Tag: positivity

In which I’m listening

On By Luther M. SilerIn MusicLeave a comment

I got new albums from Prince and Billie Eilish today, both of which were released today, and I feel like that fact represents most of the breadth of my music tastes pretty accurately. The Prince album was recorded in 2010, at the tail end of the New Power Generation years, which for me is Peak Prince. I’ve only listened to it once (and am currently halfway through the Eilish album) but it’s entirely possible that there will be gushing about it in the near future. I need a couple more spins before I’m going to be able to write coherently about it, though.

Yeah, I said “spins,” even though I’m listening to MP3s. My blog, my grammar. Shuddup.

I went over to work today, as planned, and while there was some stuff that I wanted to do that I wasn’t able to (they had all summer to move my desk, and they haven’t, which … grr) I got a decent start on setting the room up. One thing I’m going to try out this year: I have more bulletin boards than I know what to do with, so I’m going to use one of them to display student compliments for each other. I’ve used this a few times on assignments as a bonus question– literally “say something nice about someone else in the room for a bonus point,” and the kids generally do a pretty good job. It’s also interesting how cleanly the compliments seem to get spread around– I pay attention, and while there are some kids who are more popular than others everybody seems to be getting mentioned every other time or so.

What I’m thinking I’ll do is make a little form– maybe a quarter of a piece of paper– and occasionally pass them out and demand everyone write something nice about somebody and also leave them out so that they can leave compliments for people whenever they want. Maybe on the days where I make them write them I’ll clear the board first so I can pass the kids’ compliments back to them. I figure anything I can do to make the classroom more welcoming is only going to result in good things, and this is going to be a year where I need as much buy-in from my students as I can possibly get, since I’ll be asking for a lot from them. And if it doesn’t work, I can always take it down after the first quarter if I want to.

Off to do some recording. I’ll likely do some live-streaming tonight as well, so swing by the channel this evening if that sounds like fun.

In which I am unkilled

On By Luther M. SilerIn Teaching1 Comment

I’m in my typical Monday semi-coma, reclining in my recliner (that’s what it’s for) and trying to motivate myself to, like, eat dinner or clean something or read something or do anything but stare at my computer, but the following is still true, and I’d like to take a moment to celebrate it: tomorrow is the last day of the first quarter, meaning I have survived the first quarter of my return to teaching.

If I can make it through the first quarter, I can make it through the first semester. And if I can do that, I can finish the year.

I’m still not sure if I want to do this next year again. I don’t know if this is a “permanent” return or just a single-year thing; we’ll see. But the first quarter didn’t kill me. And right now, I’ll take that.

Neither of these people are me

On By Luther M. SilerIn Work8 Comments

8a202184c338637c55139ba665ce60e1c5ced87cf032df9e1131b7b21b7e31d6.jpgYou may have had a bad day today.

But look on the bright side:

You did not, somehow, while idly tossing your keys over your head and catching them, trying to kill time with fifteen minutes left in your shift, manage to get your keys stuck on a rafter fully fifty feet off the ground when there is no ladder higher than thirty feet on the premises, thus locking yourself out of both your car and your home with absolutely no way to get your keys that anyone can figure out.

You are also not the person responsible for loading out six thousand dollars worth of furniture into a U-Haul and doing it incorrectly, a mistake that the owners of the furniture did not discover until they had unloaded the U-Haul into their new house– in fucking Indianapolis.  

Go ahead, ask if we’ve figured out who the two extra pieces that were put on the U-Haul and weren’t supposed to be there are actually supposed to go to.

In which I am a ray of goddamn sunshine

On By Luther M. SilerIn Teaching12 Comments

UnknownAt the beginning of this school year, I made myself a promise: I was going to do my damnedest to keep from yelling at kids this year.  I knew from the beginning that this was not going to be a resolution that I was going to be able to keep for the entire school year; the relevant question was how long I’d go before I failed.  I am, as you may have guessed, somewhat of a volatile personality.  I’ve done better almost every year at keeping my cool in the face of nonsense.  Some years (last year) I’ve backslid; I guarantee I’ve raised my voice to kids less frequently this year than I did last year.  So, in that, I suppose it’s been a success.  That said, I’ve had a few embarrassing displays even just in the past few weeks, so I’m not there just yet.  Also, I keep losing sight of the fact that there’s still a full quarter of school left.  Positive Man recognizes that there is still time for things to go wrong.  🙂

Here’s where I’ve failed so far this year, and where I’m going to do my best to improve substantially in what’s left of the school year:  I have not been good enough in 1) emphasizing positivity in my classroom; 2) rewarding the kids who are not behavior issues; and 3) rewarding and/or simply acknowledging good choices in general.  It’s very easy as an educator to get too tied up in managing pathology in the various forms that it might show up in your classroom; there have been times in this year where I’ve simply felt buried in it.  Things have been getting better lately in my first/second hour block, which have been my problem children all year long– unfortunately, they’ve been slipping in my third and fourth hour block.  My honors kids continue to be the living personification of why I’m a teacher.

For the rest of the school year I need to work harder at being positive, both to set an example and to give some recognition to the kids who sorely deserve it.  Even when I’ve recognized positive behavior this year it’s generally been for kids where that positive behavior has been rare.  That’s a good thing, mind you, but it leaves out the kids who do what they’re supposed to do every day, or even do what they’re supposed to do four days out of every five or nine days out of every ten.

I gotta do better.   Time to start.