It's been a week!

That is really what I meant, it's been one heck of a week. It had it's ups and ended on more of a down note.

My 7th grade class has read the poem IF, by Rudyard Kipling. You know If you can do this you will be a man my son. Yeah that one! They did NOT get it! I was frustrated and they were frustrated. I had an idea. We broke into groups and each group had to "translate" one stanza into "their" language. That went surprisingly well. Next idea, make them write their own version, but use the ending phrase responsible adult. WOW! Most of them blew me away. I read each version aloud to the class and they were impressed with each other.

My 8th graders read Brer Possum's Dilemma, and a brief article about crime scene investigation. They then had to evaluate the crime scene for poor Brer Possum. I was amazed and all but one class did very well. In that class only 1 student came prepared. Of course that was the day we all got emails about the high failure rate.

I emailed my principal about that one class and was basically blown off. Our failure rate should only be 12%. For some students, mine is the only class they are not passing. I'm very old fashioned, I want the kids to think and write and read. I REALLY like to see the work they have done, with their name on the paper! Call me strange.

We had a student OD at school and was taken away by ambulance. We had a student climb onto the roof and into a tree and refuse to come down. I don't know if they had to call in SWAT. One of my students who was sent to another campus because of a behavior problem will be returning early, as THEY cannot handle her. Like I can?? A student stood up in class and said I was a crap teacher. Another student will be placed at the alternative campus, so I get to write up a month's worth of lessons, just for that one. A co-worker's son has gotten in trouble with the law and she is searching for "placement" for her son. "Placement" comes with a heavy price tag!

But I did have a student stay after class to tell me she understands what I mean when I say reading takes place behind the eyes. And a faculty member's daughter asked me what bus I ride. A student whom I have never taught, shared her book of poems with me. I knew she was hurting, and now I have a better understanding of her pain. It's nothing out of the ordinary, but it was poignant and I remembered those feelings I had at that age.

Like I said it's been a week. I'm feeling fairly low. I was ready to throw all my stuff into a huge pile and have a bonfire. I read a lot of blogs tonight and that helped. It seems to have been a rough week for lots of us. How was your week?