First Ammendment

We have been having the interesting debate at school about students and their blogs (Xangas specifically). I was sent this article through NCTE

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/
article/2006/01/16/AR2006011601489.html

Basically it talks about a school in DC who have concequences for those who post "inappropriate material" on their blogs. All the stuff I tell them not to write in the TAKS essays: getting drunk, their intimate relationships, etc. I printed it out for a friend who used it as her lesson on Friday with a lot of the seniors that have Xangas.

The comments from the teachers included:
"Yeah, they can post anything they want, they just need to know there are consequences."
"They have to realize that other people can see what they are writing."

I really lean towards we should just leave them alone. But truthfully there have been those who were fired for what was on their blog. For better or worse, should we teach appropriate use before these kids could get in *real* trouble?

Well that's the arguement. What do you think?
Here's a link to random high school blogs so you can get a feel. Not my kids obviously since I'm trying to be better about being more vague. :)

Should I be proud or disappointed?

I have always considered myself slightly better than Oprah book club picks. Now don't get me wrong, I truly appreciate her efforts to get a population of this country reading that wouldn't otherwise. However, they tend to all have the same plots as a Lifetime movie: women in trouble, men fail women, women conquers all...and maybe falls in love. :)

However, the novel I'm reading with class just became an Oprah pick:

http://www.bordersstores.com/features/feature.jsp?file=night_rg

On one hand, it may lend credibility to the book for some kids. On the other...does this devalue the quality of the book? Now that it is mass-marketed to the daytime tv watching population?

mijos

Tonight my friend and I watched our soccer team play an away game at the high school near my house. We brought our blankets, hot chocolate and warm jackets...because we were prepared this time, no telling us about it 7th period.

When we were there we whiled our time away divying up our students as our children. One of our students has been my friend's son, mijo, for quite some time now. And she has all but decided who my son should be, but we have all these other spare children running around! So I think we are up to 4 1/2 a piece that we each claim. One set of brothers has three so we have dual custody to be fair. Apparently we shared a sancho or two along the way to have so many that are actually brothers!

Also, I have been on this kick lately telling my students, when they are whining too much, "Does it *look* like I care?" I know, it is the sarcastic side of me. One of the kiddos, mijo actually, asked me after school how to say it. He kept swapping the words, "Doesn't look it...." So we had to practice for a minute. We didn't work on the intonation so when he says it, it just comes out extremely rude. :) I am going to regret teaching him this; I can see it now.

update on the perfect way to fold a t-shirt

Dan was successfully able to do this. I am in awe of my husband's greatness.

one of the most amazing things I have ever seen...

Last week two of my students called me over and asked me to watch this...

How to fold a T-shirt perfectly

Two days later they called me over because someone had successfully figured out how to do it.

These are the things that I *want* my students to share with me. The weird new year's resolutions they made over Christmas...not always. :)

i can see the fisheys in the water

Dan successfully cleaned out the goldfish pond yesterday. We drained all the water and scooped out the sludge and leaves. Then we pressured washed it, thanks to the pressure washer Dad gave us one time because "it comes in handy." Now it is very pretty and clear. There is a little bit of residue, but we think that the filter should take care of that...and we got blue water tint so it will be slightly blue also. We counted our fish (because we had to take them out to drain the water) and we have 13. They seem to have all survived, even though a couple of them got bopped in the head by a shovel.

I seemed to have misplaced my digital camera so I only have pictures on my cell phone and don't really know how to get them off. Maybe one of my students can tell me.

We are going to Target right now to get the rest of the stuff together and because I love Target. Not Target in general, just the brand new one downtown between my house and school. That one is great, convenient and handy.

18 screws

Three of the computers in my laptop cart are currently not working. I set out this week to get them fixed, e-mailed support and they e-mailed me back suggestions.

I was supposed to take out one screw and pull the hard drive, try to boot and put it back. I got all the computers out after school, with the tiny screwdrivers Dan loaned me and set to work.

Out came one screw, nothing happened.
So I pulled out another screw, at this point attracting attention from two of the boys in my room, and nothing happened.

Then I handed it over to I who pulled and prodded. After 7 screws, in my defense, I did mention that perhaps we should stop and think about this. Perhaps they had been wrong about it only being one screw...but probably they didn't want you to take the whole bottom off the computer.

When I and A had ever screw out of the bottom of the computer, we still couldn't get the hard drive out. They decided it needed muscle; I decided the computer was broken to begin with so we probably couldn't do any harm. At this point, Dan calls and asks how come I hadn't looked at the support docs online. Good question. However by this time both boys had degenerated into giggles and was laughing pretty hard myself.

