DonorsChoose.org

Hey Team,

Quick post time. There is a neat organization called Donors Choose that is focused on helping teachers in poorer areas of the country with classroom supplies. They service all grades and subjects and you can support an array of projects through it. I have a project for a laser printer that I am trying to get funded right now and if any of you would want to donate toward it or think you might know someone who would, I would be incredibly thankful. Just click on the link below for more details. More later, hope all is well with you and yours!

http://www.donorschoose.org/mr.ware

Murphy's Law - Tuesday

After monday’s charades, there was a noticeable tension in the air. Again first, second, third, fourth periods and first lunch went fine, and second lunch, during my planning period I had to go to a professional development seminar. When it concluded, I was walking back to my classroom when one of the hall monitors, one of the sweetest ladies I have ever met, said with a smile from ear to ear, "Mr. Ware, you wear your running shoes again today?" to which I said somewhat jokingly, "haha why Ms. Campbell, they fightin' again?" and she replied, "sure are, look at 'em". Suddenly I realized they were in fact fightin' again, so I bolted out to the scene to find a recently ended girl fight. As I tried dissipate the crowd and herd the students toward their classes, another girl fight broke out of equal magnitude, thus sending things into frenzy again.

This would have all been enough for tuesday, except Tuesday morning I noticed that the air my cooling unit was blowing was not exactly cold. If you’ve been following my blog, you know that a relatively common thread throughout my time here is non-trustworthy air conditioning. Some places that would be fine, maybe even pleasant. Mississippi in August is not one of those places.

The first four periods were still “cool” enough that the students didn’t complain (and sweat). After lunch it was definitely hot enough outside for my classroom to be downright uncomfortable.

So with fighting on the mind and an abundance of heat and humidity in the air, I tried to teach trigonometry. Most of my students put up with it and things were going ok until the academic coach came by my room and told me that the school was temporarily on lockdown. “Oh lockdown? How splendid” I thought to myself. Turns out these girl fights were related and the police were in the process of investigating it. While they did so, we were to hold our students where they were to prevent further fighting from taking place.

Luckily, ingenuity kicked in in the form of manilla folders (or vanilla folders as one of my students said). Manilla folders are not only helpful for general storage, but can also serve as a makeshift fan quite easily. Before long I had my students determining the cosecant of 7π/6 with as much of a breeze as their wrist could afford. All in all, there were two fights, 0 air conditionings, who knows how many tardies and many frazzled teachers.

Murphy's Law - Monday

Week two was an opportunity to explain Murphy's Law to my students. For those of you who are unfamiliar, Murphy's Law is an adage that simply states "anything that can go wrong will go wrong". Such was the case with week two at our "new" school.

Monday started off the way most mondays do, alarm clock ringing to early and the mosquito-filled august air too muggy. First, second, third, and fourth period went along relatively smoothly, along with a nice warm lunch duty for the first lunch serving. My planning period is during the second lunch serving, so I was in the office trying to work out some paperwork, when I heard a commotion outside. I ran around the corner to see the JROTC teacher dragging a child away from a recent fight that had taken place in the courtyard. I say dragging because it was all the Major could do to hold the boy, as he was squirming like a recently hooked fish, still trying to get in on the action. This is relatively common, so I thought "no big deal". Eventually the kid even started adhering to the direction he was being yanked and walked under his own strength. As they approached me, the Major asked me to grab the child, but with my poor hearing, I didn't quite make that out, and as soon as the kid passed me, he ran around the corner then back toward the courtyard. As soon as he did this, I realized the err of my ways, and was then in hot pursuit of the recent combatant. He made it about four doors down before I caught him and literally carried him back to the office. This was the first of 2-3 fights that day.

Later, new teachers who had seen my heroic act of justice made sure to say, "Way to go", and "great job" as it is not everyday a teacher gets to run down a student and get away with it. "Aww shucks" I said, "just another day on the job".

The second first day

Friends, family, random blog browsers, we're back for the second round of blogging about victories and defeats in a classroom. In the time since my last post, many things have changed about life and our school. I successfully finished summer school in late June, married the love of my life, traveled to Costa Rica for a bit, and rushed back to the Delta to begin professional development two weeks before school started. In that time of professional development, I was able to get to know the MANY new teachers and administration. We have a new principal, assistant principal, school improvement grant coordinator, academic coach, 2 new english teachers, 5 new social studies teachers, 2 new science teachers, 3 new math teachers, and between 160 and 175 new tenth graders. Basically the only thing that is familiar from last year is last year's students, and our school's dilapidated building and grounds.

School started on August 8 with a funeral. No I am not kidding, we had a funeral. All of the 600 or so students walked by a hearse as they were being corralled into the gym. In the gym, soulful black spirituals could barely be heard playing over the rattling industrial air conditioners. Chairs were laid out in front of a podium for faculty and staff, and students sat on the bleachers on either side. At approximately 8:00 a.m. all of the faculty entered into the gym behind a casket which was being rolled out by six pallbearers (one of which being me). The ceremony proceeded as we laid the old high school and all of her awful disfunction to rest.

First the mistress of ceremonies welcomed everyone to the event. Afterward, a veteran teacher welcomed everyone again, and delivered a goosebump invoking speech regarding the circumstances of the ceremony. Then two coaches welcomed everyone a third time and made reflections on the old school, one as a student, the other as a coach. Then after a quick verse of "Glory Glory Hallelujah", I made resolutions. Finally it was the time of our new principal to deliver the eulogy. First he gave his own personal history with the school, as he actually attended a rival high school, and had a lasting negative impression after an incident with the marching band and an egg. Afterward, he made his wishes known for the “new school” which will rise from the ashes like a mythological phoenix. Finally, he asked the students to all write down something they did not like about the old school on their programs.

