We Do What We're Told

Old Peter Gabriel song, stuck in my head today...

Those of you who know me know that I teach in a failing school. Our students are those you hear about on the news: the ones whose needs are not being fulfilled by the schools.

My school was outsourced several years ago because it was failing. It was taken away from the district and given to an EMO (like an HMO, but it's E for Educational). The staff wasn't fired, but 90% of them left. Since then, vacancies have been filled to a large extent by folks like me: alternatively trained, non-union-huggers. We have a boat load of Teach For America folks here, and Teaching Fellows, too. Have had, for at least 6 years (since the EMO took over). The amount of work the majority of these folks put into their jobs astounds me. They're, for a large part, dynamos. They don't stay long - 2 years, as a rule - but while they're here, they're putting in 100%.

We're still failing.

We have all sorts of new strictures this year: each teacher must have specific "words" in his or her lesson plan which shows the level of questioning (higher levels for more thought). We have to have so many calls to parents - regardless of the fact that most of the time we can't get a number that connects. We have to have certain posters on our walls. We have to have certain structures in each lesson. Our lesson plans have to be in before the week starts and are rigorously vetted by administration. We have formal and informal walkthroughs of our classrooms as many times as once a week. And the list goes on.

So, they announced last week that they're firing us all. Something like 2000 teachers are to be "replaced" because we aren't meeting goals. We can reapply for our jobs, but only up to 50% of us are allowed to come back. Next year, our school will be outsourced. Again. And this time, we're adding an hour to the school day, we're adding a day to every other school week, and we're extending the school year through July. And teachers will be even more closely watched than they are now.

I do what I'm told. I do all the required and recommended stuff - sometimes it adds to my lessons; sometimes it takes away. I generally work an extra hour at school, daily, and on weekends, I'll spend most of Sunday doing schoolwork. I would not go so far as to say I am a good teacher. But I am not a lazy teacher. I am not a stupid teacher. I am not an uninterested or uncaring teacher.

At the end of the day, I have 30% truancy, minimum, from all of my classes. And it's not the same kids daily. I would estimate that I see 20% of my students on a regular basis (missing 0 or 1 class every 2 weeks). I have a bell curve of reading levels from 2 to 11th grade (I teach juniors and seniors) in EVERY CLASS. Ditto for math. My kids can't, as a rule, point out NORTH FRICKING AMERICA on a map, let alone the city where they live.

And it's my fault.

Until last week, I really laughed this stuff off. But between the Obama "it's all the union - fire the teachers and it'll fix the school!" example that my husband told me about, and the kerfuffle at my own district, I Give Up. I give up.

It takes two to tango, and my dance partner's sittin on the floor, laughing at me and kicking me. Until the kids are held accountable for their own educations, the schools will fail. Charters succeed because they can kick out kids who don't perform or who don't behave. Schools who don't have that option will fail. And any kids who want to succeed who are in those schools? God bless 'em. They don't stand a chance.

Anybody want a sub next year? Or maybe a washed up DBA? I'm so over this crapola.

(*)>

Discoveries…

As three of my students argue about whether a mushroom is a f’ing (no apostrophe) consumer or a f’ing producer, another pulls me aside.

“Miss, a vegetarian eats vegetables, right?” I'm proud, because he's using his prefix/suffix/root word examinations and connecting to outside knowledge! All those teacher buzzwords!

“It’s the term for a human herbivore, mostly, yes,” I answer.

“So what’s a humanitarian?” he asks, with a look of disgust.

“Someone who’s nice to humans…” I answer, understanding his confusion.

