Guess how many classes I had to say that to today?
Okay, not in those words, but I did tell one of my classes that two different adults had described their time with them as a “shitshow” yesterday, and yes, I used that exact word.
I’m tired.
Category: Teaching
Math-people, Pt. 2
Okay, maybe that wasn’t as complicated as I thought it was going to be:
Basically all I did was add the “Is the number a fraction?” step there, and we’ll have to review converting fractions to decimals a bit, but it’ll do and they need to remember how to do that anyway.
In the meantime, I actually called out sick today; my Mounjaro (I assume) got on top of me hard in the last couple of days and I spent less of last night sleeping than I generally like to do, in favor of activities that generally aren’t meant to be described in polite company. So I slept most of the day away once it passed. I may have to have a review day for my kids on Friday already, though, which feels awfully early, although if I remember right we probably had about one a month last year anyway so maybe not. We’ll see how the next couple of days go, assuming I can drag my ass out of bed.
Math humans!
Look at this flowchart:
I am not a digital artist, as you can probably tell, and I put this together in Sheets, which is certainly really far from the best way to do it, but it gets the job done. Here’s the question: how do I best include the existence of fractions? Fractions are always rational, but depending on what the fraction is, it can be any of the rational number sub-categories as well. I could just include an instruction after the first question to convert fractions to decimals, but 1) that feels inelegant, and 2) it sort of introduces another source of error, but that source is there anyway, I suppose– a kid that doesn’t recognize 1/3 as a repeating decimal is probably also not going to realize that 12/4 is a natural number.
Can you figure out a way to work fractions into this without adding a ton of qualifiers and disclaimers or extra questions? One or two is fine but I don’t want this to get much messier than it already is.
Hmm.
In which multiple things are true at once
The first True Thing is that, even making the inevitable corrections for First Day of School, I am of the tentative opinion that I’m in for a reasonably good year of school. Things can always change and my fourth hour is going to be a challenge, I think, but I had a half-dozen boys in particular who I was concerned were going to end up being shitheads and who at least right now appear to be interested in staying on my good side. But my advisory shows every sign of being delightful and my Algebra class looks pretty damn good too, so I’ll take what I’ve got.
The second True Thing is that dinner was a handful of Saltines, a bunch of grapes and five or six slices of deli chicken because the notion of creating anything more complicated was well beyond me.
The third is that I am tired in every organ and muscle and pore of my body, and I’m going to bed early tonight, because somehow I have to do this again tomorrow? How does that even work?
(I did not, by the way, get that geometry class that I was angling for all summer– did I ever actually say that? I can’t get pissed about it. The chance that I was going to get lucky enough to get paid for a class with six kids in it was never high. I have an overload again anyway, though, because we only have three math teachers and that is absolutely Not Enough Math Teachers.)
THANK YOU
I am an idiot, and got distracted, and I did not successfully get a picture of the pile of donated supplies. Be aware that probably 75% of this cabinet is donated, and this isn’t everything.
There are 2500 pencils in a different cabinet, and look at all the markers.
Thank you, everyone. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
In which the machinery of government moves … quickly?
Holy shit, y’all. I applied for my high school math licensure literally yesterday and I got an email today that my addition had been approved and my license was updated. This from, remember, sending them test results from a test that took forty days to get official score results on, and in what is almost certainly their busiest time of the year.
I’ve talked my fair amount of shit about the IDOE during my time working here, but they’re absolutely on point with getting licenses up to date. Damn.
And, yes, that’s seven different content areas I’m licensed for. I really should get my science licensure just for the hell of it.
Adding to the level of today’s miraculousness, of three meetings I was expected to attend today, two ended early– one by forty-five minutes, and that was the one I was fully expecting to eat every single second of its allotted time– and the third took within a minute of precisely the time it was planned for. Tomorrow is going to be a crazy-long day because it’s parent-teacher night, and I have to dress like a grown-up and everything, but Wednesday should be pretty chill and then on Thursday the children arrive.
We are still missing two math teachers– a department that should be five people is only three– so I got another overage approved today. It went fine last year, so unless this group of kids is markedly more evil than last year’s– cross your fingers– I should be able to manage it just fine. I would always rather have an overage and soak up the enormous amount of extra money you get paid for it than be constantly getting phone calls to cover random classes during my prep period anyway.
That said, because I’ll be at work for twelve hours tomorrow, expect a video update at best. I will be in full no-brain-only-sleep mode by the time I get home, especially since I got no meaningful sleep at all last night and am kind of running on fumes already.
Here we go here we go here we go.
Three in a row
I had big plans to get lots of planning and writing for next year done today, and I move from “backish” (I’m going to work, but I’m not getting paid) to “back” tomorrow, as I am contractually required to be there, with “back-back” being on Thursday, when the kids return.
Instead of getting planning and writing done, I took a nap, and right now it’s 7:50 PM and I could very easily go directly to bed if I wanted to. Tomorrow will be all meetings all day, so I just need to be conscious and physically present, which I think I can pull off.
I’m gonna go play Elden Ring until it’s dark enough to make going to bed actually reasonable. Perhaps I shall make words tomorrow.
Classroom tour!
I am probably 95% done in my classroom. I have to put some things in closets and do some cord management and things like that, but if school was starting tomorrow morning I wouldn’t be terribly worried about it. Since I have a week, we’re absolutely all good, and I can start focusing on curriculum.
Want a tour?
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