When he finished his speech, he introduced his staff, and one by one teachers came to the microphone and read aloud their homeroom roster. When each student's name was called, they came down to the gym floor and symbolically dropped their programs into the open casket, officially putting to death all these things many held so dear.

When we left, we each went to our homeroom classes and reviewed the student handbooks with the students. Once that finished, students were released for lunch, and afterward they began changing classes and meeting their new teachers. This felt particularly miraculous because last year it took the guidance counselors a week to even get the students their schedules. Changing classes on the first day would have been unheard of last year. The day (and week) went significantly better. If it is at all indicative of how the year will turn out, I have high, high hopes.

Summer Skillz

School has been out for over a week now. Since dismissal, I have gone to the beach, played golf, and sincerely tried to sleep in past eight o’clock. Though I will surely carry parts of the past ten months with me, I fully intend to make the most of my summer off as well. As a “second year” (because I’m in my second year of teaching), I will living in beautiful Oxford, MS during the majority of the month of June and be helping out with summer school. If you remember some of my earliest posts, you’ll remember that Teacher Corps has a summer school that they administer in a town about 25 or 30 miles north of Oxford. The summer school essentially serves as a training ground for first year teachers. It is also an opportunity for second year teachers to hone their skills and develop better practices of their own.

One of our blog assignments asked us to think and write about teaching skills we are hoping to practice and improve on this summer. As I think back to the past year, I know that I still have a long way to go to be an effective instructor. I can’t possibly be good at this with only one year of experience. What I would like to improve, though, is developing activities that will push the students to learn and comprehend the subjects while also having fun. I had a couple of instances last year where a student said “why don’t we do more stuff like this?”, as they were both learning and having fun. Unfortunately I didn’t really have a good answer for them. The risk of “fun” activities, is the management of your classroom could go to shambles. Because of the relatively uncontrolled environment, one kid says something to another, and before I can intervene we’ve got arguments and no one is learning. This is honestly why planning fun activities is such a risk. Summer school is a pretty safe venue for experimenting with ideas like this though. Also, because I’m only going to be teaching a couple of times a week, I should have more time to think and brainstorm ideas that I could implement.

As said before, I realize I have a long way to go to be an effective teacher. This summer should be a great opportunity for developing many other skills as well: an effective set in beach volleyball, my driver and #4 iron, the moorhead swag...

A Note to Second Year Teachers

Dear Second Year Teachers,

The first year of teaching is one I never want to repeat or replicate. In it, I have been stretched, strained, and stressed far beyond the point of anything close to comfort. In all the difficulty, though, you have remained a constant source of...well...honesty.

I could say you’ve always been inspirational and motivating, but that would fall short; you were something much more helpful. In a conversation I had with some friends recently, they said, “what is the typical alternate route teacher like in their second year?” to which I was able to reply without hesitation and say, “they’re much more realistic”. Like me, you probably entered the program “bright eyed and bushy tailed”. You probably felt you had a silver bullet to the ailments of the struggling public schools, but reality quickly and humbly brought you back to earth as well. Having gone through this, you could have lied and painted a picture not accurate, but you didn’t. You knew that teaching sucked at times. You also knew that teaching has unmatchable moments. You knew all these things, and you expressed them. For this I thank you.

An overly optimistic and skewed picture would have been cruel. To tell first year teachers of all your successes without your failures and hardships would simply make them feel like failures. I’ve never met anyone who has stepped into a classroom like the one I teach in and immediately succeeded. I don’t even know what success looks like in this circumstance.

The hardship and difficulty you experienced last year, which you honestly conveyed, gave me hope for my own personal development. Development is difficult to track. It is difficult to see take place. People say it is happening, but dealing with the same difficulties for eight months tends to be somewhat taxing and discouraging. Thankfully, though, you are living proof that there is light at the end of the tunnel. That light still seems dim and distant. A year still stands from that light, but again, the proof that you have been lends a certain comfort.

As you move on to whatever it is that you will do next, know that your honesty has been a tremendous help. As I step into the shoes you once filled, I intend to employ the same attitude. Things will continue to be rough in my second year as well. Students will continue to be ornery. Air conditioners will continue to break. The Delta will still be the Delta. What will continue though, is a gift of truth.


BCW

Senior Skip Day

Senior skip day is not an uncommon tradition. It always goes where the entire senior class decides on a day they will all skip school and demonstrate their “invincibility” by all taking a unified day off. When I was in high school, there was a senior skip day. I didn’t observe it, but many did. Like many high school traditions, I thought I had a pretty good understanding of what senior skip day involved, then I moved to the Delta.

My high school takes senior skip day to another level. In following the standard tradition, the seniors clear out as expected. With them, though, they take the majority of the school. It is not an exaggeration to say that there were less than 100 students at school, compared to roughly 650 enrolled.

Knowing that senior skip day was approaching, I asked my classes by show of hands how many weren’t coming. The results showed about half from each class. “That’s fine,” I thought, “I’ll still plan something for the ones who do make it”. Well what I welcomed to class that day was far less than even anticipated. Here’s the layout of students had all day:

1st Period - Enrolled: 18, Attended: 1

2nd Period: Enrolled: 17, Attended: 0

3rd Period: Enrolled: 17, Attended: 2.5 (one left midway through)

4th Period: Enrolled: 16, Attended: 2

5th Period: Enrolled: 13, Attended: 2

6th Period: Enrolled: 23, Attended: 5 + 1 kid from another class

7th Period: Enrolled: 26, Attended: 3 + 1 kid from another class

Now part of this attendance could be a result of the mini-hurricane that took place that morning, but the weather cannot have that much of an effect on attendance numbers. If nothing else, these signs further point to a day in May not too far away!