sheets down to the office even though our grades are on-line and just as I hand them over everything goes kinda gray and fuzzy and I am suddenly sitting on the floor just as light-headed as can be. Well that was interesting. The school nurse asked me about my stress levels. Hee hee. I think my teacher fuse just couldn't handle the relief and just clicked off. My swan song for the school year: sitting on the floor of the office laughing like a loon. Put a fork in me, my room is packed up, my cabinets are bursting with things I really don't want to see for several months, and I am so glad this "helluva year" is over.

Pearl Story

"Pearl" cheats. It doesn't matter what we are working on, I can say with certainty that she has never done anything w/o copying some portion from someone else. At first I believed that she was trying to cover up reading difficulties or was just really lost but over time I realized that my Pearl is just a scammer. One of the first things you pick up as a teacher is the "Lingo": Scammer, Dude, Trippin', my personal favorite, "Eskippiando". Pearl has taken scamming to a artistic level. Cell phone cheating, little scraps of notes cheating, have to move all students away from her during tests cheating, paper on the floor cheating, writing on leg cheating, you always lose my paper scamming, tapping answer on desk cheating, copying from papers taken from my inbox, taking papers from other kid's binders, someone stole my paper scamming, emergency in the bathroom cheating. The best was the surprise visit before school to say hello and then taking a test off my desk to fill out and pass off as her own later in the day. Too bad she grabbed one of my SPED modified tests for my Foundations kids. That incident was actually kind of amusing. Pearl is not a morning person and she had to get up early for that. She probably spent more time trying to scam than it would have taken her to actually do the work or study. Pearl's many scams did make me realize several things about myself.
1.) Despite it all, I still trust my kids. I do believe that the majority of my kids will do the right thing.
2.) I am not stupid. I do have to do a little more work like multiple tests to prevent cheating. I have also moved my in-boxes next to my desk.
3.) The best thing to do is monitor my kids constantly. Not just in case of cheating. In case they need help, in case they don't get it, in case they just need a little attention, in case they don't believe they can do it on their own w/o cheating, in case they don't how to do anything w/o cheating.

Whiffle this year

I would personally like to find the Texas State Legislator who proposed the school year change that pushed us past Memorial Day and beat him/her silly with a whiffle bat. I feel like I am torturing these kids and myself. They are so far gone right now that I am just a glorified babysitter. Final Exam? Hee hee hee. I swear I am dumbing it down on a daily basis. My kids are losing brain cells by the class period. Whiffle, whiffle, whiffle!!! Whap! Whap! Whap!

Wonder where your students will be in 10 years?

My sister had to go to the pharmacy to get a prescription filled for her cat. When she gave the young woman at the counter the presciption, she was asked for the patient's birthdate. My sister explained that she didn't know because it was for her cat. The woman looked at her quizzically and asked her if her cat had ever filled her presciptions there before. At that moment my sister couldn't hold it together any longer and started laughing. When the poor girl started to ask for the cat's phone number, she collapsed in hysterics. My sister felt really bad for laughing but I am just a little concerned that this person is working in a pharmacy.

Next Year

Middle ground. I can survive without constant peaks and I know the pitfalls of this profession are the unavoidable valleys you run into working with kids. But why can't I achieve a middle ground? Had several weeks of real excitement about next year because I had been told that I could teach a history class and probably some AP classes. This week, belated news that they really wanted me to stay with the 9th graders. Didn't tell me until I had heard it from several other people who had seen the master schedule already. It felt like damage control to me. It probably would have stung less if I hadn't been told from another teacher that they'd just hired a teacher for that position from our feeder middle school. Sigh. OK, I can understand. I am good with ESL and SPED kids. I also know that I tend to get certain kids because I have a good reputation with handling some of the more difficult kids. But come on. Throw me a bone. Throw me some nerds. Please rescue me from freshmen. They are really different now and as any teacher knows, they are "YOUR KIDS" this time of year. But I keep thinking back to October when I had over 170 "STUDENTS" and would have walked out the door if the opportunity had presented itself. Opportunity meaning the ability to survive w/o living out of my car of course. I know I can go home for the summer, take some good classes and recharge those educational batteries. I just don't know if I have the edumacational battery life to put up with another first 6 weeks like I had last year. Too many days of Death Valley. How about a few more days of Hill Country?

Zen and the Art of Biting your Tongue

Designer Jane started telling me about her vacation plans today as if she had never attempted to bite my head off the other day. In the middle of all her jet-setting info, she drops the bomb that her mother is pregnant and that Jane is devastated. Besides the fact that Jane's a freshman in high school and she's probably horrified by the idea that her mother might be having sex, Jane is suddenly confronted with competition. My little Jane has been an only child up until now. Things are gonna change. I sympathized nicely with her and she wished me a good weekend as she walked out the door. Oh well, at least I am a favored chew toy. Glad I was able to not say what I really wanted to say the other day. Just keep chanting, "Summer, summer, summer."