In which I am listening to Nappy Roots

On September 11, 2013September 11, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn TeachingLeave a comment

field-of-pretty-flowers-124a

Have some pretty flowers. At least, this is what Google gives you when you google “pretty flowers.” (Image credit.)

Okay. Today was better. At no point today did I wish to resign, storm out of the building in a high dudgeon, or annihilate any other living being who I work with or am responsible for in any way. That’s progress! Days without rage are good, and as you could probably tell from yesterday’s post that day was rather high on rage. Better is good. I got things done today! Things that have been nagging at the back of my brain for weeks, and only emerging into full remembrance when it’s been much too late for me to actually do anything about it!

I have my ISTEP scores, by the way, which is unrelated to yesterday’s issues. Short version: I’m happy, personally. I’m not going into building level stuff right now and may not go into building stuff at all here, as it makes it too easy to locate precisely where I work and I’d prefer not to do that. I’ll have to figure out how to write the post if I do. But personally I’m happy. More details of some kind later.

(Fifteen minutes of staring at the screen later)

I’m apparently lacking in things to say today. Despite how bad yesterday went, I’m doing a pretty good job of keeping to my “don’t yell at kids” promise this year. I had that one moment with one kid (I think I talked about it here; if not I’ll come back and edit, because it’s kind of a funny story) but other than that I’ve done really well. Even the reading of the riot act that occurred this morning (complete with rearranging the desks and new seating charts for my first and second hour classes, which were the main sources of my bad mood yesterday, although by far the only ones) was done largely through tone and without raising my voice. Today we managed to remember that, hey, we’ve sorta done math before, once or twice at least, and maybe a fraction isn’t some sort of alien life form that no one has ever seen or expected us to convert into a decimal before.

So, yeah. Point is: better day. Hopefully yours went okay too.

Ha! I didn’t tell that story. I love my homeroom, right? They’re wonderful kids and I would keep them forever and ever if I could, but sadly they’re only my homeroom and I don’t have them all day like I did last year. I have duty in the gym in the morning, so often my girls are already waiting at my door for me when I get to homeroom– my unofficial rule is that I don’t care when the bell rings, if you beat me down to my room (which, remember, is out in the sticks) then you’re not tardy to class. Anyway, one day a week or two ago I’m letting the girls into my classroom when I hear a piercing, blood-freezing scream from one of them– a kid who I like a lot but who could very justifiably be accused of being slightly high-strung.

I spin around. Note that at this point I’m not even raising my voice. “Nefertiti, what in the world is wrong?”

She points at the tiniest arachnid ever, which is toddling across the carpet and minding its own damn business. She’s still shrieking.

“THERE’S A SPIDER!!!!”

At this point I lost my temper a little bit, I admit it– I don’t like horrifying piercing noises first thing in the morning, and drilling my ears for no reason is worse— and I snapped at her– loudly– before I really even realized I was doing it.

“Child, unless that stupid thing has laser beams coming out of its eyes that I need to know about, you’d better leave it alone and get your butt into my classroom before the bell rings.”

And that was it. I’ve yelled at one kid this year and it referenced spiders shooting laser beams.

I think I can live with it.

In which I memorize

On September 6, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn TeachingLeave a comment

We’ve just finished the third week of school, and I’ve probably spent most of the past three weeks breaking the law in some form or another. That folder there is full of special ed documentation about my many, many special education students. There are, right now, 22 dossiers in that folder, ranging from three to thirty-some-odd pages long. Some are for students I don’t actually have in my classes and have never met. I’m legally responsible to have read and understood (and “understood” in this case should be taken to mean “memorized”) the documentation on each of those kids. And I am absolutely certain that I don’t have all of my IEPs yet, and am even more certain that I don’t have all my BIPs yet, as I don’t have any at all from seventh or eighth grade.

Here’s the thing: special ed paperwork, and the idea of an “individualized education profile,” or IEP, is a very good idea in theory that has gone terribly wrong in practice. It’s much like Communism in that regard. The idea that a student with disabilities shouldn’t be educated in the same manner as a student without those disadvantages is a good one. The idea that special education students deserve the same access to a quality education as other students is a good one.

The idea that I’m supposed to memorize, on average, fifteen pages of accommodations for each of my twenty-some odd students, and that one person is supposed to write these IEPs for what could be dozens of kids with special ed needs in a low-income building, is insane. It can’t be done, and great special ed teachers are getting driven out of the field because half of what they do now is push around stacks of paper, and then endlessly revise those stacks of paper based on federal and state and local guidelines that can’t ever seem to stay consistent for more than a week or two at a time. It’s freaking madness.

And then there are the BIPs, or Behavior Intervention (I think) Plans. I support the concept behind the IEP, if not the way they’re implemented. Half the time I think BIPs are bullshit. I’ll be honest: I still haven’t sussed out what the distinction is between a kid who ends up with a BIP and a kid who is an asshole. It probably has something to do with whether they think the kid’s assholism is an actual disorder or not. What they basically are is a list of steps that you’re supposed to follow with Little Johnny Special Snowflake when he’s fucking up so that you can get him back on track– steps that don’t have to be followed for any other student. While it’s not supposed to mean this, frequently in practice a BIP means that LJSS can get away with shit that would get other students literally crucified– because LJSS is just too much of an asshole to be expected to conform to regular behavioral norms.

But whatever, right? I adapt my disciplinary methods to the individual student I’m dealing with all the time. In other contexts– hell, right here on this blog– I’ve defended not nailing a kid to a wall for something that might have me reaching for a hammer with another student. I get it, even though it annoys the piss out of me.

