Another wild week

I can't decide if it's easier or more difficult to do a week recap on Friday or to comment on each day separately, but I'm doing the recap because I finally have the energy to do so.

This week is homecoming week, which was something I couldn't have cared less about in high school. I never went to the game, I never dressed up for the days unless it was Pajama Day (and that was just laziness) and I have no memory of Armstrong putting together a parade. Here, though, it's a big, town-wide event and I'm still getting used to the small town culture shock.

This week is also banned book week. We discussed it in 2nd hour Language Arts all week. I have to say, it's like the perfect discussion topic for the group of kids I work with, because every activity is like "find the dirty parts." Today we taped back together my class set of Sherman Alexie's "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian," which had been censored by the district (the f-word was Sharpied out and a whole page referencing masturbation was torn out of each copy. If anything, the kids are excited to read the book this winter. My favorite part was on Tuesday when I read "And Tango Makes Three" (the most challenged book in the U.S. in the past few years) to the class. I hyped it up, trying to get them to guess why a penguin book would cause a ruckus. A few pages in, the whole class went "oooohhhhhhh..." Awesome.

This week was also NWEA testing week. We spent last week identifying (with the MAZE test and fluency probes) which students were at risk of not passing the MCA Reading or Math tests they need for graduation. By the way, it's most of our kids. The purpose of the NWEA test is to figure out what kinds of questions the kids are just not getting. So this week, we got them all set up on the computerized tests and I helped Bernie monitor the kids and collect their scores. It's kind of important to keep an eye on them, because they get so exhausted and downtrodden that they just want to click through making random guesses, so I had to keep reminding kids that I really needed the results to be accurate so I could help them pass the MCAs. I also discovered that there are not only serious lapses of knowledge and skills, but that they could all use a little help with test-taking strategy. So I'm trying to get my hands on past test questions so I can go through one a day with my Soar class. Ah, standardized tests.

What would any given week be without a big emergency, though? Wednesday I spent the afternoon in the urgent care. Amy, the art teacher, had been planning this cool art project involving sheets of plexiglass. She had gotten Lowe's to agree to donate the plexiglass and she was having the kids design 3-D sculptures out of it. So I'm just finishing up collecting NWEA scores when Derek comes out of the art room gushing blood from his hand. It turns out to cut plexiglass you need an Exacto knife and I'm sure you can guess the rest.

Jane needed a second adult to come along to the urgent care, so since I wasn't teaching I hopped in the car. Jane and I sat with Derek while the nurses examined him. He's a pretty tough kid, I have to say. I, on the other hand, totally embarrassed myself by getting all dizzy during the exam. So I sat out in the waiting room and made phone calls to check on Derek's tetanus shot records. Then I read a magazine. I was feeling pretty useless.

So I'm sitting in the waiting room reading a magazine from last April when I look up and I see Kayla, another ALC student that I don't have in my class, standing at the desk with her hand all wrapped up. Apparently not 30 minutes later, she had done the exact same thing. So it was a good thing there were two adults there, because then I had to sit with Kayla. So I learned all about Kayla and her 3-month old baby and her fiancee that works at Taco John's and her fiance's ex with a two-year-old that's stalking her. And I said to myself what my co-workers have been telling me for awhile: Welcome to the ALC. So we had to wait for the doctor to finish stitching up Derek and then she came in to fix up Kayla (her cut was not as bad, so they patched her up with some adhesive). I was doing fine for like 45 minutes with her and I only started feeling faint again at the very end when she was applying the glue. And just like that time my dad was in the hospital visiting Joe, the doctor noticed I was getting faint before I did. So she made me lie down on the exam table and the nurse came in and confused me for the patient. Super classy.

Anyway, yesterday was spent another useless day of training while a sub taught my class. It is amazing to me that the district wanted to pay for a day of training, plus a sub, to explain what I will be evaluated on by my principal before I am tenured. Literally, it is a one page list of items that could have been handed to me in four seconds. But no, I sat there all day and brainstormed ways I could show my administrator how I prepare my lessons (uh, maybe I could show her a lesson plan? DUH!). Then I came home and did what I always do: drown my sorrows in an ER rerun.

Today we get dismissed early for the homecoming parade, which I have to participate in as a new teacher. I have no idea what's going on, but I'm wearing my t-shirt. I'll update you all on that later...