Tuesday, September 12, 2006

How many detentions makes a dozen?

Do I have to go down and get my kids? Really? (note: this was started during lunch)
 
Man, some days I just can't figure them out. This is to be expected, they are illogical children, but really. I'm sitting here waiting until the last second to go down and get my kids from lunch. We have split lunch which means they go absolutely insane in the second half of class, but that's not really why I don't want to go pick them up. I'm handing out 10 detentions when they get back! Ten kids out of eighteen didn't turn their homework in today. My pre-AP class had 8 not turn it in. Who knows what last hour will look like. My bootcamp kid decided that he didn't want to take the quiz. So... he didn't. I told him he would get a zero if he didn't do it before lunch and he wrote his name on it and turned it in blank. Wonderful.  
 
I think it is a bad thing when you actually hope for some type of natural disaster so that you don't have to go down and pick up your students from lunch. It's not that bad, but it is kind of frustrating. Just when I think that I've got them on task... they turn in their homework, they come on time, they tuck in their shirts... they lose it all over again. And they're so mean to each other! They are seriously just mean. I don't know how to reason with people who can be so hateful towards each other. I can't believe no one has taught them to value themselves (and therefore each other), it's so frustrating to watch.  
 
After lunch comes more time with 3rd hour and then 4th hour. I lost it with them yesterday. I took away every privilege they had, four kids were standing in the back of the room, two detentions. AND STILL THEY TALK. I don't know, when I was a kid, I knew when I had hit my limit and I stopped. Not these kids. We spent the last 15 minutes of class writing a behavior essay (non-teachers read: an essay that deals with the behavior... in this case: "Why were you choosing to be disrespectful in class? How does this affect your classmates? What can you do to change this behavior?"). The kicker on the essay writing was when I read the essays and half of them said they weren't doing anything wrong. Tony wrote that he had improved (this could be considered true in a way. Tony has downgraded from curse words on my desk to spitballs on my wall). Monique wrote that it was unfair she had to write an essay because she was being good (um, I guess she considers good drawing on Martin's binder and then throwing paper at him). Maybe I'm expecting too much, but I'm surprised they couldn't even understand what they were doing wrong.  
 
Oh well... tomorrow is another day. The bell is about to ring and I have to be down there lest another fight break out.  

Post-School Day update:
Bootcamp boy got himself suspended at lunch. A girl (who is not my student) had a seizure, so that's all anyone could talk about. Fourth hour was wonderful. And I made my fifth kid cry.

All in a days work.

1 comment:

Matthew Wilson said...

I understand about that mid-lunch dilemma: Do I go get them, or run as far away as possible before anyone figures it out?

It's a tough one... one I continue to debate every lunch period!

 
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