While on the phone with Dan I hear cheers because they got the hard drive out. It only took 18 screws. However, they were able to figure out a better way and get the other two drives out with only 6 screws being removed. Five off from the e-mail support lady. But in her defense when I look that laptop up online, it is configured differently.

None of them are working yet.

I am cracking down on the cursing thing. One boy has a three page, typed paper to write now. The other student *did* go to in-house, by himself, all day, on Friday. He was miserable and really mad at us. However, perhaps he learned his lesson.

First week back

Well, it is the first week back to school and I have to say that I am really enjoying it thus far. My computer project went off without any hitches. Only a few complaints of "please mrs. let me use the computer today." All in all a very successful project. Tomorrow I go over the benchmark scores and tuesday we start our novel, Night. I hadn't read it until after I started teaching, even though I remember my sister reading it in high school. It is a pretty good book and I hope the students like it.

I had to write up one of my kids that hangs out in my room after school. Unfortunately he can't say an entire sentence without cursing in either English or Spanish. Since they have taught me a variety of Spanish curse words (I can cuss like a sailor now -- a phrase I have to say is beyond the understanding of my students so I gave up, the etomology is far too complicated to explain), I can't ignore their spanish curses. The student didnt' really think I would write him up. If my friend hadn't been there I might have backed down. I couldn't give him detention because he and his friends spend all their free time in my room anyway. That isn't really punishment. My friend is on her administrative internship so she can assign punishments. We gave him In-house for an entire day. He won't know anyone so he can't talk and will probably be by himself since the tardy calculator hasn't been running that long. We are hoping that this is discouragement enough.

how much did you love school?

So, when you were in school did you ever show back up before you had to? I don't think in all my years of school I *ever* showed back up early...not even for some extracurricular thing.

Yesterday we are standing around talking. Bemoaning my friend who is leaving us to go to the old building and be our instructional specialist (same school, just not my right hand anymore). While my other friend may be going to an asst. principal somewhere.... I may just get left behind! Ok, back to the story, we are standing around talking and one of my 9th graders sticks his head in the window and waves. So Angela and I step out and talk to them.

"Guys, school doesn't start till Monday. What are you doing here?"
"Oh, really? Ooops. [sheepish grinning]"

The conversation ends with asking to use the computers, since they were up there. I told them no cause I had tons of stuff to do yesterday. Angela mentioned that she thought they might have just been up there to use the computers cause they had been bored all break. At first I thought, "Yeah, maybe," but then I remembered that one of the boys has a brother at our school...who didn't show up for school. This was all a ruse just to come and use the computer! Cute really. I kinda wish I could have let them if they were really *that* bored. I could have put them to work too, as it turned out.

various tv watching day

Today I have to admit my laziness. I have currently not gotten out of my pj's and am sitting on my couch after having watched 3 tv shows and a movie.... I have successfully finished up next Friday's lesson plans and am considering making up all the grammar quizzes for this six weeks so they will be done. Also I need to finish grading the benchmarks. I am about half through and they need to be done this week so I can go over them on Tuesday.

I am super excited about this six weeks. I have gotten all my lesson plans for lit genre planned out. We are reading Night by Elie Wiesel and working on short answer questions a la TAKS. Then we are going to write an essay. In an amazing amount of preparation I am handing my students a calendar with the syllabus for the six weeks the first day back. Shocking, huh?

Today I cut apart cards pasted them on blue card stock and trimmed them with my fancy shaped scissors so the students can all practice their inference skills and figure out the clues about the main character. Next I can cut apart their benchmark grades and sort them by class so they can figure out what they made! :)

Hope everyone else is having a good day!

Making Chicken and dumplings

I whipped up a batch of chicken and dumplings for our hall potluck at school last week. Since I was under the weather nothing tasted good and Dan wasn't feeling well so he wouldn't taste them for me, so I showed up to school with dumplings; the first batch I've ever made by myself, and not entirely sure how they tasted.

Since I had a half-dozen boys hanging out in my room I decided to con one of them into tasting it for me.

So I called over Andres and asked him if he would taste my food.

"What is it?"
"Chicken and dumplings."
"What's that?"

Well this presented an interesting problem. How do you explain dumplings and have it sound like something someone would want to eat?

"Well it is chicken, in like a thick broth...Then there is a bread thing inside, dumplings. They are like biscuits that are cooked in. They should be soft but taste cooked, not doughy. Can you just taste them and let me know if it tastes cooked?"
"Sure."

I mean really, he is a 15 year old boy. Is he honestly going to turn down food?