Weird…

~~~~~

Also, as I was listening to some chant, to try to soothe the inner beast, some of my students came in for help… one of them looks up and says “this sh’t is just like rap, only not as cool.”

And he was right.

New insights abound!

(*)>

unfortunate nickname

I have a student, a beautiful, intelligent, hardworking girl. She has a typical urban name - lots of sh's and q's in it. She has taken the nickname of QUINNIE. She writes it all over her papers nowadays.

Now, isn't that a nickname for a female part, in certain anglo areas?

Should I discourage her from using this? If so, how on earth would I tactfully do so?

sigh.

(*)>

Is it the age, or is it the time?

I recently assigned my third project to my kids. They had to keep a science journal for the marking period. Each week, they were to cut out or print out an article from a newspaper. They had to write three paragraphs: summarize the article, link it to science (and explain the science), and give an opinion about the article or the science.

Of course, it was "too much, miss!" If I had a dollar for every time... anyway.

One of my better students handed hers in. It was hand written, which makes the fact that it was grammatically correct and almost completely spelled correctly much more awesome. She had articles on a new FBI database (science: technology), unsolved shootings in the city (ballistics and forensics), the new soda and sweets tax (health), and many others. The thing that struck me was, every opinion of hers came down to this: there aren't enough laws or enough law enforcement. Every problem - including obesity - can and should be litigated.

I remembered back to an essay contest I was required to enter my sophomore year of high school. We had to write a letter to a world leader, letting them know how we could make the world more peaceful. I was angry - I hated writing essays. So I wrote my letter to "Joe", the average man in the streets. I asked him how he could expect his leader to make a difference when Joe did all sorts of mean things. Blah blah blah. Filled it with sentimental sap. My teacher was peeved, but whatever. He couldn't prove I had done it tongue in cheek.

I won second place. He laughed his butt off with me.

The first place essay, I think, was to Ronald Reagan - telling him to cool his jets. But it stuck to me, even then, that we all expected someone else to solve our problems for us.

So, my question: is it the age (teenager) who thinks that government can actually do something worthwhile, or is it the time (now, 21st century) where we put more faith in law than in humanity?

(*)>

Poor IT Team

So, unless you've been living in a cave (and since Osama's living in a cave, that's probably not an excuse), you know about the attempted bombing of that plane around Christmas. And you've heard all the hullaballoo about lack of responsibility, where does the buck stop, etc, etc.

The media has been justifiably hard on The Powers That Be. How could this happen, post 9/11? But then, I read the details. I see the complaints about "how hard is it to follow and connect data" and "misspelling of suspect's name not caught" in a completely different light. And I think I know why no one was fired.

I imagine there's a 25 man (person, sorry) dba team somewhere whose job it is to make 172 archaic database systems talk to each other. They're probably given a nightly batch window to synch these db's that's 40 minutes long. None of the db's is probably newer than 2005, and most are probably older than 2000. Things like spelling correction and fancy google like searches just aren't possible.

My guess is that the intelligence problem in this case was completely database driven. And when only 2 people know how any given database system works, any manager is hard pressed to fire either of them.

Have I mentioned how glad I am to be a teacher these days?

(*)>

Anger Management

So, I started out the day angry at everything that came in my direction. I started in to work, listening to the radio...

Radio station A talks about how Watson and Crick "discovered" the structure of DNA. No mention of how they took the work of Rosalind Franklin... grrrr... change the station...

