My Fun Trip to Mexico

The Texas-Mexico Border in Laredo

The two hours I spent in Mexico were great. I called one of my students to express my excitement about being in Mexico, went to some stores, ate lunch and walked around. Yeah, so it wasn't really a trip to Mexico, but more of a trip to South Texas, which sounds bad but really wasn't. There are, contrary to what people will tell you, some kind of pretty beaches in this state. I really liked Mustang Island, where I had my first lesson on how to drive a standard transmission automobile. 

Since my vow to not talk about work on this site anymore, I've been pretty silent. It's not that I've got nothing to say, it's just that any time I start talking about anything interesting, like politics, current events, etc. it always comes back to my job and the frustrations surrounding it. So...

I don't know how I do this - I get near the computer and suddenly time lapses and I'm up past when I need to be in bed. Only one more week and I'm on vacation...35 more hours in that building....but I'm not talking about work, so goodnight.

Taking a Break

I think I need to quit this thing. It's enough that I worry about work at work, when I wake up in the morning, when I go to sleep at night...I could at least reserve myself some time to not deal with my increasingly stressful job. I'm making one last entry, tonight, then this site is going to have to become something else.

Last year was, minute to minute, much more stressful than this one. Last year was all about survival, getting through each day. I can do that now - it's no problem - but now that I'm out of that mode, now that I [sort of] know what I'm doing, I get more and more frustrated each day. Why? Because now I know what things could be like if only we had the resources in our schools. Let me share a few examples:

At my school, we are in week four, yet we are still unable to make copies. There are those who say that "good teachers should not need to make a lot of copies." Fine. I agree that doing pointless worksheets all the time is, well, pointless. But when every element of the curriculum that we are required to use calls for doing worksheets that are included in the curriculum, it becomes very necessary for the teachers to have access to a copier. It was made clear to us by the administration that we would not be reimbursed for any copies we made on our own time at public copy shops like Kinko's. And while Kinko's does give us a discount, it's still very expensive - $1.50 a foot for laminating [laminating machine's broken, too], and something like nine cents for a copy. This adds up fast. The district does provide us with $250 for supplies and expenses throughout the year, but this money does not come to us until our September check. Most of us just can't afford to spend $30 a week on something that should be provided by our school. Of course, this problem could be very easily solved if the district would spend the money on consumable workbooks for each child in each subject. Things would be so much easier on the students and teachers.

Many teachers at my school, including me, still do not have enough textbooks for our students. We don't have teacher's editions for all the subject areas. I have a friend who teaches fifth grade at another school. In fifth grade, the high stakes test is in Science. At this particular school, there is one copy of the Science curriculum, and it is in the library. Teachers must go to the library to do their lesson planning. They do not have the TE, which is vital to presenting the lessons, at hand in the classroom.

It just seems to me like so much money and time are wasted on things of no importance. Training that teaches us nothing. Laptops that no one brings to school, because if we don't buy the expensive insurance [with our own money, of course] we're liable for the cost of the computer if it's stolen or damaged at school. Computers that sit unused in the classroom because the kids don't know how to use them, we don't have computer classes for them, and technology isn't a required part of the curriculum, so we're not allowed to use time during the day for it. How effed up is that? We live in a technology-driven world, we have the resources to educate the students about technology, yet we're not given the time to do it.

And I can't even go into my opinions on the war in Iraq, the evil Bush Regime, Haliburton, Republicans in general, the war...

I think we need to get back to basics. Memorize times tables, learn long division, write vocabulary words in a notebook, do science experiments. All this nonsense cooperative group work, new ways of teaching math - it just doesn't work. Bring corporal punishment back. My students from Mexico are, aside from the language barrier, far ahead of the students who were born here. There's still a fear and respect of teachers instilled in students there, I guess. These American kids know there's really no consequences for their bad behavior - the worst we can do is tell their parents, and they usually don't care or are too busy to care. I've written before about how parents see it as the teacher's responsibility to teach ethics and morals. I'm not saying I want to beat my students, I'm just saying that being sent to the principal's office used to mean something.

