A Little Treat

Woke up very, very early this morning with the "stomach flu" -- it was a mild case but left me exhausted and depleted and sleeping until noon. Then I climbed out of bed, opened up my Pitt State account, set up two Google.docs for the group work assigned for the coming week, and saw that I had been assigned grades on the homework essays, the group essays, and the midterm exam -- all taken in the last two weeks. I had 97.8% of the grade (or 137 out of 140 points) at the half-way point.

Feeling a tad relieved (though the final huge paper is still due), I climbed back in bed, put in an SOS call to Hubby for some 7-Up, and read my new copy of a very old John Irving, The Water-Method Man. Irving wrote this in 1972 and it was his second published novel. As with all the novels I've been pouring through, I was unable to put it down until I had finished it.

Many of Irving's themes are present: Vienna, dancing bears, sex as a force of life, man lost in his fears and failures. And many of Irving's delights are present, also -- his humor even in the darkest moments, his ability to make you care about the protagonist even when he's truly a jerk, his use of juxtapositions with time and place. Not his best, but riveting none-the-less.

Hopefully my head will be clearer and my stomach much more settled tomorrow. Next Wednesday my final project paper is due -- and I haven't written a word of it yet. Plus there are still those two Google.docs I've got to participate in the writing of. And one other essay that's supposed to involve the interviewing of three paraprofessionals (at a minimum). I don't have a para at my school, nor do I know one to contact now. Still, I've worked with them during the last four years - so magic tea leaves do your thing, invent me one more essay out of whole-cloth.

Starting Summer

The final day of the district workshop ended after only 3 hours -- more with a whimper than a bang. We were to list all the resources available to the high school English teachers in the district -- and that was such a short list that we all went home right before lunch.

Finally I got the feeling of freedom and release. I now have three delicious weeks before grad summer school starts. Three weeks of going to bed at 3 a.m. and getting up at 11. My internal clock is thrilled.

However, today I trudged out at 6:30, took a bath, got dressed and Hubby and I went garage saling for a brief period before it got too hot. We never left our neighborhood, but I did find a couple of cute things to give as sock gifts to the Houston crew over Christmas.

While Hubby computed, I did a bit of grocery shopping for things I want to eat this summer -- cereal (Grape Nuts, Rice Krispies). Then I started cleaning a very wee corner of the bedroom.

I also finished the second of the Stieg Larsson Millennium series. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was absolutely riveting. The Girl Who Played With Fire was not quite as good, but that's rather like saying "this is a honking big perfect diamond, just not the Hope diamond." The two books are simply so good you can't put them down once you start reading. I am chomping to get the third in the series, but it's not yet out in paperback and I'm reluctant to pay for a hardback that I will have trouble holding (carpel tunnel makes reading paperbacks almost required for me).

I understand that Larsson left a draft of the 4th book on his computer but his family and girlfriend are fighting over who has rights to the book. And there are also outlines for book 5 & 6. I'm really sorry that he died so unexpectedly (and young) before we (the readers) could find out what was planned for the future of Mikael and Lisbeth.

It's going to be a short summer -- for those outside education who believe we (teachers and students) actually get three months off, it's certainly not true. Plus, remember, teachers are only paid for 10 months of the year -- NOT twelve. But we do need time to recharge our batteries and feed our souls and take care of family matters. I dread thinking what a 12-month school year will actually look like. I know it's coming, though, and sooner, rather than later. Still, THIS summer, I'm going to enjoy myself for the next three weeks, and like Scarlett O'Hara let tomorrow take care of itself.

Eight Weeks

Tomorrow morning I resume getting up at 4:45 a.m. Spring break is over -- ending with 8 inches of snow on my front lawn . . . but the calendar says this is spring, actually, so the temp has risen to 42 degrees tonight and the snow on the streets has already turned to slush.

Two more weeks of March.

Four weeks of April.

Four weeks of May.

I hate early mornings.

My classes are full of difficult students.

The school district is in severe money troubles causing much anxiety for everyone and a very unsure future.

This is the first time since I restarted my teaching career that I'm dreading the coming morning.

Gettin' Edge-cated

Summer plans are frighteningly busy for me this year. I've already attended two meetings around curriculum development and have homework assigned for developing a plan for teaching a Language Arts Study Skills class for SPED.

Next week I spend the first three days at my own school working on scheduling 200 students in the Health Community. We've never done the actual "computer" scheduling before, so factoring in the learning curve time, I figure we've got about 15 hours of work ahead of us.

