#teacher sloth

[slothquisitor]

My professional development today is at our local aquarium which makes a lot of sense since I teach English.

What are the chances that we get to walk around the actual aquarium at any point, do you think? Because if I’m in this close proximity to sloths and I don’t get to see them I’m going to be real bummed out.

[slothquisitor]

Well, it's graduation today. Which means, we made it! Unfortunately, this week the personal life has been lifing, so there will be no update to Halfway to Whole this weekend. Hopefully, I'll get this next chapter ready to go for the beginning of next week, and we'll be able to resume our usual weekend posting schedule.

Personal ramblings about the year under the cut (tw: death).

It's been an exceptionally difficult school year for so many reasons that are sort of hard to articulate. It's been a school year bookended by grief. A colleague and friend died the first week of school, and my grandmother passed this week. It's impossible to separate this school year from the grief of it all. Whether it was sitting with students in their loss or putting on a smile to teach and celebrate my students while waiting for the call.

It's been a year of intense uncertainty as we head into a district split. We don't know what our jobs or schools will look like in a year, and there are a lot of people in positions of power trying to provide reassurance, and doing a very bad job at it lol.

It's also been a year of joy. This week, I said goodbye to my students and told them they're the reason I do this job. And it's true! They're the best part of it all. They are funny and brilliant and incredible and surprising and frustrating. They constantly humble me and keep me laughing, both at them and myself. When you spend so much of your day with an audience, you really can't take yourself too seriously.

This year, I shepherded a student teacher through the process of being so afraid of being up in front of the kids to being a confident, competent teacher. It was a joy to mentor someone with so much excitement and energy for this job. It was exciting to guest lecture to a room full of pre-service teachers, too. It was validating to see all of the work I put in and the cohort I built at my school move the needle when it came to test scores. The MLs at my school went from 46% showing improvement to 60%! We built a faculty book club with the express purpose of getting adults in our building reading. It started with eight teachers, and now we're pushing forty at every meeting as more people join us every single time.

I guess more than anything, I'm trying to remind myself that each year is a spectrum of experiences. The good and the bad, the sad and the frustrating. I'm ready for a summer of rest, but I'm also looking forward to next year, already thinking about things I'll do differently and how to be better.

My grandmother was an educator, too. She taught elementary school in the same district I currently teach in. She forgot a lot of who she was, even forgot me. On the days she didn't know who I was, I'd tell her I was a teacher and see her face light up as she told me, "I'm a teacher, too!" Even as she lost so much of who she was, she remembered that piece of herself, that important role. Already, so many of her former students have reached out to our family expressing their love of her. It's a nice reminder that even if we're unsure that we're having any impact at all, students remember.

[slothquisitor]

Genuinely trying to come up with a professional reply to this parent email. Also the audacity of sending this to me the last day of the term, like, what?

[slothquisitor]

I love when students pull dumb shit, and it doesn't work at all for them. So I have a student, let's call him Jeff. Jeff came to me today (on my final deadline of the year) to tell me he couldn't possibly meet the minimum requirements on my essay (ten sources, five of them scholarly, essential learning you don't pass without it) because he couldn't find five scholarly sources. His topic was the Vietnam War.

I sort of laughed him out of my classroom. In a nice way. Told him I'd see his essay when he submitted it before midnight.

Anyway, I got an email not an hour ago from Jeff. Jeff is now telling me that he's at the hospital because his mom is having surgery, and he cannot possibly finish the essay tonight.

So, I texted my friend, who I know is friends with Jeff's mom. Guess what, I learned? Jeff's mom is fine. She's not in the hospital.

This is almost as good as the parent who tried to prove her student was in my class because he was sending pictures of the clock to her, and I got to let her know my classroom didn't have a clock.

[slothquisitor]

Today my partner delivered my Fizzquisition (ha!) order and pastries to my class and I didn’t notice because I was too busy helping a student and he told the students by my desk to keep quiet AND THEY LISTENED.

Anyway, I fear he has become fic inspiration.

[slothquisitor]

I was down and out from work yesterday with a migraine only to return and be reminded that it is sophomore night and I have to be here until seven.

Scheduling this the Tuesday before spring break is downright diabolical.

[slothquisitor]

Absolutely batshit conversations I’ve had with my students this week

Student: Profa, do you have change for a hundred dollar bill? Me: I am not a cashier. *Fully knowing the answer, and likely to regret asking* Why do you have a hundred dollar bill? Student: Me and REDACTED were just trading some things. Me: Remember those conversations we’ve had about me being a mandatory reporter? *** Student: Why can’t I make up my reading points? Me: Because the deadline was Friday. I let you make up everything all term long without penalty, but after my deadline, I need time to finalize grades. Student: But I didn’t know it was your deadline! I come late every single day! Me: Yeah, that is why you’re missing all those reading points. I mean, the deadline is also written on the board and posted outside my classroom. Student: I don’t look at that stuff! Me: *stares into the camera* *** Student: Well, I texted you on Friday! Me: You texted me? Student: Yes! With the number on your Canvas page! See! *shows me text* Me: You texted the school’s landline. Why did you include my extension number first? Student: I thought it was one of those text this code this number things. Me: Okay. Well, I didn’t get your text. Student: Why didn’t the school secretary send it to you? Isn’t that her job? Me: You texted a landline. No one got the text. You do understand that, right?

You guys, it’s only Tuesday morning. I am so tired.

[slothquisitor]

So today (in addition to catching these same three students with burner phones they’ve been turning in instead of their real phones) I also discovered that they’d somehow tracked down my NINTH GRADE YEARBOOK PHOTO. Then, they proceed to rattle off names and stories they have no business knowing.

Anyway, I weaseled out of them the culprit. Apparently, it’s a guy I went to high school with who teaches at the other high school in our town. We were great friends senior year, but I haven’t really seen or talked to him since. Anyway, I just sent him an email asking if this is a declaration of war because I have way more embarrassing stories and incriminating photos of him than he’s got on me.

The chaos gremlin in me really hopes he says yes.