Try, Try Again

Yikes, it's been a while. I blame that on the increased busyness of recent days... And... well... Actually, that's really my only excuse. I'm very busy and important. Duh.

Back to the teaching stories then. Shall we?

The big thing this week was feeling frustrated about the kiddos just NOT TRYING. I realized when entering grades that at least a third of our kids are failing, and it just killed me. We give these kids all kinds of work time, we're super clear on what they have due and what their homework is, and we make ourselves available before and after school for help if they need it. The kids that are failing are failing because they're just NOT doing their work. Some of them are seriously intelligent too-- but they slack off during work time, don't show up for class, whatever-- and don't get their stuff in.

I told Viola I felt like we were watching these kids stand outside in a blizzard. We holler out to them, "Hey! Come on in! It's really warm in here, there's a fire, and a great spread on the table! Hot chocolate too! Come on in!"
They shrug and shuffle their feet on the snowy ground. "Meh. It's too far of a walk."
So we go out to them.
"Well, here then, take this coat-- I hate seeing you so cold, this will warm you up a little."
They gaze at some point in the distance and seem to ignore us altogether. "Naaah......Don't feel like putting it on."
Exasperated now, we try again: "Well take some SOUP anyway, that should do something to help keep you warm. Come on, all you have to do is lift the spoon to your mouth and swallow."
But they don't, they're not interested. So they do nothing to help themselves, and they freeze in the blizzard, and die.

Dying in the blizzard is the real-life equivalent of flunking out, or having an extremely short list of life-sustaining options after ruining themselves by not trying in school and getting Fs across the board.

Some of them may realize eventually that it's a good idea to walk 50 meters to get into the warm house, but by then, they may have already limited their options. They may have gotten frostbitten by being out in the cold for so long, and there goes a hand.

It just kills me.

Anyway: this week, we were working on writing our Epic of Gilgamesh essays. We gave the kids a work day on Thursday; in preparation for it, they were supposed to bring in a hand-written rough draft. As we guessed, only about 25% of our classes brought in a completed rough-draft, but we sent those kids to the library to work on typing them up. The rest, we let work on the drafts in class. One sophomore, Jeremiah, didn't have anything done, but he wanted to go to the library anyway. (To type up... what?) Viola let him go though, and I tagged along with the typing crew to supervise.

In the library, Jeremiah asked in his typically detached way, "So what are we supposed to write about?"
We have been talking about this assignment for the last several days. I tried to keep from sighing. "Well, did you get the paper about the assignment?" I asked.
He shrugged, and looked at a far distant point. I asked the boy sitting next to him if we could borrow his paper with the essay prompts.
"Here Jeremiah. So here are the different prompts-- pick out one that catches your interest--"
"Okay." He glanced at them. "Okay." And then he started typing.
"Oh... You know what you're going to do...? Okay. Um... great!"

I left him, not really thinking about what he intended to come up with after his disinterested glance at the paper.

At the end of the class, he raised his hand. "Okay, I'm done."
"Seriously??" I asked. He scrolled down on the computer screen, and showed me that he had the required amount. "Wow, great! Go ahead and print it off."
With his signature air of disinterest, he printed it off and handed it to me without making eye contact, then sauntered out the door.

I glanced over the first paragraph and was dumbfounded. It was GREAT. There were some fragments, and he didn't have a clear thesis statement, but his command of language was outstanding-- he used clever, unique descriptors, showed real wit and humor, and expressed himself elegantly. I SAW how quickly he had cranked that out-- to see him just bust out something of this caliber was incredible! And this kid is failing our class!

Yesterday, he came into class early and sat down. I went over to him with his paper.
"Jeremiah." I paused. "This... blew me away."
His eyes darted over at me to see if I was serious. "I'm not kidding," I told him. "There's some organizational work needed, but your grasp of language is outstanding-- there's humor here, your word choice is fantastic... I mean, Jeremiah, this is an area where you are GIFTED. You should be ACING this class, not failing it-- I mean you could do this professionally, the raw talent is there! You need to hone it now, and I want you to start bringing me your stuff so that I can edit it and help you get there... But dang Jeremiah. You're seriously talented."

As I was talking to him, he kept trying not to smile, and his TEETH were showing-- this is a kid that normally looks SO checked out! But he was grinning in spite of himself, and it felt so good to tell him that I believed in him.