So...I might come back every now and then and post something about my job, but probably not. Wish me luck this year - I need it.

Corrections

This week there was an article in the daily paper that mentioned me, and the performance of my class at my school last year. It was a positive article; however, they got my numbers wrong! I have no idea where they got the percentage that they put in the article. In discussing this with a coworker, I began to wonder just how much in our newspapers is wrong. I realize this is an old issue, but I'm guessing that most people assume that facts they read in a major daily newspaper are accurate. It seems that lately, this is becoming less and less true.

School's going pretty well, by the way. My students this year are just so eager to behave well. Last year was so much harder. I suppose I know a little bit more about how to handle kids now, but I really think this bunch is just better behaved by nature. Their English is so very low, though. I went to some special ESL training yesterday and it was outstanding (shocking!). I can't wait to go in to day and try some of the things I learned. I'm going to spend a lot more time just teaching vocabulary. I can teach grammar and structure all day long, but if they don't have the words, they can't write interesting essays.

I'm pleased...Yo la Tengo tickets are on their way to my mailbox, as is an order from Insound. Also, one of my neighbors moved out and gave me her microwave. I've never had one before! It's so much faster than having to do everything on the stovetop. Now all I need is a toaster so I can quit using the broiler to make toast.

And now I'm talking about toast, which means that I am just looking for a reason to sit at this computer and not go get ready for school. The third grade plague has hit me already - I feel like death. The last thing I want to do is go expose myself to more germs.

Sabado Gigante!

How pleasant it was to have an extra day off this weekend. Two Sundays. That's how Monday-off holidays feel to me. Friday-off holidays feel like an extra Saturday, and are therefore better. I like Saturday. I like the combination of feeling like you should take care of a million different things yet having the option to be as lazy as you'd like. That's my definition of relaxing.

The electricity's not great in my apartment building; I blow breakers almost daily doing nothing at all. So, I can't run both the television and the stereo at the same time. They can't both be plugged in. Tonight, while I was watching the television and kind of wanting to just listen to music, I was thinking I might try putting the TV in my bedroom, where I never go, and just having the record player in the living room. Maybe see what it's like to not watch TV. I'm just as bad as anyone else - I come in and have to turn the TV on for noise or I get nervous. Something bad happened to (American?) children somewhere along the way; I know very few people who are content to enter a quiet room, not add any noise, and sit in the room comfortably. I'd go insane from the quiet.

Of course, it's rarely quiet here - the clicking of my fingers as I type, cars with crazy sound systems blaring by the window and the cat's constant screaming keep this apartment pretty filled with an adequate amount of white noise.

The TV does it for me though - I guess it's hearing other human voices that's comforting. But I'm going to try to do without it. I don't have cable, so there's really not that much that I want to watch, anyway. And I never watch movies. I only have a few, and my television set is really too small to watch them on. Plus my living room furniture is so uncomfortable. It's beautiful 50's stuff, in perfect condition, but it would be better for a fancy parlor in someone's house or something. I need a squishy couch to curl up on when I get home from work.

I can hear the television set of someone from another apartment complex through my bedroom window. Insane. I couldn't even sit in the quiet if I wanted to. There is no quiet anymore. Maybe that's why I enjoyed my vacation so much. It was very quiet almost everywhere we went. Peaceful and calm. Some places didn't even have stores or hotels. Just little mountainside towns with a few conveniences for tourists. California...some of the cities in that state just blew my mind. I can't imagine being able to live there. I can't imagine living anywhere besides Texas but I get the feeling I need to - soon.

If You Don't Have Anything Nice to Say...

We're almost through the second week of school. Turns out my school isn't alone in our desperation - I've spoken with a couple of friends who work at schools that are in just as bad of shape as mine.

The kids are great this year, though. I got a new student today, and things are pretty rough for his family right now...it's a sad situation. But he seems like a cool kid so I think it will be good to have him around.

