brette

So it’s been a while.  Whoops?

Students often find it necessary to comment on what I wear.  I tend to wear a lot of skirts and dresses, so comments like “Geez, Miss!  Do you just really like dresses or something?”  or “Why do you wear dresses all the time”  are pretty common.  I also have multiple pairs of glasses, and someone is ALWAYS thinks I’m wearing new ones…even if they’ve seen them a thousand times before.

But lately, I’ve had some students who want to be my fashion police.  Today, for instance, I wore a black dress, light grey cardigan, and purple shoes.

R (a BOY):  [Starts laughing hysterically]

Me:  What’s up, dear?

R:  You don’t MATCH, Miss!

Me:  What?

R:  You don’t match!  You’re wearing black and grey with PURPLE shoes–that doesn’t match!

Me:  Matching doesn’t mean that everything is the same color

R:  But you have black shoes just like that.  You should have worn those with that dress

Me:  But I wanted to wear my purple ones…I think they look nice!
R:  No–they don’t match.

Me:  So that’s like saying that you don’t match because your shirt is blue and your pants are khaki.

R:  No it’s not!  Blue and khaki match!  Purple and black don’t!

Me:  Ok, thank you for being my personal fashion consultant…

It’s worth noting that this is not the first time this has happened…

When I talk to parents, I hear all sorts of interesting things.  Today, I was chatting with a student’s mother…

Mom:  Oh, sweetheart, my son told me that you asked to see some work before he went to the restroom.

Me:  Yes, that’s our policy.

Mom:  And he showed me all of his math work, baby, that he had to do before he went.

Me:  Uh-huh…

Mom:  And sweetheart, I know he has to go to the bathroom every day during your class.

Me:  He does ask often…

Mom:  Because every day, I tell you, since the day he was born, he has to have a bowel movement between 2:30 and 3:00.

Me: …

Mom:  And I know my child, sweetheart, and he just has to go.  But I stand by you if you make him do his work first.

Me:  Well, thank you–I appreciate it.

Mom:  Yes, baby, I stand by you 100%!  But I know my son, and he has a BM every day at that time.

Me:  As long as he gets some work done first…

And sometimes I wonder where my kids get it…

Though this post has very little to do with teaching or my classroom, I think it has everything to do with what corps members (at least those coming straight out of college) experience.

I have more freedom now than I ever have before in my life.  Until now, my life has been fairly well laid-out–or, at least, there have been strict parameters on what I should (or should not) do.  In high school, there were clear expectations as to the classes that I should take, organizations I should participate in, and what I needed to do in order to prepare for college.  Where there was choice (should I take AP Physics or AP Chemistry?), there were easily numerable options.  In college, there were more options, but again, they were numerable–do I take statistics this semester or next?  Do I take Spanish or Italian to fulfill this credit?  Do I join this sorority or that one?  There was a finite set of majors from which to choose and organizations in which I could participate, and it was reasonably simple to narrow those down into things that would be of interest to me.  Even upon graduation, there were a few clearly preferable options–Teach for America, of course, being chief among them.

Now that the end of the two-year commitment is in sight, I am faced with the dilemma:  What do I do next?  Where do I go from here?  What now?!

So often, people say to me “You could do anything after Teach for America!” (or with such-and-such degree, or with your work ethic, et cetera ad nauseum).  That, I’m afraid, is exactly the problem!  There are now virtually no parameters on my future career/academic plans.  There is nothing that is clearly labeled the “right” choice.  I could do anything anywhere and for any length of time.  The deciding factor in choosing one path over another is, quite simply “because I want to.”

That is a VERY scary concept.  I am more free now than I have ever been before–I am untethered by romantic, familial, career, or academic obligations.  I’ve never been in a position to do whatever I wanted simply because I wanted to.

So for now, the loose plans are to keep teaching (but in a city that is more palatable than Houston), then go to grad school and perhaps become a guidance counselor.  I often feel like I make a better counselor than I do teacher, but I relish the teaching experience that I’m gaining now.

We’ll see.

I have a new favorite game.  Integer War.

It’s played like regular War (the card game):  everyone flips a card, the person with the highest card wins, play until someone gets all the cards.  But all the cards represent an integer:  black for positive numbers, red for negative, and all the face cards are taken out.

The game seems simple enough, but my 7th graders are ENTHRALLED with it!  Many take it very, very seriously–they like to pretend it’s a game of skill, even though it’s not.  Some hilarious quotes from the day:

Before a tiebreaker:  “Oooooh, it’s on like popcorn!  Like popcorn and ranch, boy!”

When a round is lost, regardless of the honesty of the other players:  “They cheatin’!  They cheatin’!!!”

When comparing -2 and -5:  “OH yeah, that’s right!  Would you rather owe 2 or owe 5?  That’s right–owe 2!”  (Negative numbers represent money you owe; positive numbers represent money you have–it helps them compare negative numbers)

Upon winning:  “I took ‘em to the cleaners!  Yeah, I took them to the CLEANERS!”

And, of course, there HAS to be an epic battle to end all battles in each class–the winningest players from each table must come together to fight to the death (or the end of the period, whichever comes first).  It’s just so hilarious to see them get SO INTO the game–it almost feels like I’m tricking them into comparing integers.

When I first learned that i was assigned to the Special Ed section of remedial math, I was a little disappointed–or, more accurately, scared.  I have very little experience with Special Education–the modifications, the IEPs, the ARDs, the other acronyms.  Furthermore, I was scared that I wouldn’t be able to reach the students or that they wouldn’t respond to me.

In reality, I couldn’t have been farther from the truth!  My SpEd kids are some of the most endearing:  they’re not in my class because they failed, and they haven’t developed a strong dislike for math.  They haven’t been labeled as “bad” at math (but that doesn’t mean that they remember their times tables…) and many of them listed it as their favorite subject!

We had some time after they finished their diagnostic test last week, so I gave those that finished early some construction paper and markers.  Here is one of their products:

Also, the following, produced by E:

E:  Look, Miss, I drew this for you!

Me:  Oh, why thank you, E!  It’s beautiful!!

E:  I drew a bunch of numbers.

Me:  I see that–they’re lovely!

E:  And then I put in some math symbols

Me:  Oh, I see!  You’ve got addition, subtraction, multiplication…

Another student:  What IS that?!

E:  It’s raining math.

Hallelujah, it’s raining math:

It’s amazing how different teaching is the second time around.  It’s almost like I know what I’m doing.

My classes are structured much differently this year:

• All 7th graders
• 3 classes of 20 students or less, for 2 periods at a time
• I have a co-teacher

My students are in my class because they either:  are taking the TAKS M(odified) test (and are therefore labeled Special Ed) OR failed the regular (or Accommodated) TAKS test last year.  That means that these babies are LOW.  But they have more time, more teachers, and smaller classes, which will help them be more successful.

We gave a diagnostic test this week, and I discovered that most of our students are on a 3rd or 4th grade math level.  I have multiple who can barely read or write.  Every day, the achievement gap is staring me right in the face.

It’s the first week of school, so I keep running into old students–sweet seventh graders turning into enormous eigth graders!–in the halls, cafeteria, etc.  Today, I ran into my Posted in Teach For America | No Comments »