New Year... Fresh Start...

I'm back, and I'm hoping to be better at blogging this year than I was last.

Last year was a really tough year for me.  It was my second year of teaching and it made me totally question if what I was doing was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.  After the riot in December, tons of dramatic political banter followed.  Parents became enraged, teachers felt unsafe, our principal was fired, our superintendent left, and many great teachers and an excellent assistant principal decided to leave our district and seek employment elsewhere.  I didn't enjoy my job last year.  I had many difficult students who no matter what I did, refused to accept my help and ended up becoming 9th grade repeaters.  It was just not a good year.

But now I am starting a new one.  A breath of fresh air... I hope!

Today was the first official full day of school and I got to know my kids a little bit.  Because I'm young, and many of my students are hormonal 14 and 15 year old boys, I got the usual questions as to whether or not I was single, or if I would consider dating a student.  I also got the inappropriate comments such as "Miss!  So-And-So was just looking at your butt!", or "Damn Miss! You're my teacher?  I could get used to this," while high-fiving his "boys".  Whatever.  I usually respond with, "No, I'm not single, I'm going to be getting married.  But I do have some single teacher friends who I could hook you up with... as long as you're into 65 year old men."  Or something of the sort to embarrass them and shut them up quickly.

All in all, I think I'm going to have a good group this year.  I'll give you a couple of today's anecdotes:

First, during my resource room, my students didn't really have much to work on so I allowed them to either draw or read.  One student, who we'll call Sleepy since all he ever talked about was how much he loved to sleep, decided to be a wise guy and draw a picture of what he sees when he sleeps: he scribbled all over the entire piece of paper with a black pen.  I then took it from him and exclaimed in front of the class that it was a brilliant masterpiece and that I was going to sell it on ebay and make millions off of him.  That's when one of my students, who has Autism and Tourettes and who we will call Gamer since he loves his video games, raised his hand and asked to take a look at "the masterpiece". He stared at it for a good 30 seconds and then looked up at me and said, "You know what?  I really see something here.  I see something through this drawing.  Do you know what I see?"  "No, what do you see Gamer?" I asked enthusiastically.  He motioned for me to come closer, I leaned in, and he whispered into my ear, "I see a penis."  Yeah... that one totally threw me off.  I just took the paper away and said, "Uhh... no I don't think I see that... what's your favorite video game again?"  Note to self: always be on your toes when it comes to Gamer.

The second story I have for you is about one of my students who has extreme OCD when it comes to germs and who I think may also have been recently diagnosed with schizophrenia.  He's scared to touch calculators, pens, and door handles or give any dap or high fives.  He's also only 4 feet tall.  We'll call him Howie (after Howie Mandel).  So today during resource, Howie asked if he could use the bathroom.  Twenty minutes after I had granted him permission to use the throne, I realized that he had never returned.  So I went out in the hall to get one of the security guards to go check on him.  Security came back out and informed me that he wasn't in there.  So as I go into panic mode, since this is the first freakin' day of school and I've already lost a kid, I ask security to sweep the building and put out an all call for him.  Ten minutes later, in comes Howie with a security escort who is barely able to contain his laughter.  I go into the hallway, after letting Howie back into the room, and the security guard informs me that he was found in an upstairs bathroom hiding in a bathroom stall trying to skip my class.  Great.  So I go back into my classroom and explain to Howie that he cannot skip classes.  His response: "Why not?  I did it in the middle school all the time."  I replied that we are now in the high school and that it cannot happen here.  So I ask, "So, from now on you are not going to skip, right?"  His respone: "I dunno.  Maybe."  This one is definitely going to be a handful.

In fact I think the majority of my kids are going to be a handful this year, but I think that they are also going to be goofy and fun for the most part.  **KNOCK ON WOOD**

I'm looking forward to the start of a new year.  I'm working with all new teachers this year, we have a bunch of new administrators, and a whole new batch of students.  Pretty much everything is brand spankin' new.  So I'm just going to remain optimistic!  Wish me luck!

And to all of you new teachers out there, here's my New Teacher Tip of the Day: Remain optimistic and make teacher friends.  They are the only ones who will truly be able to understand you!

Day 3 For Me... Day 1 For The Kids...

Well today was the first day for our freshmen, and I'll be honest, if I were a freshmen coming into our high school for the first time, I would think that it was going to be the absolute best experience of my life.  We trick them into thinking that we are ridiculously "hip" and "cool" by starting off the day with a deejay in the gymnasium blasting hip hop with a ton of upperclassmen cheering and dancing for the freshmen.  It really is a pretty awesome experience and it helps kids feel a lot more comfortable within their new environment.  Overall, it went as smoothly as it could; the first day is always the most hectic.  The freshmen participated in a bunch of ice breaker activities and then followed their schedules so that they would have an easier time finding their classes come tomorrow.  I got to meet the majority of the kids on my caseload and they seem like they'll be a fun group.  I'm looking forward to when they come out of their shells and aren't as timid as they all are now.

At one point, right in the beginning of a science class I co-teach, a new first year teacher introduced himself to the class and began his lesson.  I unfortunately had to stop him and say, "Mr. Science #2, this is actually Mr. Science #1's class."  His response was, "Oh, is this like a co-teaching gig that we're doing?"  I then had to explain to him that he was, in fact, in the wrong room and was attempting to teach the wrong class.  He became extremely flustered and then realized he was supposed to be all the way on the other side of the building.  So here is, yet again, my advice for new teachers: ALWAYS know your schedule and where you should be at any given time during the day; you must always attempt to appear more organized than your students.  If you're teaching in a building that you are unfamiliar with, come into school a couple of weeks before classes start and walk around to familiarize yourself with your surroundings, especially if you're teaching in different classrooms.

First Day Back...

The 2010 - 2011 school year has officially begun... for the teachers at least.  I had to sit through a 6 hour professional development today with a flamboyantly gay guest speaker who told a ton of bathroom jokes and embarrassed the hell out of quite a few teachers.  Needless to say, it was the best PD I've had to sit through to date.

At one point during all of the "excitement" (it wasn't that exciting, I'm being sarcastic here), the principal of our high school introduced each of the new teachers joining our "family" this year.  I couldn't help but think of (and cringe) when he had done the same last year; my first year.  Each new teacher, when their name was called, was asked to stand up and wave to all 250 faculty members of our high school.  I remember sitting in my seat saying to myself over and over "Don't look like an idiot, don't look like an idiot, don't look like an idiot..."  When I heard my named get called, I stood up, turned around a bit, waved to everyone, and sat back down.  It wasn't until afterwards, when I had multiple people coming up to me asking me if I was alright or what was wrong, that I realized that in the midst of telling myself not to look like an idiot, I had apparently forgotten to tell myself to look friendly and personable.  Instead, I had stood up, scowled at the crowd, waved a pathetic wave, and then plopped back down in my seat apparently looking suicidal.  Naturally (and unfortunately), I became known as "Sour Puss" and "Miss Grumpy" by more of my colleagues than I had wanted for my first few weeks as a first year teacher.

So my advice to first year teachers: First impressions count, so even though you may feel like you're about to throw up and poop your pants all at the same time, put on your best smile and fake your way through the nerves!