So I give him a scoop full and he tastes it and tells me it is ok. Then they all walk around the room whispering about my food. A couple of boys made faces, to which I replied that I don't make fun of *their* food (specifically mentioned menudo). And this is what we eat at my home. They laughed and no one else said anything else about it. Most of them said it smelt good but weren't entirely sure about tasting it.

Christmas at the Pape house

My parents have taken off the week between Christmas and New Year's. Amazingly, since they hardly even take off work on the weekends. Of course today they went on 3 service calls and spent the morning at the shop, but still.

What have we done over Christmas? Had multiple parties: Dad's company Christmas party (which I missed most of cause I hadn't gotten over the crud yet), Family Christmas party at Aunt Gloria's on Christmas Eve and then Christmas day we ate the tamales that one of the guys that works for Dad gave him for Christmas and an enchilada experiment that I made. I probably wouldn't have attempted it but it was just going to be for mom, dad, Dan, Sheri and Joey....then Mammaw and Pappaw, Eddie's family, Aunt Leisa and my cousin Derek all ended up there too. I don't make terribly authentic enchiladas, I always do it wrong. But they ended up ok. Martha saved me by knowing how to make sour cream enchiladas and made those also.

Yesterday we went shopping at the mall and ate dinner with a friend of Dan's. then today we went shopping again. Best thing today was that we got to go and eat at El Sombrero's in Clinton, which I probably ate at 2-3 times a week in college. I had missed it terribly. Silly huh? I live in Fort Worth and can have much better Mexican food and I end up craving El Sombrero. But you know? It was good.

Silence OR What do you say?

Currently it is 12:24 am. Now, for those people who know me, (and since Sheri, Deva and Dan are usually the only people who read this) I don't stay up late. In fact I am early-to-bed girl sometimes getting in as early as 9:30 on a school night and can sleep right on through with no problems. Now I can't sleep. Probably because I'm getting better and am not as tired. Though apparently those steroid shots can keep you awake.

Train just went by. Didn't even know there was a train at 12 am. One of the joys of living across the way from a railroad track. Of course, nearly everyone in Fort Worth lives near a railroad track.

One of the teachers at school has discovered blogs. Specifically student blogs. I pinned my lips shut and didn't say a thing. He monitors them for inappropriate content and discussions about himself. :) Please don't let me get that old!

Today was a good day at school. I was feeling better. I was only disheartened when 3rd. . . which is my planning period I had 8, count them 8, students show up in my room. Why were they there? Apparently they were exempt, from both tests and didn't want to go home. Well except the kid that rides the bus and had to stick around until the bus ran at 3:35. At one point I had 21 people in my room. Now that was after my friend down the hall brought in her class so that I could head out a little early to go to the doctor.

The majority of the boys in class today were on elchat.com again. I am still shocked and surprised that the filter hasn't blocked them from it yet. I keep having to watch a few of them to make sure that it is appropriate content. The problem is that I don't speak that much spanish. I was doing ok at shutting them down when they were just cursing at each other. We caught one of the boys talking to "laura - sexy y horny." We told him that someone with that name was up to no good. Come to find out it was another boy from across the room. Then "maira" shows up and she was also someone in the room. My friend and I let it go on for a while and somehow with us giggling on the other side of the room, they never figured it out. We ended up having to tell him later. :)

Later on two other students were chatting with each other and only realized it when they asked each other where they were from and one of them calls out, "Hey, this person is from Fort Worth!"

But really there was only one thing that happened today that really impacted me. Sitting at lunch we were discussing students and one of them had gotten taken away to juve for being found with cocaine. Not someone I teach, but someone I knew, and I was there when they got caught. . . .We thought they were tagging the walls in the boys' bathroom or smoking cigarettes. We were going to be pretty mad about that, but I wish that had been the problem.

In the process of discussing this, one of the teachers brings up that this student wasn't the only one involved in drugs and started naming names. So the first couple I thought, "Ok, *maybe*, but I'm not sure." I try not to take what teachers say about students to heart. Everyone deserves more than one chance. It isn't like I haven't needed them myself in life. Then they named one of my kids that hangs out in my room all the time. Immediately, myself and another teacher piped up and said, "No, not him. He isn't involved in anything like that!" But we were assured on good authority that it was true. If it were true I would notice, right? I am not completely naive to think that it doesn't happen. I know of students who have come high on weed to my class. I noticed that.