I told Viola about our conversation and she said, "They love being told that they're talented. What they don't love is being told that they have to do work..."

That's true-- and it's very possible that Jeremiah is going to come in Monday morning with nothing. But now that I KNOW what he can do, I'm going to keep hounding him all year-- I'm going to chase him with that winter coat if I have to.

---------------
Amusing moment with "Gal Pal":
(Out in the hall)

"So Grace, how come you seem to be having trouble focusing?"

"Well-- it's just my friend is being so ANNOYING right now, and it's just like really GETTING to me... Like, I told her that I liked this GUY...And then, like RIGHT AFTER, she said that SHE liked him... And then she told me she would like DROP ME for him... And like, I knew that she talked about people behind their backs but then I heard stuff that she'd said about ME... And so it's just like so annoying, and it's really making me mad, and I just can't focus on the essay..."

"Oh man... I know that stuff can be tough. Well-- sometimes when I'm really dealing with personal stuff, I just take ten minutes to sort of PURGE it by either journaling about it, or sometimes I'll call a friend... Now, we're in school, so you can't call someone, but why don't you just write down some of your thoughts for about ten minutes and get it out... And then see if you can come back to the essay. Okay?"

(Nodding.)

I'm really sort of loving working with teenagers. :) Even if they drive me crazy. That's... what are we at, now? Week 5? We'll call it Week 5. By the way-- in case any of you had wondered-- all the kids' names have been changed in these blogs.

Fragments, Run-Ons, and Footsie

This blog is a deviation from paper grading. I've managed to get two done in the last two hours. Guys... they're SO bad. I mean, I know these kids are still learning to write, so that's fine-- but correcting them is just this insurMOUNTable task. No really-- look at this one climactic "sentence":

"then he found his mother she had a sword through her stomach but she was still alive but barly Nicky asked her "why am i able to kill a demon" she replied and said "because you are half human half demon, and your father is a demon and he lives in the castle in the sky in the outer rulem, Nicky you need to find him to learn to use your powers for good to get the villages crystal back."

That's fine to tackle as a sentence-- but papers and papers of this? I just took a look at my third paper-- "As I was boring in my room I thought about this news that I just got from my mom. It's really annoying me I cant sleep and even think about some think else." ...And I couldn't handle another one. That's only my THIRD! I'm going to need to figure out some method of tackling these that doesn't take 45 minutes apiece.

The good news is: I'm sick. So I'll have all day tomorrow to groan over them while I drink hot tea in my sweats.

Other news from the classroom. Remember Isaac? Of the hostering the gun? Did I mention that he and his little gal pal shamelessly play footsie all through class? They sit at the front table, and I typically sit in a chair just a few feet in front of them. Now... THEY can't see underneath their desks, so maybe they assume that nobody else can, but my chair gives me PRIME spectator viewing. Today I watched the whole drama unfold: Gal Pal sneaks over her feet to Isaac's. Isaac enjoys it briefly then catches my evil eye and tries to discreetly withdraw his feet. Gal Pal sinks further beneath her desk to reach Isaac's slightly withdrawn feet. Gal Pal totally is rubbing Isaac's leg up and down! I walk over and whisper to Gal Pal, "Please sit up, Grace." Gal Pal withdraws her feet. Isaac is now lonely and creeps his feet back towards Gal Pal. More footsie-ing occurs. Finally, the big guy at the end of the table pushes his legs forward in between the two. THANK YOU JAMES.

After class, I pulled Gal Pal over first and had her sit in my chair. "Do you see what a great view I have of what goes on underneath the desks? ...If it's this distracting for me, I have to imagine it's distracting for the two of you. Let's maybe try to keep that to a minimum, yeah?" Then pulled Isaac over and told him the same thing.
"I feel like we've had this conversation before," he said. "I'm totally having deja vu right now."
"Probably because we HAVE had this conversation before," I retorted.

Oh-- and did I mention that Gal Pal has a boyfriend?? Who is NOT her footsie friend? Scandalous.

Doctors have soap opera dramas. So do lawyers and politicians. For goodness sakes, the most amazing show on television turns the mundane events of a paper distribution company into side-splitting hilarity. So where is the big drama around teachers and their students? I'm feeling like some Hollywood producer is missing out on some AMAZING comedic/dramatic potential by not harvesting the daily events of our kind...