I'm still so frustrated though - my school still doesn't have a copier! I can't do anything! Can't even give them homework! Ugh.

Outside of that stuff, I'm just a mess all around! I can be sort of dramatic, but I swear, I feel like my world is collapsing around me right now!

And I need to get rid of a cat. I need to find a farm to send her to where she can kill mice and be outside.

Frustration

How effed is my school? This district? I just can't grasp how things can be so poorly run when seemingly intelligent people are in charge. As I said yesterday, our school is without air conditioning in more than half of the building. We're half way through the first week of school, yet we don't have reading or mathematics curriculum. See any news story, TEA press release or, oh, the federal law relating to it and you'll figure out pretty quickly that reading is extremely important, not only for the obvious reason that people must be able to read to function in society, but because schools, namely schools like mine, are in bad shape and we've got to raise our test scores to dig ourselves out of this miserable hole.

I don't know as much about the education code or what went into creating the new high-stakes tests as I should. Sadly, I probably know more than any of the other teachers at my school, though, since I spent the two years prior to becoming a teacher writing about education for a newspaper. This is why I became a teacher: I got sick of writing about how great things were for all these rich white kids - how all their teachers are fabulous and experienced and the kids all easily got into whatever wonderful college they wanted. I'm exaggerating, of course, but when you stop to think about it, it's really just plain unfair how many advantages, yeah, rich white kids get.

I'm getting away from myself...and now I shall do it again. In my attempt to better my knowledge of my current job's requirements, I decided to look at a website about No Child Left Behind. Gross! It's just another place filled with GWBush propaganda.

Now I feel all frustrated, buried in my hatred of stupid administrators, a stupid president, and the fact that half of my class doesn't even know the alphabet in English. 

--

I've got to think about something else. I think about school when I eat. I dream about it when I sleep. My social life is dead and buried now that school's back in session.

I need to buy Yo La Tengo tickets. Hell, I need to buy their latest album. And other ones too...all my records are played out. I'm bored with music. Not bored with music, really, just the records that I own. Back in college, I always knew what was coming out, what was good, always had a ton of great things to listen to. Now when I'm in the car, it's NPR all the time. This is not a bad thing, but does signal to the fact that I'm getting old.

Third Grade

Today was the first day of school. It went well - so much better than last year! I actually managed to maintain control of this group. Last year I cared what they thought of me, felt that it was important to entertain them from the word go...no. No, no, no. That didn't work. I lost control the first day last year, and I plan to keep control this year. So I was mean.

Remember last year when I said I'd be mean, and then I was nice? This year I was actually mean! I am terribly proud of myself. I suppose when I say 'mean' I mean 'strict,' but in a kid's mind I doubt there's much difference.

My group seems to be pretty naturally well-behaved. They had little trouble staying in their seats, writing quietly and being patient while the business side of the first day [textbooks, supplies, etc.] got taken care of. I'm certain that a large part of the reason why they were so good is that I only have 15 kids, and only five of them are boys. Last year I started out with 29 students, of which at least 14 or so were male. Girls are just better behaved. Sure, they talk a little more, but when it comes to major infractions, it's almost always the boys I have trouble with.

This morning on WFAA I saw the DISD spokesperson say something about all schools in Dallas having air conditioning. Someone's probably said that all the schools have all their curriculum too. Maybe they think we all have a photocopier. Printers. I guess they forgot about us. Kids were throwing up from the heat at our building today. More than half the school is completely without air conditioning. The heat index is, what, 110 degrees? People, especially little bitty people, can not function in those temperatures! I really feel for the sixth grade teachers, 30 adult-sized bodies crammed into a portable building, and no air conditioning. This is Dallas, one of the biggest cities in America, not some third-world place. I know people have it worse, but come on! People pay property taxes. The least we could have is a functioning air conditioner and all the tools we need to start teaching on the first day. We're literally killing time because we don't have Teacher's Editions for math or reading or experiment kits for Science! The only subject we're prepared for [minus being able to print or copy any work, of course] is Social Science. And they wonder why we have to play catch-up for the TAKS tests in the Spring...