On to Rick Santorum talking about how big Pharma is shooting themselves in the foot for no reason... Then he waxes poetic about how good Pfizer is... Pfizer that just took over Wyeth and is laying off people left and right. Change the channel.

What's todays news? They're talking about Tiger's philandering. Who The Hell Cares If He Boinked Every Woman From Florida To Canada And Back?!?!? Jeezus. News? Please?

So I turn back to the first channel which is talking about identity theft and how it happens and that gives me agita, so I go to another channel...

where they're talking about how 20,000 new people are signing up for food stamps What the dump?! They said some chick in Ohio has a paid in full 300k house and Mercedes. But she has low income, so she qualifies for aide. So I, who am still paying off my 150K house in PA, am giving HER food?? Do people have no shame??

So, I get to school and start to try to teach. My kids were working on a lab when two girls asked me to settle an argument. Ms R? How long do you have to wait to have sex after you have a baby? 6 weeks or 9 months?

I wanted to say: until you are 21 or can pay for a child yourself, but I did not. Instead, said, "I teach chemistry, not biology." And I went on my way.

is it saturday yet?

(*)>

Recycling?

So, I was limping (more on that later) to my classroom from my lame-o meeting when I noticed a bright orange square in the alcove outside my room.

If I didn't get that little prophylactic out of there, it was going to be wrapped around my door handle. But I wasn't about to pick it up. I mean, gross! So I kicked it down to this other alcove for an unused lab.

Fast forward 1.5 hours to the end of day. I had go bathroom (much like Corky in the one episode of Life Goes On I watched), so I walked past that alcove. The Cheetos wrapper was still there. But the condom was gone.

All I could think was... someone decided to use it.

Just the thought makes me skeeved.


The school district, in response to Pres. Obama's OH MY GOD ITS A FLU EMERGENCY NO ONE PANIC!! has upped their dedication to increasing the strength and determination of all bacteria. They've installed hand sanitation stations in all classrooms. I have one installed next to my sink, so the lazy ass kids will forgo washing their hands, and instead will haphazardly and incorrectly apply Listeria-infested hand sanitizer to their nasty hands. Ah, well, we're due for a good plague, anyhow. Bring. It. On.


Speaking of plagues, I took the kids to the Renaissance Faire. Sean wanted to go in costume - as a monk! I could work with that! I made myself a plague victim and I made Tim lame.



I was asked what plague I had, and I said "Swine flu!" That sure scared some folks!

We are doing well, in general. Ups and downs of life are fine. My foot is STILL hurt, after a year, so I guess it's permanent. I've noticed when I wear my orthopedic shoes (ugly but comfy), I can walk a lot better. So, I guess it's off to the shoe store! Darn!

Hope anyone that reads this is well!

(*)>

I Must Be Bipolar...

So, two days into the school year, and I was dejected.

My class sizes are from 33 to 40.

My room seats 30 comfortably.

The class periods have been shortened to 45 minutes.

I was challenged covering the material in 57.

I couldn't get through ANYTHING yesterday. Build safety rules, do catalyst and math minute. That's it! two problems and safety rules. No demo. Nothing!! I was supposed to do a lab today, but no dice. Not in this century.

And I don't even know, when I had the time, if I even impacted anyone at all. Our general testing scores ranged from awful to pathetically disturbing. Frustration and chaos were having their effects on me.

To top it off, my new pants - which I bought a size bigger than normal - were TIGHT. And I could have sworn I lost 5 pounds in the last few weeks!

Just before my first class, I got an email from another teacher. This teacher coaches a sport, and wanted to let me know that a bunch of the students were talking about me. They were really positive, not just about me as a person/teacher, but about how being in my class was actually a positive experience.

And when I got to the bathroom later, I found the pants had been mistagged - two sizes too big! I was actually comfortably wearing a size SMALLER than usual.

Like that, out of the doldrums and onto cloud nine.

I think it must be exhaustion!!

