New student

The last couple of weeks have been insanely busy for me. I had to give post assessment essays to all three of my classes- and then grade them, all three classes are doing research papers so I have been receiving those- giving feedback so they can revise, and my CT asked me to teach her tenth grade class because she liked what I have been doing with my tenth grade class (which feels really great to hear...but since we have block periods teaching four of her five classes has left me almost no time during school to do any grading) It is good though because this is how its actually going to be when I have my own classroom so the experience is useful.
Another thing that has kept me busy is figuring out what I am going to do with this new student that started in my tenth grade class. There are only three weeks left in the quarter and I need to make sure that she has a decent amount of grades from me. Her first day was today, so while the class was taking their post-assessment I had her start reading To Kill a Mockingbird. She complained about having to read the book, but we are only a little more than half way through it so it isn't like she cant catch up.
Side note- Her complaints about "how boring the book is" almost started a riot in my class. My students LOVE the book! We spent a couple of classes acting out the court scene and discussing ethos, pathos, logos ( I set up the room like a courtroom and they all had a part) so when they heard her say something negative about it some of them freaked. I didn't laugh in front of them but it was hilarious how upset they got. I had to assure some of them that just because she didn't like the book didn't mean we were going to stop reading it...super funny.
 Figuring out what exactly to have her do though is just another added stress I didn't see coming. I asked her to take the long weekend to catch up to where we are in the book so hopefully she does. Another worry I have is that she isn't going to feel like part of the class...especially after what happened today. This class has such a great community built in and they are so comfortable with one another. I was surprised at how welcoming they were to me, I thought that is how they would be with her but because of the tension today I am going to guess it is going to take some work before they send any love her way.

Wolf Hat

I have been waiting to post because I really wanted to post on this one boy in my 12th grade honors class and I was waiting till today to see if he would finally hand in the writing assignment that was due last week. If i didn't have it I wouldn't have had any writing to bring in with me from this student. LUCKILY!!! he handed it to me at the beginning of class.
This boy drives me nuts! He brings the craziest things with him to class everyday...they aren't really toys...but when I take away the harddrive he took out of his computer to bring with him to class...I feel like I am taking away his new hot wheels from Toys R Us. He is in my Honors class (which for the most part is full of amazing students) and he does deserve to be there. He is super smart but he is just off the wall. He always wears one of those hats with the big furry animal coming off the top of it...his is a wolf. He sits in class and plays with whatever he has brought in that day until I walk over and move it onto another desk or take it. The thing that drives me the craziest is every time he knows exactly whats going on in class. He has the BEST answers to all my questions. It makes it so hard to say something about how he acts in class because he knows more about what going on then the students sitting in class listening. The only thing I feel like I can say to him is that he is distracting his classmates.
He only does in-class work. Any homework I send home generally doesn't make it back and if it does it is not necessarily going to be in one piece. The other problem I have is when it is a writing assignment, like the one I collected from him today, he doesn't follow the directions at all but the writing is good and he clearly put effort into it. The writing assignment he handed in today was suppose to be two TIQA paragraphs (TIQA is this body paragraph thing the entire school uses) what he handed in doesn't have one quote. The Q in TIQA stands for quote the A is for an analysis of THAT quote. Without a quote to analyze there is no Q or A. His two paragraphs are great though...but at the same time he didn't do what I asked him to do. Then on top of that it is a week late and I am pretty sure he only gave it to me so I would get off his back about it. I have been pestering him about it so I could use him as my example in class this week.
I honestly wish you could all see his hat!!! I don't think he ever takes it off. Morning, noon, and night he wears that wolf hat.

Be Flexible

I am quickly learning not to plan to far ahead. In the beginning I was making lesson plans that had really specific time frames for everything I wanted to do in class. Now I am allowing a lot more time for warms ups, reading, and activities. When I originally wrote my lesson plans I thought I would be starting Act 2 of Macbeth today with the graphic novel...so I have all my lessons for that already mapped out and my copies made since last week...but instead today we finished Act 1. I find I am planning that flexibility into my lessons now. I still include where I want to be at the end of a lesson...but I plan for what I will do if that doesn't happen.

I still create a plan that has what I want to get through in the next two weeks but I don't obsess about getting each lesson plan made until it is a little closer to the actual day for that lesson. Between fire drills, assemblies, and other interruptions its hard to get through the entire "plan". Things that I wanted to have finished end up spilling into the next day which is fine I just adjust and make time. The more comfortable I get with teaching though the better I feel about being flexible.

I am also trying to decide how flexible I want to be as a teacher when it comes to taking late work. It seems the general rule in the class is that students can hand in late work right up until the end of the quarter even if it is assignments from day 1 of the quarter. Obviously during student teaching I will follow what my CT does and accept it but I don't know how I will actually feel about it when I am a teacher. I can see giving students a certain amount of time to make things up...but just an example of how students take advantage of being able to do there make up work whenever---I have three girls in one of my classes who still haven't finished a test that my CT gave them three weeks ago...she has completely handed that class over to me so it is my responsibility to make sure they finish it...if they don't finish the test by the end of the quarter it gets graded as is. They have been telling me they will come during advisory to finish it but then never show up. Seriously...How long should a student get to finish a test? an entire quarter seems unreasonable to me. I am willing to be flexible with late work but I still think that there needs to be a time limit.