The anti-Cupid on Valentine's Day

Boy this post is a late Valentine entry.  I meant to finish it last Friday- but I took our very abbreviated February rest seriously! 

I am the anti-Cupid.  Opposite in every way from that cute chubby little baby in a diaper with a bow and arrow, inspiring young love everywhere.

I do not wear a diaper. My schedule got changed and now a third class has been added to morning program.  I need to get the worksheets copied in the  thirty minutes before my first class starts.  If the line at the copy machine is long  or if one copy machine in the chain is not working- not an uncommon occurrence, I don't make it to the bathroom before class and that diaper thing has it its appeal.  But I'm not there yet.

So I guess the chubby thing is the only thing Cupid and I have in common.  He goes around spreading love, I go around saying, "Stop kissing, go to class."

Thursday was Valentine's Day.  With our February break, reduced to a long weekend and a global warming induced succession of snowy frigid days, followed by warm slushy ones, only to be succeeded once again by freezing ones,  by Wednesday I thought this week would never end.  And the state, city monitors were spreading anxiety.

Valentine's Day brought the usual procession of helium balloon and stuffed animals and I tried my best not to consume the little chocolate treats I purchased running into the school (see above for chubbiness report).So much love to be spread around.

Three little stories (kind of like the mini-valentines the elementary kids bring in for everyone in the class- I only have the energy for three)

Michael showed up for math class for the second time of the week on Thursday.  Tuesday he spent the complete period on his phone texting.  "It's important," he kept telling me-it's my mother."  If it was, why wouldn't she make him get off the phone and do math?  I asked him continuously to put the phone away-he kept reminding me it was his mother, it was important.  His mother is disabled and can't leave his house, Maybe it really was her, maybe I'm stupider than I look. Wednesday he didn't show, Thursday he was there with two roses.  "I was going to give both to my mother, but I guess you deserve one," he said as he handed it to me.  He didn't take the phone out, he did math.

I gave up my preparation period to go the educational planning conference for Matthew.  Matthew, who sat quietly and suffered through the tenth period math class all last semester.  Matthew's mother eloquently retold the story of Matthew's childhood, how he ate the paint behind the his playpen at the babysitter's house as an infant and had an extremely high level of lead in his blood.  Matthew, who spent the last semester staring at every algebra example as if taking his eyes away from the assignment long enough to retrieve a pencil from his bag would some how cause the paper to attack, listened intently.  Matthew received a shopping bag full of chocolates for being most improved student. I needed chocolate.  I asked him for one of the KitKats, he studiously sieved through the collection and handed me all of them.

Regina showed up for tenth period with a rose, a box of chocolate and sour face.   Regina and I have been staying after school to work on learning to read.  Regina did not attend school for the first 13 years of her life and she ended up in high school without the ability to read a three letter word.  In the current, leave no child behind world, Regina has no option other than the same college directed courses everyone else takes (and passes them all- how- I can't begin to fathom, I fear it has much more to do with unrealistic grading policies, than hard work and perseverance). So we work together after the day ends and we sound out words with short vowel sounds.  The sour face was for the fact she was sure she would end up in a foster home because she had arrived at school late yet again and someone had called her mother.  I got the rose and the valentine- she got a phone call to her mother, explaining how hard Regina was working with me.  She was there Friday. No foster home this time.

Maybe one more little story.  Wendy took my phone and texted Mr.Teachefish- Happy Valentine's Day.
No signature.  Mr. Teacherfish, assuming it was me, texted back "I love you.- Let's go out for dinner."  Now the fourth period class thinks I'm married to a romantic guy.

May all our days be lead paint free,  spent in homes with people who love us  and filled with roses and chocolate.
Happy belated Valentine's Day

Anxiety

I don't drive to school much, I take the bus and train but sometimes the universe arranges itself so there is a car at my disposal. 

I got stuck in front of the firetruck on the overpass between two highways.  It screamed at me for a good two minutes,-which any kid can tell you the louder you get screamed at the harder it is to figure out what to do next.  I don't know how I got out of it but, no sooner had I gotten down the road a bit and was beginning to breathe normally again,  an ambulance pulled up behind me and the sirens blasted again.  Twenty-three degrees in New York and I arrived in school sweated out.

And that was the easy part of the day.  

I was speaking with the math assistant principal, when a pretty young woman who struggled with English, asked, "Mr., are you busy?"  

"Yes, of course," he answered, and she stood by the side and waited.  And waited.  And waited some more.

Finally he asked what she needed.

