I am in awe of how little I actually exaggerate in these stories. I tend to edit for continuity, so I will, for example, put two different events on the same day, and say they happened to just one teacher. I’ll change a name and such for the sake of anonymity. But, in truth, I …
Yesterday, the last day of classes, we get a “Faith Based Initiative”. Some preacher from the neighborhood decides to take all the kids who have been suspended a bunch, and give them a barbeque over in the football field. The end result is that all the nice kids are in class doing various onerous tasks, …
I have to interrupt a standardized test in order to give a standardized test. I am in the second week of giving a standardized test that isn’t a test, because nobody gives a wank about this test. The only reason we’re giving this test is because the district paid millions for it. We bought it, so …
I have a student teacher this year. Her name is Chloe. I also have to give a standardized test this week. So I’m stuck. Do I give the test honestly? Or do I do what I really do? As one administrator put it, “This test has no educational value. Do as you will, as long …
The kids are reading Romeo and Juliet. So my student teacher is fishing for the answer “dramatic irony”. She asks, “What do you call this, when Juliet is speaking on the balcony, and she doesn’t know Romeo is down below listening?’ To which Marshay responds, “Stalking.” And then yesterday as I’m walking out of the building with …
I recently went to a lecture on “data dysentery”, the countless reams of data we educators collect for, well, for what? To this data, I would like to add the following, a record of the sheer number of observations I’ve had in one semester only, this last semester. These observations were done by three administrators …
The coach has classes of sixty. That’s OK, though, because some of our language classes, say Advanced Chinese, have four kids, so our average high school class size is 32, the exact state maximum. The coach is holding down his end of the arithmetic average. Anyway, three weeks ago the school closed the gym for renovations, …
There are a lot of reasons to quit this job. Kate did. I don’t blame her. But of all the reasons to quit this job, the three best are depression, humiliation and rage. A freshman turns in the homework. I look at his t-shirt, and see a disarming photo of a nice looking young man. …