--

I was talking to my mother on the phone after school. She asked when I could move to a better school. It made me think...and I think I want to try and stay at this school for a couple more years. At least until I really know what I'm doing and can actually help some kids. People always talk about how something has to change in the education system, and I guess where I can at least try to help make a start toward that is to stay at this school. These children need people who care about them. It's sad, and I guess this happens everywhere, in every big city, but the 'best teachers' run off and work at the 'good schools.' I'm the first to admit I still really have no idea what I'm doing. Many of the teachers at my school have five or fewer years of experience. But it's getting better - a lot more people stayed this year than the last, and it's my hope that next year even more people will stay. The only thing that could make me leave is a job teaching in Mexico or South America, which would only make me better at my job because I'd learn Spanish. But we'll see. It's just the first day of school.

Perfect

And just at the moment I started enjoying myself, getting into the rhythm of a lazy, relaxing life...summer vacation is over. Tomorrow's my first day back.

I'll be spending two lovely hot August days in a high school in - I guess this place is in East Texas somewhere. It's by Balch Springs, which is really pretty far away. I feel sort of like those of us who taught at the Edison schools and these other low-performing schools are being punished by DISD.

- We get two fewer days of summer vacation. They could have kept us two hours late a few times and covered the hours we'll be spending doing curriculum training over the next two days.

- Just having to go to training is punishment. Staff Development/Training in the district is so pathetic I don't think it warrants even having that title.

On that subject, though, before anyone is going to start treating teachers more professionally, we're going to have to start acting the part. During these training sessions, teachers eat, drink, leave to take mobile phone calls, draw, talk, pay bills, really anything to avoid listening to the boring presenters and looking at countless sub-standard PowerPoint presentations. I am not saying I'm not guilty of this, because I certainly am. I already have plans for what I'll do to kill time tomorrow [draw pictures].

Maybe now that I've thought this out I won't be rude and will pay attention to the presenters. Maybe they'll present the information in such a way that is neither condescending nor sleep inducing. Maybe that's what it'll take for schools to improve in this town.

Where was I?

- Being made to drive out to Balch Springs/Seagoville/Whereverthisstupidhighschoolis. There is no way that more than half of the people going tomorrow live near this place. I live in the center of town and it's still at least a 30-minute drive for me. I can't even imagine how long it will take for the teachers who live in North Dallas, Lewisville, Plano, and other cities. I can't understand why there's not some central location somewhere [I think this might be what Nolan Estes Plaza was supposed to be] where all training can take place. 

Tour de America

I spent the last couple of weeks on one of the best vacations I'll ever take: a 3,500 mile, eight state tour of the Southwest. I went from Texas to California through New Mexico and Arizona, and then back through Nevada, Utah and Oklahoma.

I took some pretty pictures; parts of this country are so much more beautiful than I ever knew. Little places I'd never even heard of before - Moab, Utah and Morro Bay, California - turned out to be some of my favorites. Driving up the Pacific Coast Highway was insane. I've never seen so many places that look like they'd come out of a dream.

Eleven Days Left

Summer vacation is almost here. I only have eleven days of school left. This breaks down to:

1 day I'm taking off

1 field day

3 field trips

2 half days

+ 1 last day of school party

8 days I don't have to do anything

11 - 8 = 3 actual entire days with students left. These days will be spent preparing for field day, and cleaning up the classroom.

It sounds like I'm home free and that the rest of the year is an easy ride, but this is not true. Three days is 24 hours with these children. And at this point, almost all of them are awful. They're so frustrated and mad that every other school in this district except ours and six others are out for the year and they're still stuck in that miserable place that they can't function. They can't sit still, they can't control their mouths, and they can't control their behavior.

I, of course, am also frustrated and mad that every other school in this district except ours and six others are out for the year. I am sick of looking at most of my students. Very sick of some of them. Sick of coworkers. Really, really sick of administration.