Also next week I start three hours of graduate credit toward my SPED certification. I'm 18 hours into acquiring the 36 hours I need. This summer's course is called SPED Technology and I'm not looking forward to it -- in fact all the courses still ahead of me make me pretty disgruntled. It seems I have to take a whole heap of courses for teaching elementary education and functional students. The SPED Technology course is geared to students who are much more disabled than the ones I work with. I admire those who can deal with functional kids -- those who are more profoundly disabled than the ones I have in my collaborative setting -- but I'm very clear that these students are not the ones I'm destined to teach. I simply don't have the patience or the motivation to cope with their problems. In the same vein, I have no interest or ability to work with elementary kids. I spent seven years early in my career with middle school kids and thought that was my milieu -- but the first year I was transferred into high school, I realized I had been wrong. The 14 to 20 age bracket is where my abilities shine.

Before I left teaching in 1990 I had been coordinating and developing a college preparatory program for inner city high schoolers -- freshman through senior. So it was quite a change, when I came back to teaching 16 years later, to enter into the special education classroom. I'm not sure that in 1988 I was geared to teaching SPED, but the intervening years away from teaching taught me more patience and gave me a different perspective on life.

The business / construction world requires nothing if not patience. Folks come to work at 8 a.m. and sit around. They work maybe two, three hours tops. They go to meetings and sit around. They take hour lunch breaks -- maybe longer. They schedule meetings outside their office -- and drive around the city. They talk on the phone when they feel like it -- making PERSONAL calls all day long. They chat at the copy machine, in the hallway, in the break room. They can eat anytime during the day. They have cafeterias that serve full course meals at breakfast, at lunch, and then prepare food you can buy and take home with you for dinner -- and the food is healthy and delicious (NOT corn dogs, corn, pudding, and milk). They can actually go to the bathroom whenever nature calls -- and not wait until passing period or when they have a planning period. It was an amazing world to me, in business / construction. Sure, there were hectic times during the year -- but even then people took hour lunches and went to the john when they needed to. My doctor laughs and tells me that women teachers have the worst urinary tract infections of anybody she works with -- because we're required to hold "it" for hours at a time -- and certainly that's been my reality in the classroom.

However, in the SPED room we move along at a slower pace. I do have less students -- this year only 11 on my caseload -- though the year before I had 21. Then we hired another SPED teacher to carry part of my load. The kids understand if I have to go the bathroom. They like the lunches I bring from home and want to share. It's okay if I need to pop out a bottle of water to get me through the 90 minute periods, as long as they get an applesauce or a breakfast bar in the bargain. For the last three years I had a paraprofessional at my command who could sit with the kids if I needed to leave the classroom. This year she's been fired and will not be replaced due to budgetary demands. Yes, my workday starts at 6:15 -- but I'm on my way home at 3:00. I have two weeks vacation at Christmas, a week of spring break, all the major holidays off (President's Day and Martin Luther Kings birthday -- you never get those in business) and two months during the summer. Yes, I'm back in grad school working on my second master's degree -- but that's okay, too, most of the time. The district is paying my tuition and buying my books. Because I have years of experience behind me I'm pretty quick at making lesson plans -- and because I'm a SPED teacher I get a full 90 minute break, where I usually get most of my planning accomplished. Because I'm a collaborative teacher, I don't have the massive papers to grade, except that now I'm actually teaching three English classes. Still, I'm experienced enough to know how to get that accomplished with minimal effort on my part. The only onerous chore I have is the SPED paperwork required (IEP's, SOP's, etc.) that have to be completed in timely fashion. An IEP is truly a "labor" of love.

This summer I'm going to be busy -- at least during June. The state college I'm attending tries to make education for busy people accessible -- so my three hour class is schedule for six classroom hours each week during June with the class ending July 2. The curriculum workshop planned to have all its work completed by July 1. Scheduling of the Health kids will only take three days next week. I'll be busy in June -- I hear the Technology class requires a lot of outside the classroom work -- but in July, I'll be reading novels and eating bon-bons. Or cleaning the bathroom. Whichever seems more important.

Summer -- and It's Time to Blog!

In the last month plus I've written numerous blog entries in my head . . . but the closing of school was arduous and tense, though not emotionally painful, so I husbanded my strength for getting through. I did. School is out for the 2008-2009 year, all three of my senior students for whom I case-manage, did graduate, and today is the first full day of summer vacation.

Except, not really. At some point I need to go back to my school to help schedule all the students in my community for next year. Counselors don't do this anymore. The truth is, I wonder, what their job description actually is now-a-days. The four counselors in our building have been cut to two, what with the economic cut-backs we're experiencing, and not one teacher regretted our loss 0f 50% of the counseling staff.

