Vickie - Day 3 (3/23)

A week in the life of a teacher, day 3...

Wednesday:
I arrive in my room, set down my things, and turn on my computer. I’m surprised to see that it’s already 8:27 because I dropped Evie off at the normal time. The first thing I do is write the early the release schedule on the board. Today students will leave 2 hours early so that we can have professional development. I then check my email and the daily demon which hasn’t been updated. I decide that I need to finish grading some level 1 work so that I know what assignments students need to turn in, but I can’t find their paragraphs. I eventually find them in a folder on the floor next to my filing cabinet. Maybe they fell out of my bag? I start to grade them and realize that several of the students had used a translator to type out sentences in English. I mark them as 0s with a note about needing to rewrite. I’m very frustrated because the assignment asked them to tell what sports and activities they do and how often. They had the vocabulary necessary but instead of writing a simple sentence in French such as, I play soccer often, they felt the need to think of a complex sentence in English and use a translator. I add a discussion about translators to my lesson plan and wonder how I can convince this group to not do the same thing again.

1st period planning: At 8:50 I head to the workroom to make a few copies on my way to tardy duty. The teacher whose room is closest to the tardy station is not there- her room is dark and her students are gathered outside. I let them in and stick my head in the workroom and ask another teacher to call the office to see if she has a sub since I need to write tardies. Her students keep poking their heads out the door and I tell them to relax and we’ll get things figured out. The sub arrives a few minutes later. I head down to the office to put in a supply request (paper clips) and an announcement for knitting club. I also have a quick meeting scheduled with one of the APs. He is meeting with a student so I wait a few minutes. Our meeting is quick and I head back to my room to keep grading papers and make sure that I am ready for my 2nd period class. I spend the short time I have left grading a few more papers. 

 Honors French 3 (10:00-11:00)- We only have an hour today because of early release. As students settle in, I pass back their subjunctive packets and tell them multiple times that if they do not give me their packet to check for completion before I put up the answers I will not accept it. Several of them try to negotiate and suggest we take a vote. I respond “C’est pas une démocratie, c’est une monarchie absolue et je suis la reine.” They do not appreciate my humor. We quickly go over the answers and students then continuing working on the environment packet that I had given them last class. Most of them work hard but several do not accomplish much. As I circulate around the room, I remind them that the quarter ends in a week. One of my students stops me to tell me about something going on with one of his friends, who I also teach. Another gives me some late work. Several ask if I have the schedule for Friday (we have a school wide event). The period is over before we know it.

Lunch (11-11:25)- I print out progress reports for my level 1 students. I’ve decided to use today as a makeup/catchup day because of 22 students, only 1 does not owe me any work. I also call the pharmacy to renew the dog's prescription, then have to call the vet to send in a new one. I chat with my coworkers in the workroom for a moment and head back to class.

French 1 (11:30-12:30)- Before handing out progress reports, we have a discussion about the writing assignment and the use of translators. Several students blurt out their annoyance at having to redo the assignment, but I few nod in understanding. I also go over some guidelines for makeup/catchup day- mainly that I will not answer any questions until everyone has their progress report and students need to come to me at the back table where I have extra copies of all their work. Despite this, several students wave their progress reports at me, telling me they need all their work. I repeat that they need to come to me and spend the rest of the period 1. Giving new copies of things to students, 2. Helping students who have questions, and 3. Keeping a student from constantly wandering out of class and in to the hallway with a lacrosse stick. It’s a challenge. Several students want me by their side as they work through individual activities and are frustrated every time I have to attend to something else. Two students ask to work outside and when I go to check on them they are at the other end of the hall. My wanderer finally put down the lacrosse stick and did some work. A male student asks me how old I am and immediately guesses 46. I tell him he has failed French for the year with his guess while several of the girls yell at him. I then give him some life advice: 1. Do not ask a woman her age and 2. If you are going to guess a woman’s age, think long and hard, and if you still must do it, subtract 10 from whatever number you come up with. My students decide I must be in my 30s and several tell me their moms are 36. I now feel old but don’t tell them. It was exhausting and by the end, I was starving. I was planning to eat lunch at the early release (our awesome PTSA normally feeds us) but know I won’t make it. As the class ends, I grab an applesauce pouch from my food stash and quickly eat it.

French 2 (12:35-1:35)- We start the second reading packet that the other French 2 classes completed. Three of the boys are talking (1 of whom is the student whose friend talked to me earlier). I ask them to focus and tell them they are welcome to go out in the hall to finish their conversation then rejoin us. They quiet down, but a couple minutes later the one student stands up with his packet and heads towards the door. I ask him if everything is ok and he replies that he’d rather work in the hall today. I tell him that’s fine and a moment later his friend follows. I poke my head out the door when we pause and they are both reading the packet. I let them know which activities to complete and tell them I’ll check on them again. We work through the reading and they complete the activities on their own, asking each other questions. 2 girls I have to constantly remind to stay on task, but they get their work done. As I move around the room, one of my students tells me that my basketball bracket would be completely broken in another day. I retort that at least it isn’t already broken like his and he laughs.

At 1:40 I get my things together and head to the media center. It’s always hard to know what we need on early release days- we’re often told to bring things that we never use and since we’re moving rooms several times, I don’t want to carry a bunch of stuff. Lunch has not yet arrived, but dessert is there. I eat several sweets and almost immediately regret it. We spend a short time talking about our district goals before moving into small groups. The first session I attend is supposed to be about rigor and EC students. I am the only non-EC teacher there. We learn about technology to help EC students and co-teaching (there was apparently a miscommunication). It’s interesting, but part way through the sugar starts to wear off and I’m feeling sleepy. My second session is about rigor in the classroom but is not geared toward a specific subject. The only thing I remember is that the presenter pronounced jargon, jar-GONE. We are finished at 4 and I head up to my room to drop off some papers, organize for tomorrow, and get my things. I leave around 4:30, once again carrying more work home than I'll probably do and feeling more exhausted than usual.