But, most of all, I'm sick of the people from the Edison program. This is hilarious...we have to stay at school until June 30 with students. Two weeks ago, the Edison people took all our technology - computers, televisions, even the library is off limits now. Then, last week, they took all our curriculum. By that I mean they took all our textbooks, tradebooks, teacher's guides, math manipulatives - everything we need to deliver lessons to our students.

Then, in what felt like some sort of slap in the face, we got a memo in our boxes from the principal stating that we were still to teach the curriculum...What? This week, they're taking the copier, and we ran out of paper a couple of weeks ago anyway. I'm just doing what I can - making it up as I go along. We're almost out of supplies too (crayons, construction paper, etc.) so I'm inventing things like lessons in monochromatic art. I'm reading them Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the third Harry Potter book. I'm doing what I can, but these kids are so out of control and ready for summer that most of the time I just hang my head and feel like crying, for myself and for these kids.

It will all be worth it though on July 2 when I sleep in, then wake up and realize I have a glorious month and a half of freedom.

Costa Rica

During Spring Break, I traveled to Costa Rica. A backpack, rental car, and not that much money was all that was needed to see a huge part of this amazing land.

Love

Nobody gets more Valentine's Day presents than teachers. I swear. The entire back seat of my car was full of presents. Is, I should say, since I haven't managed to bring most of it up to my apartment. I just don't know what I'm going to do with the fake flowers [I got real ones too; those I brought in], trinkets, porcelain roses, and many, many candies and cards. 

I am sick of thinking/talking/writing about elementary school. Spring break is exactly one month from today. To say I'm counting the days would be an understatement. More like counting the minutes...the seconds...

I have a problem - my cat. She's very cute and sometimes I enjoy her company, but she's starting to drive me mad. She destroys things, makes noise at night, and causes evil, evil pain to my arms and legs with her claws. I think the only way I can keep her is if I get her declawed and she suddenly becomes uninterested in doing anything at all except sleeping and lying around. I didn't want this cat because I didn't want the responsibility, and now I'm stuck with her. Sometimes I think I should just get rid of her now before I get really attached. The thought of her being around ten years from now, which is likely since cats seem to live forever, is annoying. I don't want to be tied to an animal that requires daily care. So...disregard all the bad things I said about her...she's lovely - anyone want a cat?

I went to Shreveport last weekend. I "gambled," a term I'll use loosely since putting quarters into a slot machine isn't really a gamble. It's a safe bet that you're going to lose. I'd only lost $20, but was coerced into feeding a slot machine another $20 on the way out, bringing my total losses to under $50 which isn't bad at all considering all the free alcohol I drank. In fact, I'm pretty sure it just about evened out.

Needless to say, I did not want to come back to Dallas and teach school today, a day that 95 percent of the city was off from work - every school in town aside from these %$#@ Edison schools (I teach at one of the seven Edison schools in this district) was closed not only today, but Friday as well. I'm beginning to think that I've been suckered. The extra money and signing bonuses sounded great when the school hired me, but working until July is going to be a nightmare, especially when most of my friends will be getting out of school in late May. I shouldn't complain though - six weeks off in a row is still a hell of a lot more than most people get. 

Geography Lesson

I have no idea how to answer the questions the children are asking me about war with Iraq. They started asking all these questions yesterday, so we got out the globe to at least see where Iraq is located.

We passed Columbia, and here's the conversation that followed:

Student: I know everything about Columbia.

Me: Really? What do you know about it?

Student: I know that all the cocaine comes from Columbia.

Me: Ummmmm (unable to respond to this due to shock)

Student: I also know that if you sell cocaine, you can make a lot of money.

Me: Ok, but if you sell a lot of cocaine, you'll also go to jail for a very long time, harm others, maybe get yourself hurt...Why do you know all this stuff?

Student: My...um...neighbor...um...[realizing he should shut up]...I don't know. I made it up.

Again, these kids are eight years old. You should be very scared for the future of our country.