~~~~~

John is off to his next class tonight. Still pushing for the advanced degree in boringology. But the thing is, as much as he didn't want to do it, I think he loves it.

Tomorrow night, he's going to take classes to learn to cook like a Viking. How many ways can you make gruel? Mulled wine in four easy steps? Sour milk and its infinite uses? I guess he's mastered so many other cooking niches that Viking cooking classes were his last challenge.

What's that you say? Viking is a kind of cooking product? He's not going to go a-viking?

Darn. I was looking forward to the elderberry mead.

~~~~~

The boys are back in school, as opposed to town. Totally ready to be back, excited about their teachers, and ecstatic to see their friends. Glad I teach high school, for sure!

And now, I've finished my homework, finished the dishes, got the kids ready... CRAP load of laundry in the dryer. A hag's work is never done.

(*)>

trials and tribulations

No, I don't currently have any of those. You'd think that would be a good excuse for not updating. But the fact is, I have no excuse.

We have had several computer woes at the dusty aviary. Our memory challenged machine has finally given up the ghost - either that or the two gerbils we hired to run the processor finally kicked. So, my computer time is mostly at school, and I usually don't have time to blog here.

School is rapidly coming to a close, but some would say not rapidly enough. Our grades go in next friday. Our last day of school is june 23. You might be saying, WTF? I know I was. How on earth am I supposed to motivate whatever kids choose to come (and we're already down to about 50%) to do ANYTHING let alone stop them from being destructive?

At our last teacher meeting (and didn't I leave business to avoid meetings? Dammit.), I decided to ask the other science teachers if they wanted to plan our last two weeks together. Share the misery, as it were. Our department chair was out that day, so, being the ENTJ that I am, I just took over. So, now, the last two weeks look like the best weeks of the year. We're doing all sorts of fun stuff - gameshows, olympics, orienteering, making things go boom - and keeping it science. And if no kids show, well, that's just fine! We'll still have each other to talk to!

~~~~~

On the home front, all is well. The moth just turned 6 last week. On his birthday, I played "Birthday" by the Beatles to wake the boys up. I started singing "you say it's your birthday!" and Tim rolls over, out of sleep, and says "FINALLY!" What a cutie :)

He really is, though. Lately, the kids are really into John Williams music, since I bought them a 4 disk set. I have heard the theme song to Jaws about 10000 times; stinky adores it. But the best was when John and I were sitting in the living room and mothy runs through to the bathroom. All is quiet for a minute or two, and suddenly we hear the theme song to Star Wars. John turns to me and says "I guess everything came out ok." all deadpan. He's like that.

Sean has been working off a debt - he lost one of the two way radios we let him use, AGAIN. We let the boys roam pretty wildly in the back "meadow/forest", but we need to be able to contact them. (We used to let Sean roam the neighborhood with the radio until the time he called us about the white van without windows following him. Seriously. Sheesh, I have to stop watching LMN.) Anyhow, Sean has all these pockets in his cargo pants, but carries the radio in his hand. Puts it down to take a leak and forgets it. First time, we forgave. Second time, he's working off the debt to buy another one.

He works off the debt by picking up dog poop, of which we now have copious amounts. He actually enjoys running the vacuum, which is weird. But he's getting there. He is so excited for school to end, it's not funny. He hates school. Sad but true.

Tim, on the other hand, loves school, and his "cheachers". "Tim, it's TEACHER, t-t-teacher." "Oh, it starts with T? OK. T-t-cheacher."

