"For now, these hot days, is the mad blood stirring."

The student teaching continues. We're about halfway through Romeo & Juliet and I'm pleasantly surprised about how much most kids are enjoying it. They're engaged, making predictions, taking parts to read and getting indignant (Juliet's thirteen? WTF???) all at the right moments. 6th hour, especially, has several excellent actors in it and the fight/Mercutio death scene we did today was AWESOME.

Mr. Leisen had me write my own copy of the final test and he approved it (especially the "Responsibility Pie Chart" I shamelessly stole from Gallagher), so at least I know I can write a decent assessment. I also did my very first parent-teacher conferences last week, which went well. I've had two observations so far (one during my poetry unit and one on a reading day) and both went well.

My own personal breakthrough happened today during 6th hour when I actually spoke with certain students who were bugging me without hesitating. Usually I either forget to pull them aside after class or I can't bring myself to do it, but today I pulled Tony into the hallway to call him out for using the basketball without asking AND I had Lauren, Bri and Alayna stay after class to talk to me about throwing paper and generally being annoying. Both went well, and I think I'm getting better at that stern voice thing.

My 2nd and 3rd hours are practially BEGGING me to watch more of the movie, and I really wish we had more time to do it. I keep telling them: be proactive, go to Blockbuster or use your parents Netflix. Alex in 2nd hour pointed out it's available on Comcast right now, so I hope some people heard him. Seriously, you watch one movie scene with a gunfight and suddenly everyone's a Shakespeare fan.