"No teacher, in room"- she got out in broken English.

"Well, what teacher does it say on your schedule?" he asked and took the paper from her hand.

If you guessed, Ms. Teacherfish, you guessed right.  I  was at the assistant principal's office confirming I had been given a new schedule, which of course, he had no record of.   I hustled down to the room on the young lady's program card and gave my new class, the new class spiel in English and then in Spanish.  And then repeated it three times as two more groups identified that in fact there was indeed a new math class in said room. 

The next period was Resource Room, and if I thought things couldn't go worse.  I was wrong.  The state monitor arrived.  

We spend an inordinate amount time worrying about being "monitored".  Perhaps that comes from spending a year on the closing school list, only escaping doom at the last moment when an independent arbitrator decided that even an all powerful mayor needs to adhere to contracts. 

The monitor entered our resource room. On a good day there isn't enough  room to swing a dead cat. (I don't know what that means exactly, but the one piece of feedback we got was don't use idioms)  She spent the next forty-five minutes, sliding between my half of the room and the other half occupied by a different group of students.  With a different teacher- equally  flummoxed. 

Lucky for me, my side is smaller, with less chairs.  She spent more time on their side.

We discussed a New York Times editorial about Women in Combat,  Shaggy, so nicknamed, because he reminds the rest of the group of the character in Scooby Doo cartoon, kept his head up the whole period and played it straight.  When I thanked him later, Carlos said, "You tell us  not to accuse anyone of using illegal substances if we don't have proof"

That's not what I meant by playing it straight.  That's why, I guess I shouldn't use idioms.

Alfonso wanted to talk about the decorated sniper who was shot to death at a shooting range in Texas.  I asked him to connect it to the article.  Miraculously he did.

Freida volunteered the correct, counter argument, it is the second time she's spoken aloud this semester.

Paulo said there was only one  four star woman general.  I said, I didn't  know that for a fact but he found the line in the article that proved him right immediately.  

Was the monitored impressed?  I have no idea, all I heard from the head of our department was the don't use idiom thing.

Later I started to calm down, what did it matter what she thought?  I sat with seven young people in a crowded overheated room who could discuss  a New York Times editorial with insight and conviction. Why should I care if anyone else was impressed?

And so I made it through the end of the day- calmed down considerably.  I had a meeting in Brooklyn in the evening  but the kind lady voice inside my cell phone was directing me there and I was getting into my "what me worry?" mode when a woman pulled up next to me and signaled that I should roll down my window.  I figured she was going to tell me that my scarf was hanging out the car door.

"You should check your right rear tire," she said,  "I think the lugs are loose and it might  fall off."

It didn't.

The day ended uneventfully. 

I survived.

Cue the Mama told me there'd be days like this- music.

Silence for Sandy

Good and Evil

After lunch the afternoon resource room students file in.
The large glass windows, the over-sized radiator and partitions dividing an already divided classroom combine to make the space more suitable to growing tomatoes than teaching remedial academics.

But unlike many classes in the school, they all come everyday.
They are representative of the New York City School system, African American, Hispanic , Southeastern Indian descent via Central America and European descent via any number of earlier New York immigrant groups.  Two live with people other than their parents. One is the senior class president.

They bicker,  They touch each other when I say "keep your hands to yourselves."

But they are kind.  Really kind - to each other (and me).

When Nina has a social studies test- everyone pitches in with answers.  Okay- so technically that's cheating, but what's the point of a non-credited test preparation class, to fail a 16 year old dyslexic or master the material?

When Eva can't to do the math Laurence helps her, until he gets stuck, then Nina kicks in, 'cause dyslexics are good in math (Nina tells me).

And Bernie has Joy translates his Spanish homework, while Michael rereads Joy's essay in English.
Not all groups work out like this.  Okay- very few do.

But on good days I remember why I teach . .

Like last Friday, after lunch and a week of crack down on technology usage, which had basically kept  us all away from our Smart Phones and other electronic devices distributing the news,   we huddled in our room discussing what at that moment was the most significant event of the day.

The fight in the cafeteria.  Noteworthy because it involved a boy hitting a girl.

Michael says boys shouldn't hit girls.
Bernie agrees.  Nina says she's stronger than most boys, so if a boy hits her she'll hit him back.  Eva agrees with Nina's assessment of her strength and say if a boy hits her (meaning Eva) she's want's Nina to hit him back.

Then Laurence says that no one should hit anyone.  He's right of course and I make a big point of agreeing.  That no one should ever willing hurt another person.