Reminds me of c-c-c-bookie, Ron.

~~~~~

Another may done, another june to begin. Memorial day has passed and once again I stopped by to say hey to many of the ancestors. It's weird, but I actually like doing that. Kind of a - thanks for living and making it so I could too - gesture. Next year I think I'll take stinky with me. He'll groove on the graveyards, I think. But for now, it's a pilgrimage for mom and me. Makes her awfully sad, which I can understand. They're her brothers and sisters, her husband and parents. I think it makes her feel lonely. But I think she likes to do it, anyhow.

Hope you're all, all 3 of you who still look here once in a while, doing well. Maybe I'll stop by again sometime and let you know what the toilet song of the week is. (This week, it's Axel F. You know, from beverly hills cop and recently used in Monsters Vs Aliens. What can I say, my kids are weird, just like me.)

(*)>

Is Stupidity Contagious?

So, I have this one student. We'll call him Bill. Bill is a generally nice kid, funny, with good intentions. He tries to do his work. But he, well... He'll be a successful person because he does his work. But chemistry is not his bag, if you get my drift.

Bill wants to do well, so he tries to align himself with those who do well.

First he sat next to an A student we'll call Matt. Matt always does his work, is quiet and studious, and seems to have a good background, with firm basics. A few weeks into sitting with Bill, he suddenly had a hard time deciding whether 400 was bigger or smaller than 200. No joke. His grade dropped from an A mp 1 to a low C mp 2. He told Bill to move, because he, Matt, needed to concentrate. So Bill moved. That was in the middle of mp3. Matt is back up to A level work, understanding how to apply gas laws on his own.

Where did Bill move? He moved over next to Andy. Andy came into our class in the mid of the year, and is a very hard worker. He wants this credit with a high grade. He got an A MP 3. 

Yesterday, Andy didn't know what the word "constant" meant, though we had gone over it, and couldn't tell what half of 600 was.

So, you medico types out there, is Bill killing his table-mates brain cells? Or just numbing them? Since Matt seems to have recovered, at least partially, it's probably numbing? 

Time to have a talk with Andy, I think.

(*)>

Lab Accident!!

A few weeks ago, I had an incident in my lab. No radioactive spiders, unfortunately, or gamma rays. Just a jagged piece of glass covered with dust and rusty iron filings.

Bled like a stuck pig, it did.

So, I go down to the nurse. Stitches! she proclaims. So they take me to the hospital.

A little under 2 hours later, I'm done. Some saline, super glue (well, they call it derma bond, but whatever), a tetanus shot, and a hit of antibiotics with a paper for more, and I was outta there. Didn't even see a doc - just a physician's assistant.

The bill just came. $1318. 

No wonder people freak out over insurance!

(*)>

Lazy Saturday?

Lazy Saturday? What the hecks is that?

So, the boys are off to the Pinewood Derby today. John found out last night that the Jurassic Avenger is not eligible for competition since it ran last year. Alas, the Rogers family  goes unrepresented today.

I did start the day early, however. Around 5, I heard a call "Mommee!! Mommee!!" By the time I woke up and heard it was outside, well, I was awake. Then it made no sense, so I listened further.

Damned feral cats. First they give Stinky nightmares (he keeps dreaming that they are "feasting" on him.). Now they decide to get busy in my driveway on a Saturday morning. Well, it sounded like they had a good time anyhow.

Glad someone enjoyed it.

To give myself some luxury, I watched some TV - and the kids came down so we watched Brady Bunch. Do you remember the episode with Buddy Hinton? "Baby talk, baby talk, it's a wonder you can walk!" That episode SPOKE to me, man, since I had such a horrible lisp. 

Nowadays it speaks to me again. Mr. Brady, Mr. I'm All Reason Brady, gets so frustrated with Mr. Hinton that he coaches Peter on how to box. Mrs. Brady, Mrs. Blessed Are The Peacemakers Brady, cheers Peter on and brings the Gatorade. 

If this sitcom were made today, reason would have won the argument. Reason rarely loses in TVLand today. But, if this sitch was in reality, there would have been text messaging, someone getting jumped, and plenty of suspensions handed round. 

I guess we can say that the Brady Bunch was Keepin It Real (or, as some of my students would say, "real rap").

Now I'm off to buy some "large beads" for an Avagadro's Number activity. Real rap.

(*)>

I'm just sayin...

In the Philadelphia School District, we have half-day training days once a month. These occur on Wednesdays and cause mass confusion. The kids are crazy, we have Monday twice, and the teachers spend just as much time with more creative planning, because the half day always throws off our schedules.

We were supposed to have one last Wednesday, but we had a big honking ice storm. 