Here’s the problem: BIPs have to be seen and signed by every adult who works in a school who could conceivably come in contact with a kid. Not just the teachers. Every adult. So, like, bus drivers and cafeteria staff and custodians and the lady who does photocopying on Wednesdays are in theory supposed to have read and memorized the BIPs for every student who has one that they could possibly come into contact with. Some of us (me, for example) could theoretically come into contact with every single student in the building.

I have BIPs in this folder for students who I have literally never met, who are not in my grade or my wing of the building, who I may never have in my class. I may not be able to pick Jenny Fucknut or Johnny Fingerbang out of a lineup, but I’d sure as shit better know their BIPs so if I happen to encounter them freaking the fuck out in the hallway I can calmly redirect them or go through their deep breathing exercises or whatever the fuck; it’s not like I’ve read the damn things yet. All of that without knowing their names, because frequently when these kinds of kids do lose their shit they’re likely to tell me that their name is Go Fuck Yourself, and I don’t have a BIP for him.

Seriously; the people in the cafeteria line are expected to know these things. Gimme a fucking break.

(The good news? I have very little grading to do this weekend, and my lesson plans are done for next week, so at least there’s a chance in hell that I’ll end up getting to them at some point.)

On progress and discipline

On August 22, 2013August 22, 2013 By Luther M. SilerIn TeachingLeave a comment

I don’t normally bleed at work, and I’m not terribly fond of it, but I managed to be bleeding before the first bell even rang this morning. I broke up a fight– or, at least, what was about to be a fight– and one of the combatants managed to scratch my finger in an annoyingly painful fashion while I was separating the two of them. I spent most of the rest of the day telling my boss that he owed me workman’s compensation once my finger fell off. I didn’t know one of the kids; he’s relatively new to the building (possibly this year, but I think he came in late last year) and the other one was an eighth grade kid who I’ve been having irregular run-ins with since he was a fifth grader. I’ve broken up more than one fight he was in and manhandled him into the office on more than one occasion.

The weird thing? I actually get along with him fairly well, all considered. He didn’t start this particular brawl, and the fact that he let me get in between the two of them and separate them actually represents progress. I’m not going to go so far as to say that I’ve made a connection with him– I honestly don’t think anyone in the building except maybe for the football coach can say that, and I’m not even sure about him– but I seem to have figured out how to finesse him to get him to do what I want. I grabbed him in the hallway later that day and let him know that I’d put in my write-up that he wasn’t the guy who started the fight, and talked to him again at the end of the day to make sure that there wasn’t any ongoing beef with the kid who had been messing with him. He said it was going to be okay, and I figured he was telling the truth.

Then his bus was late. The buses are terrible this time of year, and this was a perfect example of why: when the bus finally showed up to school, there was still a primary center kid on the bus, who either didn’t know his address or had gotten on the wrong bus or some piece of nonsense that was keeping the driver from dropping him off at home. Complicating things, the driver’s radio wasn’t working properly for some reason and she wasn’t able to get in touch with anyone at the little guy’s school. So the kids all filed outside to get on the bus and then the driver had to make them all wait (outside, in drizzling rain) while she went inside and made some phone calls to try and figure out what to do with the kid.

This didn’t set well with him. So he and another kid (his girlfriend, maybe? And as I’m writing this it occurs to me to wonder where his little brother was…) decided to walk home.

They can’t walk home if they’re supposed to ride the bus, even if the bus is late. There are massive legal issues involved; if they’re bus riders, they ride the bus. Period. Is it unreasonable? Yeah, probably, on some level or another, but it’s still the rules and I’ve got to enforce them. I managed to get him to head back into the building, but he wasn’t happy about it.

“This is fuckin’ bullshit.”

One of our new paraprofessionals overhears this. “What did you just say?”

“Fuckin’ Christ, dude, leave me alone.”

He takes exception. And I did something I haven’t done before: I actually waved the guy off, letting the kid go into the building unmolested and holding the para back (not physically, mind you) to convince him to ignore a fourteen-year-old not only directly disrespecting him but doing so in an impressively profane fashion.

And the interesting thing? By the end of the conversation, the guy agreed with me. The kid, meanwhile, went inside, like I wanted him to, and while he was the last to sit down like he was supposed to, he did it. The thing about this kid? He’s all street, and has absolutely no parenting whatsoever at home. His mother’s worthless– another teacher in my building, who has his little brother, and is new to the building, met her the other day and said she was the rudest person she’d ever met. I have absolutely no idea where or who his father is. For all I know, neither does his mother.

This kid is not going to back down to anyone, and he’s even less likely to do so when he’s already had a shitty day. There are things I need him to do, right? I need him in the building, where I’m not going to get my ass sued off if he gets hit by a car while he’s walking home or just never goes home at all. I need him sitting down and being with everyone else (granted, this I need less than I need the first thing) and I need him back on the bus in a few minutes and not in a screaming match with the driver who’s keeping him from getting home on time. And a stranger (remember: new paraprofessional) getting all in his face about how he said “fuck” a couple of times is not going to make any of those things happen.

So I basically let him get away with dropping the F-bomb a couple of times. Maybe I’ll talk to him about it tomorrow. Today, this afternoon, wasn’t the time, and doing it in a confrontational manner definitely wasn’t going to work. Confrontation itself doesn’t work with this kid. The only thing I’ve seen work with him is quiet, calm conversation and simple, direct requests, which he’ll usually comply with, and ignoring his occasional outburst.

Is this doing the right thing? Or am I guilty of not having High Standards of Behavior now? Have I Done Nothing to punish his profanity if all I do is remind him about how to talk to adults tomorrow? Is a lunch detention really gonna make any difference?