Today I start a reading curriculum skills building workshop. I've never taught reading, and this is to be a "Reading Skills Summer Work" but the SPED group wanted my English curriculum building expertise (such as it is) so I'm scheduled to meet from 1 to 4 today, with more sessions TBD.

I received my state teaching license this year -- and I'm vastly relieved to get it. The state I'm teaching in has had a very strict and complicated procedure for licensing and it's taken me three years to convert my lifetime license from the neighboring state. However, I am now properly certified to teach English, History, and Government in grades 9 - 12 until the year 2014. Cool.

Next week I start three hours of grad school -- a course called Special Education Technology which is meeting Tuesdays and Thursdays from 5 to 8 p.m. -- but only goes from June 8 to July 2. I'm now starting on the SPED courses that are pretty much all directed either at elementary students or are for functional students - neither if which I'm ever going to teach (never say never, you opine? Hum -- well, I'm certainly never -- and I really mean NEVER -- teaching elementary school) so I'm not very enthused about them.

Last week I had my 63rd birthday. It was pretty much a non-event but this weekend I received two dozen (!!!!) pink birthday roses from a dear friend -- and they are the most beautiful and fragrant roses I've ever gotten. The entire back of the house has the delicious aroma of rose petals.

Hubby and I have been going to garage sales on Saturdays for a couple of hours. He's in the market for pre-school material for his daycare adventure, while I'm collecting books and video tapes for high school SPED kids. Not that DVDs are so popular, VHS tapes are selling for a quarter -- or in one case five for a $1. Can't beat the price!

Hopefully this summer I will be able to write more on this old blog -- starting my third year now -- chronicling the ups and downs of an older woman, returning to the classroom after a 16 year absence. It's going well, my friends. Really well. My job, even as I watch those around me getting laid off and fired (my paraprofessional was fired in a closed door hearing last Friday), is secure, I love it, and I work with great folks. I'm truly blessed.

5 a.m. is awfully early . . .

We managed to roll out of bed at 5 a.m. -- on time and waking up without the benefit of the alarm (aside: Hubby gifted me some years back with a very expensive radio/CD player/alarm clock which is so complicated all I can do is set the time on it -- I've never gotten it to go off at any set time in the last three years -- which necessitated my learning to self-program getting up without alarm benefit). Hubby strolled to the kitchen in his undies to do the breakfast / lunch chores and I stumbled to the bathroom for the morning ablutions.
All dressed, dogs, Hubby, and I were out the door in the still dark, frigid wee morning hours and I was strolling down my classroom hallway by 6:15. The temps outside were 17 degrees and it wasn't that much warmer in my classroom.


The day ran fairly smoothly. The science teacher called to say one of mine refused to work and could she send him to me. Instead I suggested I come talk with him; sometimes it's as hard for the kids to get self-started as it is for the adults. When he found I wasn't mad, just rather amused that with only seven days left in the semester it was NOW that he decided not to work, he thought better of the situation. Seems he hadn't wanted to come to school today but his mother made him, so he conveniently left all his supplies at home. "Well, this is silly. You came. You knew we'd expect you to work. How do YOU want to handle this?" I queried and he agreed that getting pencil and paper from me and doing the vocabulary assignment wouldn't be such a bad deal.

In World History my two girls passed two benchmarks each. My student aid came in the last part of second block and instead of getting right to putting away Christmas decorations, came over and gave me a big hug from behind. Then she got right to work.

My para, who was absent the day before Christmas, was now absent the day after Christmas. My understanding is that you miss the day before AND the day after a holiday, the district will not pay you for the holiday. I hope she's found other employment because if she shows up this week without a doctor's note, the principal will suspend her for at least another two days without pay.

Third block completed all the assignments for Mockingbird. Now I'm just marking time with them. They work so diligently at this point that I hate to see them go. We have only the final left.

Lunch was taken up with a teacher from another community who is very, very unhappy with her life at my school and thought I might offer her some insight. I had little to contribute other than "hunker down, keep a low profile, and try NOT to piss anybody off." That's my current teaching philosophy, anyway. She wasn't really pleased that I wouldn't help her tilt at her windmills.

Fourth block went by quickly with the students working on a reading program on the computers in the lab. The kid from first block brought back the unused portion of his borrowed tablet just as the bell rang but had lost the pencil into the stratosphere. Then the SPED staff met for 30 minutes to review new procedures for alerting parents to IEP meetings. And it was time to go home.

My virus still hangs on. I feel crummy and on getting home went straight to bed. But I got an unsolicited hug from my student aid and that made the day all worthwhile.