We were supposed to have a big snow storm Monday, but it petered out. Yesterday, we were supposed to get flurries that didn't stick. We got eight inches.

Oh, we were supposed to have our February training day today. Snert.

God must like *something* about Philadelphia teachers. 

And because they announced the closure at 5:30, and I checked at 5, all my shoveling is done! Well, snow shoveling anyhow. I never truly stop shoveling, as those of you who know me can attest.

Happy snow day!

(*)>

(oh, and how often would you see post labels combining good science, religion, and teaching?)

Bureaucratic Nightmares!

(date changed to make it a lower post.)

OK, so as most of you know, I attempt to teach science to a hoard of kids in an inner-city school. Because most of our schools are a little bit challenged in keeping up to what the kids need to know (you know, no child left behind and all that), we have very specific and detailed instruction on what we must be teaching and when. This exists for most major courses.

Well, this year we have a new overlord of the schools and she has been informed (? does she have snitches?) that many? some? of the math and english teachers aren't sticking to the program. So now they all have to give a quiz EVERY FRIDAY (which takes a good portion of the period) to see if the teachers are far behind... so they're losing one in five (on a good week) days of instruction because they're not going fast enough... does anyone else see that this might be a dog-chases-tail kind of problem?

But we science teachers are not immune. Beyond our bi-monthly "are you teaching the right stuff" test, the state administered a standardized science test last year. Every district (in the state?) apparently scored below proficient. Much of the test, wisely, as it is governed by politicians, is geared toward environmental science. Which is not a course required in most schools. Also, there was a great deal tested on the life-cycle of stars which is taught in 7th grade. The test is administered in 11th grade. Yes, this all makes a great deal of sense.

So, the knee-jerk reaction is to "teach to the test". I now have a lesson I have to teach every week to help my students prepare for the PSSA.
Problem 1: most of the stuff in the review is biology/environmental. I last had biology in 1985. I do not remember it, and I do not care to.
Problem 2: I have 150 students. 10 of them are juniors. The other 140 are not required to take the PSSA until next year.
Problem 3: I have my own schedule that I must follow. I am just a little bit behind now, but stealing a day a week? Please see the second paragraph of this post.

Sigh.

Speaking of teaching outside my "expertise," in celebration of the coronation on Tuesday, the school is doing a whole host of presidency-related stuff. I have to teach about the Gettysburg Address, I have to teach about the I Have A Dream speech, I have to teach about the Declaration and the Constitution and all this civics history and other schtuff. And I have absolutely no clue. So I got out Schoolhouse Rock. Isn't that the best way to learn it? Heck, I can still sing the preamble.

All of this makes me very confused. But hey, keeps me on my toes!

(*)>

General Updates

Tis the season... for kids to be rowdy. Stinky and the Moth are burning off enough energy to light NYC for a day whirling around the house like dervishes. The kids at school are about the same.

How do you teachers do this year after year? It's enough to make me dislike holidays!

We have had a knifing in the bathroom this week and a bomb threat. (That's new for us - more a suburb thing.) More to the point though is that I have about 60% attendance at any one time. I'm not sure what to do with it! But I just teach the same lesson twice. Most kids who are there both times just work ahead; the rest don't pay attention either time.

I tell you - the sentence for egotism should be teaching high school. They'll straighten you out fast as to your importance in the world!!

John has started the steps to go back to school. He's terrified that his job will be gone in less than 5 years. He's probably right. But he'll be fine. He's smart and he works hard. I wish he'd have a little more confidence in himself. He's had mr. doom cloud over his head for months, but now that he's moving forward down a path, he's back to being the John I know. That's probably the best Christmas gift I could ask for!

The tree is up, the lights are up, and we went for a two-horse open wagon ride through a luminary-lit neighborhood last night. Life is good. Hope the same for anyone who wanders this way.

(*)>

Whaz Happenin

It's almost December. Although time does not fly, I can't believe it's almost December.

Stinky is about to turn 8. He reaches my chin already. Of course, I'm vertically challenged. But still. The moth is up to my... errr... chest. But Sean somehow got to practically eye height while I blinked. How'd he do that? Just today we were remembering some of the things he used to say... like...

When he was little Sean had a boat (in his imagination). If he liked you you were "on his boat", and if he didn't or you made him mad, you were "off his boat." If there was something you liked... say a movie or something... he had that on his boat, only better.

