Well, Last year, on a Monday I'd be up to my eyeballs in bratwurst and probably nursing a burn on my arm from the super hot barbecue fire. And it'd be raining, and cold.
This year life is a bit different, but that's okay. Today I started my fellowship introductory course. It is really boring. Really really boring. Probably more boring than this blog post even. If you can believe it!
We sit in uncomfortable chairs, in a hot room, listening to people repeat themselves. Today we discussed lesson plans that were used by past fellows and I've learned that anyone who says "But I'm open to suggestions" really isn't. What they really mean is "I think the way I did it is fine, and I'm not going to change my mind about anything, and anything you say is dumb anyway so I'll just say 'well, that won't work' and then I won't have to listen! hahahahaha". It's a little discouraging.
All the schools participating in this program are considered tough schools--or low preforming schools. The teachers are really pessimistic about the students' ability and tell horror stories about discipline problems.
"If there are fights, they're really bad and we call security and stay away" or "See those heavy science books? They throw those at each other"
OOooooh, great, so I said "Well, how often would you say you call security. You know, on average?" They couldn't answer. I said "Once a week? Every other day?"
They said "oh, it's often, it's often it's a big problem."
If it's that often--couldn't you at least quantify it? I suspect--or I'm hoping--that it's one of those things where Once is Enough. You know, in the past year and a half 2 people have jumped in front of the Metro Train. However: if the subject of people jumping in front of trains came up in casual conversation, or if I had something to prove about being a Metro Train rider, I'd probably say "People jump in front of trains All The Time". I'm hoping this is also the story with desk-clearing, blood-drawing, drag-out, knock-down middle school fights.
Tomorrow we'll be paired up with the teachers we'll work with next school year. After that, we'll begin working as pairs to develop actual lesson plans. I'm more excited for that--hopefully that will be more stimulating and less Frightening.
In other news: I bought Laura guitar hero and drums for her birthday. I swear it is just for her! I am not enjoying it at ALL. But I will say I am REALLY good at the guitar part. I can even play on Hard. It also turns out, that Laura is a really good drummer--but the video game drum surrogate is not at all like actual drums, so she's trying to figure out the system timing. Looks frustrating from here....
Oh, and I signed up to be on the National Bone Marrow Registry. I sent in my DNA swabs today. If anyone else is at all interested in joining it's free right now (normally it's $50 or something to get your HLA typing done). You should do it. You can save a life! (Or at least get a few days off of work) Sign up for the Bone Marrow Donor Registry
2 comments:
standing around the fire in your coat and fluffy boots!
have fun at skool Miss L or do they call you your first name? i think you'd make a great teacher. One of the fun ones where everyone wants to be in your class.
I want to be in your class!!! Your course sounds like many I've visited though. I've met a lot of people like that. Guitar hero... shrewd! The drums are super difficult. Even I couldn't do it, can you imagine? I'm in the Finnish bone marrow thing. And there's a blood drive next week!
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