I saw a meme this week that I fell head over heels for. In fact, I decided to make a poster of it with a really sarcastic looking teacher speaking to one of her more challenging students. The meme said "Well, let me pour you a nice tall glass of 'get over it' and I'll even throw in a straw so you suck it up!" I wanted to say "That! That right there!" says it all when it comes to dealing with the dealings of the undealt. These kids have no filters, but you step over their line and hurt their widdle feewings, you get your eyes and ears full of their nasty little teenage angsty tantrums in the form of slamming books, kicking trashcans, knocking over a desk, or just throwing up their hands and cussing you out as if cussing was both original and meaningful. They truly are a step behind when it comes to being cool -- but you can't tell them that; they think they invented the "F" word.
I absolutely love it when I've been confronted by a would-be who wants to be all that, and she shakes her head from side to side with her little drawn mouthy-duckface. She cocks her head to one side and calls me a bitch. What? That's all you got baby? I ususally retort with "That's Dr. Bitch, sweetheart" That usually suffices and they either laugh or shut up, not really knowing how to respond. It's just enough time for me to regain control and move forward. Timing. It's everything.
Apparently today there were some kids who just couldn't or wouldn't wake up long enough to realize that the assignment on the board magically disappeared after 8 minutes. I took my eraser and erased it. You'd have thought I had stolen their last cupcake! Here came the cries, "You can't do that!", "You have to leave it on the board the whole hour" and then there was, "But I didn't write it down!" OK...too bad. It was on the board, I asked you to write it down, I instructed you to write it down. I warned you it would be gone, and then yeah - - I erased it. I kept my word. Find a friend, get the assignment from them, but yes it is actually still due by the end of the hour. We don't give homework at this school -- God forbid. They have to do all the work THAT hour or pick it back up again the next day. Do any of you remember being so spoiled? Not me. I had homework from 3 or 4 of my 6 classes EVERY DAMN DAY, and get this, I was expected to do it, too.
Am I that mean teacher? You know it! I pride myself on being efficient, effective, and precise. I give the instruction, write it out, lecture over it, talk about it, but I don't have to hold the pencil for them and write it out for them on their paper -- again, God forbid they be expected to read, comprehend, or write in an English class! Most of the time it only takes a few days (OK weeks) for the kids in my classes to catch on that I don't play. We have play time. We have fun too. We have games, I let them throw paper balls at each other at the end of class if we get all of the work done. It's what it is. You have to get the work done to have the fun -- sort of like needing to eat your vegetables before the ice cream; if you think about it. Now, I'm thinking about it and ice cream sounds really good.
Yep, that's me, the mean teacher. I'm the one walking back and forth the entire hour so I can get my 12,000+ steps in each day. I'm the one demanding that you get your pencils out and stop borrowing supplies from someone, get them yourself, and if you can't afford it you write that out on a piece of paper and slip it onto my desk so I know not to scream at you again. I will supply pencils and paper for those kids who can't afford it, and what I do is have it out for everyone so I'm not singling anyone out. Do you have any idea how expensive it gets to keep 110 kids supplied? I do a lot of asking for donations both online, in the community, and I donate a great deal myself. Don't tell anyone I'm nice. They think I'm heartless and really cruel.
One thing I do on Fridays (tomorrow) is to go to the gym before classes start and complete my "duty" which is to watch kids in the gym for 20 minutes before classes start (only on Friday). I walk the gym floor from one edge to the other at a really fast pace trying to get as many steps in as possible and if a kid has been particularly bad that week he or she has to walk with me or have detention after school. They typically walk with me. I've got 3 or 4 every week, but by the time we start out and get started there seems to be 10-12 join in and we have to move to the other side of the gym as not to interfere with the stand-around teachers who talk and don't even bother to watch the kids in the bleachers. I laugh. I think duty can be really useless at times, but I see the point of at least trying to appear as if we're doing all we can. If it were up to me every kid would be walking the freaking track outside and moving around. We have far too many fat, unhealthy, lazy, sloth kids hanging out in our communities these days and that's not me being hard - - that's me stating facts. Obesity in teens is absolutely on the rise.
I remember when I went to middle school just over 45 years ago, I could count on one hand how many overweight kids we had in all three of the grades combined. There just were NOT many over weight kids. We played outside. We didn't sit around bending our thumbs and screaming at the monitors. We had actual activities and chores to do too. We just didn't have time to sit around and get big. We had a hard enough time getting our homework completed to a grade B so we could be in sports, cheer, student council or anything else that truly represented who we are. This year (at our school) there aren't enough boys interested in playing football to have a team. Are you serious? When I asked a few of the boys why they weren't playing the answers were shocking! Most of them were afraid to get hurt and many of them just thought it was boring. Wow.
Are we sure we needed to give up some of the "classics" and some of the standards we've been slowly giving up in order to accommodate the kids and their working parents? I mean it may be time to bring back some of the accountability, responsibility, civility, and good behavior! It may be time to bring back discipline and actual consequences for misconduct and disrespect. A student asked me a question in the middle of my lecture today. I told her to wait until after I was finished speaking. Her little 14 year old attitude barked back "You won't shut up!" You know she's walking with me tomorrow, and probably next Friday too. Her two-page essay on Theodore Roosevelt will be due on Monday, and she will need 3 different references without plagiarism. If she can't muster up the discipline to do it I've got the word of her cheer coach that she won't be cheering again this semester. We need to do more. We need to bond together as teachers, as admin, as staff, and stand up for what we know is right for the correction and education of our children.
When we, as an educational community, allow parents to step in and complain about how their student is being treated but they don't want to talk about the who, what, when, where, how, or why that same kid, my student, their child, decided not only to not work, but to throw a hissy fit when asked to take notes, or because I chose not to answer them on THEIR time table - - we have a real problem. I'm not saying parents don't have a role, oh goodness no, I'm not saying that whatsoever. I want parents to be involved. I want parents to show up. I want parents to help with assignments, but when a parent drops a kid off smelling like beer and cigarettes and then wants to lecture me about how I treat their kid, I'm not moving my feet. I'm standing my ground - - and if that means I find another job, or get asked to leave the one I have, you know I won 't complain. I can't find anyone to change occupations with me - - good tough and effective teachers are really hard to come by; I'm a commodity. Kids need boundaries. Kids need structure. Kids need someone (sometimes anyone) to look them in the eyes and say "I will not tolerate your behavior, it stops right now, do you understand me?" Most times they don't like it, until they realize I'm there because I want to be. I don't need the money that badly.
Ask yourself: would you rather have a teacher who put up with your bullshit or one that squares off and refuses to budge, allowing you (the student) to realize you matter to that teacher ENOUGH that they (me) will take the time to correct you? It's not rocket science. If it was I couldn't teach it. I don't do math or science, but I'm pretty damn good at English.
Photo Credit: Core Walking
No comments:
Post a Comment