I always wondered, at the time, how parents could look fondly back on those endless, tiring years. But what do you know? I'm looking back fondly. Weird.

The house of Bird is cold. We keep the heat down and global warmening seems to have stalled this year. I went running this morning and froze my fingers. I had gloves on, but still lost feeling about 2 miles out. Had to turn around and beat feet home. And the sun was up and everything. Bummer.

School is school. Violence is down; class attendance is up. I still can't teach my way out of a paper bag. I can't seem to get across that protons are positive, electrons are negative, neutrons are neutral. 70% of my kids still don't get that. And I'm supposed to move on to bonding. I can't reteach this stuff anymore. They just don't get it.

It's frustrating, really very much so. But at the same time, it's more frustrating when they won't do anything, for the most part, and then get mad when I fail them. Like, what the hell? This isn't poetry. You can't listen and expect to understand. But they think they can. They think that they can listen a few minutes, chat the rest of class, and still get enough info to pass. The combination of (baseless) arrogance and apathy is toxic.

Enough of that.

I've been reading the chronicles of Eve Dallas in my spare time these days. I read some a few years ago, but Ms. Smith sure can churn them out!! I love this character, and it's enough romance and sci-fi to take me away better than Calgon ever could.

(*)>

FIRE!!

Updates updates...

First, on the school front. Well, I did my first real lab yesterday. 5 tests - acid, base, water, electric conductivity, and flame test - on a series of elements from around the periodic table. Period 2 was fine. Period 3 was great. Period 5 was really good.

Period 6 lit my garbage can on fire.

Of course, another teacher happened to be there when it happened. English teachers don't understand the fun of fire. He was pale and scared. I got to use my fire extinguisher! I was revved. And pissed. One of the students asked me if they were my worst class. I said, "yes." Then I mitigated, "I don't have anything against any of you as individuals. But as a group, we're chaos. Chaos and labs don't mix. You're not doing labs. You'll do worksheets when my other classes do labs."

The kid who lit the fire? I'm betting he doesn't make it back to school for a while. Those kids were MAD that they didn't get to play with the lab stuff.

It was never really that dangerous. It was contained in a metal garbage can. Besides, the science wing is far off on the side of the building, and is mostly empty. Damage there is easily contained. Schools are designed that way, usually, because science is dangerous. And fun. Don't think so? Go check out the fun these blokes are having, especially with any of the group 1 elements. Try potassium (K). I can't show these in school because youtube is blocked. Damn porn.

So back to that portion of the school being isolated. Because most of the labs are empty, the kids like to hang out up there. They stole a bunch of keys, among them a science wing master. Every once in a while we find evidence of B&E. Used condoms are among the evidence. Ewww. I mean, seriously. Think back to your science lab. Ewww.

This year, my boss heard some noise and caught 2 boys in one of the empty labs. It was dark. She pulled them out and wrote them up. She knew there were most likely two girls in the room, but it was better this way. Detention/suspension is nothing compared to the idea of getting caught in one of the labs with another boy for most of these guys. Holy crow, they were fired up at the implication that they were... hanging out together. She just smiled as she wrote the slips. They couldn't turn in the girls if they ever wanted to "hit that", but now their reps were questioned. A win-win if you ask me.

I was telling my husband this story, not knowing that stinky was around the corner, listening. I suspected he was around; he is most of the time these days. So I obviously used round about terms. The next day, Sean says to John, "I thought Mom's story was funny." John was like, "what story?" Stinky replies, "the one about the two boys dancing in the room. They were dancing with girls but the teacher made it sound like they were dancing with each other. Now everybody thinks they like to dance with boys." He giggles.

Little pitchers have big ears. I have never understood the source of that saying, but man, my pitcher has the biggest ears ever.

The boys are both fine. Soccer today - but it's rainy and Moth man has been sick all week. So he's not going. We got their pictures back this week. Classics. Stinky's shirt already has gook on it and Moth, well, it's not his best pic, that's all. Typical elementary pics. They're doing well, and EXCITED for halloween. Tim's a skeleton and sean is a zombie. Look for pics next week! Yeah right, ok, maybe next month! Next year?