Tax Dollars

To any Dallas-area people reading, here's one to file under So Where do the Tax Dollars Go, Anyway?:

For two weeks, we have had no heat in our classroom. The majority of the school (built in the 1930s) is on a huge, beastly heat/AC generator that is controlled by the fools downtown. My room and the one next to me, however, share a small heater that's controlled in my classroom.

Two weeks ago today, it stopped working. Our maintenance people reported it to the headquarters downtown, and were basically told that the prospect of us receiving a new motor [that's what's broken] this school year was remote. I mean, please! These are little children we're talking about, trying to learn, trying to study, trying to take the !@#@$ TAKS test, and they're forced to sit in a room that is as cold as it is outside all day long. It's going to be, what, 38 for a high today? We can pay the superintendent half a million dollars a year, but we can't buy a stupid motor so that my students don't freeze?

Next week we have parent conferences, and if the heater isn't fixed by then, I'm going to try to get the parents to go downtown and complain. The last thing the district wants is 20 irate mommies at their offices screaming at them.

Insomnia

I got too much sleep last night and now I can't sleep tonight. Nyquil, sleeping pills, chamomile tea, illegal tranquili...well, I haven't gone that far, but almost.

Sunday nights do this to me. The degree of dread that I feel about returning to work Monday morning is only matched by the degree of dread I feel, um, most nights, since I loathe going to work so very much. That's not entirely fair - I don't really dread going to work per se, I just don't care. I don't really care about much of anything lately - it could be that I've been kind of sick, or I absolutely hate winter - I'm not sure. I'm not terribly sad, not really happy, just sort of here.

Standing at the top of January and staring down a long semester is pretty rough. My school doesn't let out until July - one week exactly before my birthday, actually. Six weeks vacation is one hell of a birthday present, but it just seems so far away.

I'm just so sick of thinking about, talking about, eating, breathing, sleeping and dreaming school and schoolchildren. I'm also pretty sick of Dallas. Plans are in the works to get out of here; it'll be a while [at least a year and a half] but knowing that I'm out of here eventually helps. I'm starting to look at grad schools and programs of study; I'm also looking into teaching abroad. I'd love to go somewhere fantastic like France, of course, but I'll probably be stuck in French Guyana instead. Wow. That place might not actually be so bad.

Whatever I took last is starting to work now and I'm feeling sleepy. Finally.

Plague

I think my class has the plague.

Yesterday there were eight of us absent, including me, and today there were six absent. We can't do anything with no one there, so we've been doing, um, nothing. It was so bad this morning - so many kids gone and so many of the ones that were there being sick - that we spent the first thirty minutes of the day dividing the room in half; the sick kids were on one side of the room and the well kids on the other. I sprayed everything in the room with Lysol and hoped no one else would get sick. By the end of the day, two more were in the nurse's office. I'm hoping the class will be small again tomorrow, as 16 kids are much easier to deal with than 22.

Today they also told us that next week we have to spend three days administering a mock TAKS test. [The TAKS test is that stupid Texas-only standardized test that's horribly racially biased, unfair and evil.] When we got back from Winter Break we had exactly 38 school days until the test. So far, they have wasted six of them on these stupid benchmarks, mock tests, writing prompts, etc. I can't get anything done! As soon as we start to get into something, we have to stop and do some dumb test. And now we've got the plague, so we're getting even more behind. So frustrating.

Lately

It's weird; I've been thinking I actually might like this job. The strangest part about it is that the last couple of weeks, since we've gotten back from Winter Break, have been a couple of the worst.

I had to do the saddest thing. Imagine that you're eight, in third grade, and failing miserably at everything. You think things can't get worse, right? Well, then your teacher refers you for special ed testing, which you don't know about, but in the course of the secret meeting about you, it's decided that you're going to move back to second grade - effective immediately. No warning, no chance to say bye to his friends - hardly even a chance for me to come up with some weak excuse to tell his classmates so they won't make fun of him.