But then I start to over think it- and feel like I have to modify the blanket statement with the amendment, that if someone was hurting my children, and I add, I consider all of them "my children",  I might have to do something.  I don't know what I would do - but I couldn't just let them get hurt.

Magnanimous of me.  (Though, I have physically inserted myself into school yard fights- thankfully I have never really had to test my verbal bravado).


But Friday's  instructional day ended, I pulled out my cell phone and the fight in the cafeteria faded to a very tiny spot in the scheme of violence of the day.  In thirty years, not all the groups have been like the one above.  I have had very disturbed young people come through my programs..  There are a few who I can imagine shooting up a classroom.  Were they evil incarnate?  I think they were sick. I think that just as I would not blame the diabetic young person for his pancreas' inability to manufacture insulin, I cannot blame the social deviant for the horrible voices in his head who tell him to hurt others.

But I blame the healthy individuals that sold his family the gun.I blame the forecasters of doom, who encourage people who live in suburban sub-developments, to arm themselves.  I blame the well sponsored gun lobbyist who hide behind a Constitution written at  a time when an "arm" required stuffing powder into a musket, not pulling a trigger enough times in a twenty minute period to destroy the future of twenty-six people many of whom had not reached their eighth birthday.And I blame the elected politicians so afraid of the NRA that they will not  pass real gun control laws. They are the evil incarnate.

I try to keep this blog away from the buzz of the social media world but the picture and story of Victoria Soto was all over my Facebook page.  According to the stories posted she hid her second graders, told the gunmen they were in the gym and was shot and killed.

Do I know if it really happened?
No
But I believe it.

I don't know if there is really a heaven, but if there is, the population increased by 26 Friday.
I do know that there is little chance sick people won't continue to want to do terrible things. The only way that we can limit the chance this will happen again  is a real change in the gun laws.

Rest in peace, Victoria, your coworkers and  the first graders of Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Frustration and Cupcakes

I teach math.

Let me rephrase that in the pursuit of honest writing.

I am assigned two sections of a course called Algebra Prep.

Which means I have two classes comprised of students who fit the following criteria.

They were at some point in their school career designated as requiring a full time special education program. And they have yet to pass the all important New York State Algebra Regents.

I like my paycheck. It allows me to browse the Macy's website at 6:30 Thanksgiving Morning and if I clicked the correct button, four pretty sweaters should be lodged between my screen door and the front door early next week. I am not sure I hit the correct button. I did reveal the secret information about where my wedding reception, was held, but then things seemed to happened quickly and the page disappeared.

I got frustrated and moved on to making coffee.

Which is why I differentiate between teaching math and doing all the things that I call teaching math, like searching for appropriate tasks, trying to infuse meaning into sets of equations, tediously pulling apart problems from the exit exam and explaining them bit by bit (The educationalese word for that is scaffolding- not to be confused with the metal and wood structure outside the classroom window where the workman is jack-hammering while I do all those things)

After four long weeks of looking at the relationship between a linear equation and its graph I give a test.

Regina said it wasn't a real test because I didn't make them sit every other row. Then she asked wasn't I going to give them something it was the day before Thanksgiving.

“What is this first grade?” I ask, as I unwrap the last tray of cupcakes. The group in the Resource Room has polished off the last of the Hawaiian Punch the period before, so I figured I wouldn't have to collect red-soaked test papers.

Then Richard announces it was good I was giving out cupcakes because it was his eighteenth birthday.

And that got him thinking about how he was grown up and should be responsible for things. Like maybe get married and have kids.

But only two kids

by seven wives......

Wait!!!! (see why I don't really teach Algebra)

You can't have two kids by seven wives, what, each wife is going to be 2/7^th pregnant?

Regina wants to know why I make everything math, Fred wants to know if you go up or down for a positive slope, Donny wants to know if he can borrow a pencil, Matthew is staring very hard at the paper and is deciding where he should write his name (on the line that says name would be my first choice.).

So Robert, who is in an introspective mood- says no what he really wants is one special 'ho.

He's the romantic type.

So I walk around and help people finish the test- Cheating I suppose. But it is a non-credit course and

the point is to convey some knowledge of algebra, maybe enough knowledge of algebra to pass the stupid regents.

Without getting too frustrated.

And then move on.

PS- I'm not sure what passing the Regents will allow them move onto , but dem's the rules. Mine is not to reason why, mine is just to do and give out cupcakes.

Reading the Met

Veteran's Day.  After  a post-tropical hurricane, and an early snowstorm, Mother Nature gives us a perfect autumn day.  We take the train to the city, walk through Central Park and land in a surprising empty Metropolitan Museum of Art.