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FOUND IT!

So, to update an old post, I just found the Harry Potter book. Sean had tucked it behind his Narnia series. I was standing there, cleaning up his CD's and thinking "that book has to be somewhere... maybe in another book?" And, le voila, as les francais might say. We are a happy pair, stinky and I.

Other updates...

Moth man is doing well in school, and is playing with all manner of kids every day when I pick him up. He is a social butterfly. As is his da, these days. Why, you ask? John's "boss" in the cub scouts has gotten seriously ill. He will get better, thank goodness (he's a great guy), but meanwhile the scouts aren't a priority. SOoooo... john is the grand poo-bah. Heh.

My school is still crazy. We had a student die of MRSA last week, which was really, really sad and kind of scary. We had a fire drill yesterday, and I can tell you, they're a lot more fun than real fires! Though I did "accidentally" start some fires in my lab this week - kids are a lot more interested in seeing more "exothermic" reactions now. Heh.

There's a new TV show that I'm interested in seeing - it's called Eleventh Hour. It just looks interesting from the ads. So, I TiVo - Eleventh Hour. And guess what? It's an old BBC series starring my fave, Patrick Stewart. And BBCA is showing that series this week, also. So, I'm TiVoing both! I love TiVo.

and with that, I'm going to post this, before I forget. Again.

Shoppin from A to Z

Every time my dear husband fixes eggplant, as he is doing today, this old Toni Basil song pops into my head.






Thank you, so much, Amy A, my best friend from middle school, for making sure that I had a complete 80's experience. I never would have known this song without her.



We are doing well in birdland. We have become a soccer family, much to my horror. I spent two friggin hours of my life that I will never get back this morning watching the Moth flutter in the wrong direction half the time. They're cute... for 45 minutes. After that? I have laundry waiting.



My school continues to be randomly weird. I have a FANTASTIC room this year - it's an actual lab with sinks, gas jets, lots of electric outlets, and storage. Drawers and drawers of lockable storage. So, I put my stuff in the drawers. I came in last Thursday morning to find that maintenance had screwed 2 drawers - not even the top two or right most two, just two random drawers - shut. I had to unscrew them to get to my rulers and paper. Why, you ask? No one seems to know. So, with a big shrug, I go on to make my lesson plans about JJ Thompson and the plum pudding.



My concerns about Spaceley's have started to come to fruition. They had surprise layoffs a few weeks ago, and there are strong possibilities of worse to come. I'm glad I'm out of there, for sure, though I do miss the guys I worked with.

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Tarot as Vocab Builder

(wow, four posts in one night?! well, John's had the computer all week... he's writing again... so I'm putting down everything I can remember... not that anyone reads these things anymore, anyhow.)

During our last week of school, I've done all sorts of stuff to keep the kids occupied.

• I taught them how to play blackjack, as it made them add quickly.
• I wrote out a few hundred multiple choice science, math, and pop culture questions and played "who wants to be a millionaire" for real prizes. (that was surprisingly successful, though my hand still hurts. See below.)
• I've watched a number of science-related-kind-of films (the Core, Deep Impact, Twister, Dante's Peak, and the Mummy series (archaeology is a science)).
• I gave tarot readings to a few kids.

yes, it seems like they were all time wasters, though I did try with most to reel in the science and math where I could. The tarot, though? A complete fluke (on my lunch break, both times).

I had a set of Tarot cards from my pre kids life - got them when I was a bookseller for under 5 bucks. Never used them. This was perfect, though. A couple of my girls really wanted to see if they worked. So I pulled them out and followed the directions.

Thing is, the cards were all described with words like obsequity and calamity and deceptive and adversity... words my girls just don't know. But boy were they interested. I think I taught more nickel and dime words to my kids in these tarot sessions than their English teacher did all year. Heh.

I even wound in a science lesson, talking about how time is a fourth dimension and Heisenberg's universes... amazing that a little supernatural makes the natural seem interesting!

Ooh, ooh, and I taught them a history lesson because for some reason, we got to talking about the difference between the Anglican church and the Catholic church and that whole thing just happens to be one part of history I kind of know.

Watch, I'm going to get slapped with doing occultish things, though I stressed the whole time that it was an interesting load of manure. Not real. Not real at all. Just fun.

Think I'll get fired?

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