It wasn't my decision. It wasn't even my idea. But, of course, I had to be the one to write the letter to his parents [your kid is so behind and you're such bad parents for not putting him in kindergarten, but waiting to enroll him in school until he was six and half way through first grade, and his second grade teacher was such a failure at noticing that he should have been held back last year...] and tell the kid himself that he was going. The new teacher said he's even having trouble keeping up in there. Sad.

I'm starting to get things figured out, though. I'm getting slightly more organized, and I'm actually having some degree of success at teaching Math. [Math was my main fear/hated part of the day at work, because they just don't get anything.] Thirty percent of my class passed the Math TAKS Benchmark in January, which is better than they've done all year. They're all just so behind. I don't even know where to start. I did tell my principal that I'll stay another year and do third grade again. I want another chance with a new set of kids.

Right, so...

I made it through the first couple of days back. Craziness ensued once school started - our music teacher died over the break, apparently from some sort of accidental overdose - so the day started out weird. You don't really want to go to the office to sign in and see the obituary of one of your colleagues taped to the counter. She seemed like a nice person but kept to herself. RIP.


Today, I started the day by receiving two new students, including one who speaks absolutely no English. Well, by the end of the day I'd taught him how to say 'yes' and 'no,' as well as, 'my name is Felipe.'

The other validation I got for my current career situation came in the form of a tiny little red-haired girl.

Roberta was in my class at the beginning of the year, and about two months into school her dad started beating the crap out of her mom, so they left and Roberta moved to another school. We all cried when she left and I really did miss her.

About a month ago her mom showed up at my classroom, all frantic like, saying that Roberta was miserable at the new school and kept begging to come back. I said that it would be fine for her to come back, just put a neighborhood family member's address on the forms and bring her back as soon as you can (yes, I know that's wrong, but this is a very common practice at my school).
 
The semester ended, and I figured her mom had changed her mind.

So this morning, when I was putting New Kid A into his desk, the office called to say that a parent had requested me and New Kid B would be on her way to my room. I got mad at first, then asked...wait...is it Roberta?

When she opened the door to come in...I swear it was the cutest and sweetest thing I've ever seen. She was smiling so big and literally ran across the room and jumped up into my arms. The kid even brought me a present. Her mother looked so happy and relieved to see her child smiling again.

Ok, so that's the last time you're going to see anything cheerful and happy and lovely and good posted here, because we had the big 'Don't Do Anything But Teach To The Test' meeting today, and my life will now revolve around giving little children too much homework and more stress than their little minds can handle, robbing them of their childhood fun and for what? So that some number cruncher down in Austin can decide how much money my school will get per child next year

No More Vacation

I was discussing the sadness that is going back to school with my friend Sarah earlier today. Obviously neither of us are looking forward to returning to lesson plans, grading papers, waking up early, and, of course, screaming children. I almost want to quit and just get a job waiting tables or selling perfume or something that doesn't involve teaching.

That said, we were trying to think of anything that could make this job more bearable. We both noted that we did not miss our students much over the break. That knowledge will make it easier to think of work as just that - work. Not a personal mission to save the world.

See, starting in early March, we begin a battery of tests to see if these kids get to pass third grade. Many of them won't pass. It's sad. A combination of the truly inept teachers some of them have [i.e. untrained, uncertified people such as myself], the, um, inability to speak or read English, and, for many of the students, laziness and just plain not caring.

So, I'm just going to think of it all as a numbers game and focus on trying to get as many of the children to pass as I can. I read that sentence, and I realize how sad it is that education has come to this. Are other states this way? Is a 'good education' based on whether a little eight-year-old child can pass big, scary test?

I've also come to the conclusion that I don't want to continue in this job next year if at all possible. I'd like to transfer to a different school - preferably a high school. I want to do the same lesson over and over for two days rather than having to create six new and exciting lessons every day. I realize that the high school students will likely treat me terribly and often the kind treatment of my good students is all that gets me through the day, but I still would like the change.

I seriously cannot think about work anymore before 8:00 a.m. on Monday.