We know some little known facts.  The suggested price of $25 admission- is just that- suggested..  And Monday the museum is closed- except if it is a holiday. For $5 each we have the museum almost to ourselves.

We go to the Andy Warhol exhibit.  By room 5 I begin to suffer museum fatigue and sit on the nicely polished wood bench smack in the middle of the room.  A young man and his mother circulate the room.  He reads the words on the explanation cards and those that are part of the pieces with ease and alacrity.  My bench mate is impressed.  "How well this little guy reads," he comments.

Yeah better then my tenth graders.

He reads the Richard Prince piece, “My father was never home, he was always drinking booze. He saw a sign saying ‘Drink Canada Dry.’ So he went up there.”

My bench mate and I compliment the mother.

"He's been reading since he's three," she tells us.  
And then, showing a great deal of reflection, adds, "figuring out what it says is one thing, understanding it is another."

"Like the Canada Dry joke?"  I ask. 

"And I didn't explain it to him either," she adds.

So some five year olds can breeze easily through multi-syllabic words, some tenth graders struggle terribly.

I will sit through another professional development on vocabulary development and literacy  today.  I will hear many good ideas.  But does anything work as well as good genes and landing in a family that knows the Met is free and open on holiday Mondays?

Maybe I should schedule a trip to Met?

I wonder if I could get it approved for vocabulary development?

I bet my tenth graders would get the Canada Dry joke.

Uncertainty

In first period English we read a poem, from the August Regents Exam

Home Techtonics

Our house is at the crest

of a mountain formed

by a fault line that’s still

doing its work. We’re up

over five thousand feet,

and probably, slowly, the spot

that we sit on is going

to get higher and higher.

So, at some point, the house

is coming down, shaken

to bits, I suppose, and what

we’re banking on is that

we’ve chosen the right moment

in geologic time, a sweet

spot between cataclysms.1

And that’s what Annie and I

hope for generally,

and what everyone seems

to want—some forgettable

moment between great wars

or typhoons or plagues—to have

timed it just right, so we’re

in just the right place between

what we read about in history

books and the moments after

which history won’t matter much.

—John Brantingham

from Earthshine, November 2007–December 2009

www.ruminations.us

Conan is worried about passing the exam.

He should be – I ask him what the poem is about

and he says something to do with plates.

So we read it many times. Conan is serious, he concentrates.

We talk about a lot. The exam says we should use the ideas from the poem to write a paragraph about uncertainty.

But Conan is confused. He writes that the poem is about a man who hopes his house does not fall down.

Which of course, it is, but unlike the campaign commercials that made me want to throw something at the tv (just how vulnerable are flat screens?-they probably don't break into the star-shaped shatter- so popular in the cartoons of my childhood,) the poems speaks to me more and more each time I read it It speaks to me.  I worry a lot..

And then Hurricane Sandy hits.

Neither Conan nor I suffer the terrible damage. The school community, so recently devastated by a automobile crash that killed four students, is spared the loss of life

But many have lost homes, and cars and the sense of well being.

On Monday when we return, I tell Conan I thought about him and the poem, during the week- at first he is not sure why, but Pablo  reminds him that a typhoon is like a hurricane.

Tuesday is Election Day.

Wednesday, a snowstorm only half as bad as the Hurricane hits. This time our home loses only half its electricity.

The Teacher's College Writer's project people, tell the story of the classroom and the first snow. The teacher invites the class to come to the window and observe the first flakes of the year. From the back, the cynic yells out, “Don't do it, she'll only make us write about it!”

We watch the snow and calculate how long the commute home will be. It's high school. We don't write about the first snow.

So it's not until the end of the week that I do make them read about the election.

We read Hope and Change Part 2 by Thomas Friedman.

We talk and talk about what it means.

I have been taking a lot of criticism in our small group professional learning community for suggesting that I use New York Times pieces with the student in the Resource Room. I am told over and over that the reading level is way too hard for them.

I am under no illusion that it isn't difficult reading with difficult vocabulary, but the material interests me and they are mad close to being fully grown adults, so I persist.

We slog or way through Friedman's analysis of what went wrong for the Republicans. And in the end Pablo says, “What if its just that Romnney had bad luck?”

Conan says elections don't have anything to do with luck. Obama was just the better choice.

Maybe.

Or maybe he was kind of lucky that Sandy hit and blew the campaign right off the front page of the paper and the nightly news.

Maybe.

Uncertainty.