To make a long story stort, we pulled the student into another room (because like I said, he hangs out in my room all the time) and my friend point-blank asked him. I didn't know what to say. It broke my heart. He swore up and down that it wasn't true. So we had a discussion about who you hang out it with and people's perceptions of you. No matter how much you don't care what people think about you, it changes your opportunities in life if people don't trust you or have misconceptions of you.

I'm sure there is a lesson there that i can learn. Right now I still want to cry about it. I'm glad my friend was there cause I wouldn't have known what to say. I didn't say a word. I just stood there and tried really hard to comprehend the accusation.

Fever count - 101

Ok, today I am sick. It is extremely obvious to my students, my collegues and most of all me. I am not walking-dead-sick, but still lacking energy. My co-11th grade teacher (who is leaving me next semester to be an instructional specialist) told the principal that she didn't think I would make it through the day. Principal says, "Who?" "You know, Mrs. F." [gotta point out how memorable I am here.] "Nah, she won't leave. She'll stick it out."

Now I need to point out that the person that had to think about who I was pegged me better than my friend. but I did leave at exactly 3:45. It took 10 minutes of 'date prisa' and 'vallence a su casa,' but i got all the boys & girls kicked out of my room and headed home. My across the hall neighbor was even impressed that I didn't stick around today.

Why you might ask was there anyone in my room that wasn't taking an exam. Good question. I had about 7 boys show up. 2 that rode the bus and couldn't leave, 2 that were taking the last exam, but not the first and 3 that just showed up. Then two more asked their teacher next door could they come in my room when they finished the exam. I should have kicked them all out. but I wasn't leaving, I knew I wasn't leaving and where else would they go? At least in my room they weren't getting into trouble.

We did have a moment where they all felt my head to see if I had a temperature. I was proclaimed "calliente" (sp?) and they stayed away from me after that. they didn't try to give me any grief though and that was good.

sicky girl or i'm really tired and school hasn't started yet

Ok, it is currently 6:27 in the morning. I'm coughing (already took my antibiotics and cough syrup -- hey deva. i been meaning to call you. can i take both at the same time?). I couldn't sleep tonight. So why am I going to school? It is finals. My 1st period has no idea what is on their exam cause I haven't reviewed it and 4th needs to get a review so that they can take their exam tomorrow. up side? i get a planning period today, we haven't taken 3rd period's exam yet. And 2nd is doing locker cleanout. So i'm pulling my oh-so-famous Ikea mushroom stool out to the hall. and yelling at kids from there to keep their stuff neat. :)

On the other upside, as soon as I get exams graded I'll be completing my TAKS/Wiesel unit on Night. I have found a way to read a novel, which will faciliate answering 3 step open-ended responses, which will lead to higher level thinking skills and hopefully facilitate essay writing. this is my plan. sometimes . . . ok, usually, my grandious plans don't turn out as I would like. but this unit will be immediately after my heart to heart with my classes about behavior and how if they don't want to do anything, that is fine. I'm here to help but really it is up to them. if they want to pass TAKS and graduate, they have to step up and do the work. I'm letting the kids who don't care sit it in the back row. I'm not fighting with them next semester. Not till after February. :)

spanish lessons

now, in addition to my informal spanish lessons, it seems I can sign up for spanish for teachers taught through the district. :) classes start in January.

in the meantime here is the spanish I've learned this week.

What's up - Que honda?
What's up (in chilango speak) - Que tranza?
Vallence a su casa - Go to your house.
Largete (sp?) - You go.

Oh and a great deal of good spanish curse words. I learned at least two really pleasant ones today. The last two spanish phrases are to help kick the kids out of my room.

Exams start tomorrow....that should be fun.

Today was the last time I will see 7th period until January! Woo-hoo!

Field trip to the library or "Can you help me find?"

Amid the hectic schedule of the past week, we managed to secure that our field trip to the central library still happened. The other reading teacher and I have bribed our kids this 6 weeks that if they read a certain number of pages (160 for Reading I & 200 for Reading II) they can go on a field trip. . . to the library. I had seriously downplayed the library part and seriously up-played "you get to spend a whole day with us, out of school, not in math or English class. come on, it'll be fun." In the end we had 45 of 75 that finished their reading and brought permission slips and got to go.

We had a blast.

Among the highlights:
-Teaching the students how to hold chopsticks at our lunch at P.F. Chang's.
-After Francisco was the kid to sit the farthest to the front of the orientation, getting to point out that he read HP & the Goblet of Fire and is halfway through Order of the Phoenix (the librarians gave him a copy of Half Blood Prince!!! He was so excited that he said it was the best day. He got to eat Chinese food AND got a book.)
-Having the kids genuinely excited to be at the library and get their own library cards.
-Spending all day with my students. they are great kids. they were *quiet* in the library even. They didn't complain and were genuinely pleased to be there. Even if it was a trip to the library, less than 5 min from the school. (Our school is right near downtown.)

To copy my sister:
Things I learned today -
1) I have been calling one of my students Isaac, everyone else calls him Ee-sahc (spanish pronunciation)
2) I can't count...or add. I counted the kids on the bus 7 times only to have another teacher come through and say "they're all here."
3) I learned 'what's up?' in spanish. but i forgot it already (didn't write it down).
4) Homework is "tarea"
5) sports is 'Deportes'
6) The kid I thought never talked, talked all day long!!! His brother was even surprised.
7) My after-school club is going to spread the words sancho/sancha into the English language. They were extremely disturbed that there wasn't a word for it in English. Basically a sancho is an extra boyfriend. It doesn't carry quite the same negative connotation as an affair or mistress. The kids are fixing us up with sanchos all the time.
8) Two of my kids are being left home alone for 3 weeks over Christmas.

SNOW DAY

Yep, I got a snow day today, along with the rest of FWISD. I also got a snow 'afternoon' yesterday. We let the kids out at 12:10 to go to lunch, buses picked up at 1:00 pm...but most of our kids walk or drive home. I spent the better part of the afternoon making sure that all the kids I could find had a ride home.

The thing that amazes me most about our school is that kids don't want to go home. Days off, after school and summer they just show up and hang around. Multiple students were sent home with reliable rides and then they would show back up on the 2nd floor *because they never left!* I mean, I'm flattered, that they want to be at school and not out on the street getting into trouble, but it was sleeting, my car was covered with an inch of ice, and the students needed to go home. So we kept pushing them out the door.

An hour after we sent kids home 7 of my students show up. All telling me they are going to walk home. None of them live within a half mile of school, so I start trying to find a way for them to get home. They wait till I get just slightly panicked, then they say that they are all walking to Pedro's house and he is going to take them home. So I send them all to Pedro's house to hang out there instead.

Today I have the excitement of not getting up until 9 am...Dan said it was a snow day miracle. I never sleep past 7:30. Then I watched ABC Family's Christmas Carol movie version of the year and 2 weeks ago's Charmed. For those of you who keep up (ha!) Leo didn't die, but he is frozen and being "kept" by the Angel of Destiny until such time as the sisters can fight a final battle. They needed the loss of losing Leo to make them stronger for this battle. :) Ok, I like Charmed, you can get on to me if you want.

I think my husband wants to play Civ IV this afternoon. I suppose I can accomodate. :) It is a good snow day activity...but we have to decorate the house later!

taks scores

I got the senior TAKS scores. 12 of my kids passed, 22 failed. Of the 22 that failed, 19 of them failed because of the writing. I teach reading....I'm not supposed to be teaching writing, but i guess i'm doing that from now on. i just can't take a chance.

today i was relocated for 6th and 7th. the cheerleaders were doing stretches outside of the portable that I was in. The male members of my class were very excited.

One of the kids I taught last year just came back from alternative school yesterday. I, apparently, am the only teacher he gets along with. he drives the rest of them crazy. very very add kid. why is it that i do fine with the add kids? ok, don't answer that.

alex and jorge were rating the girls on a scale of 1-5 during the testing by pointing to a girl and then holding up fingers.

one of my kids came up and told me 7th that it was going to snow tomorrow. I told him he was crazy. He asked me did I watch tv. I said I was out of town all weekend. I nearly, almost nearly bet him $10 that it wasn't going to snow tommorrow, that he was just making that up. I would have been wrong!

a week off...

...Exciting fun things of the day:

1) I'm presenting about India tonight for the Week of Prayer at my grandparent's church. I went there in 2001 for an ethnographic study. Kinda nervous...Apparently they have hyped me up quite a bit, i hope no one is disappointed.

2) I called H's sister. . . who speaks perfect English. She is about 15 years older than him and was in high school when he was a baby born in Los Angeles. We had a discussion about him and how he is doing and what he could be better at.

Then 2 days later I caught him wearing spanish curse words on his shirt. :) kinda proud of myself for noticing. Had to hunt him down cause he wouldn't come back and change it right then.

3) I get to go on a field trip with my reading I's a week from Tuesday. We are going to the downtown library and then out to eat. *I'm* excited, I hope they are.

4) My 7th period class is out of control and I'm being observed in there on Wednesday...This could be bad. I get to practice my lesson on Tuesday, but we are relocated because of TAKS benchmark testing to a portable. This *might* just be chaos.