Just What We Need

So the company that took us over has these people who randomly come in and meet with us to tell us how horrible we are. A good time is had by all.
Last week, the woman in charge of School Climate (who lives in Texas) flew in for a day to tell us this: "We're just not having enough fun here! And that's our goal, right? To have fun!" Well, besides the fact that no, that is not our goal...how would she even know anyway? And one of the many problems with this "goal" is that children and adults have waaaay different definitions of "fun." I actually think the kids are having a blast: no consequences, running around doing whatever they want, not having to do any classwork...sounds like a party to me.
Anyways, I don't even want to dedicate an entire blog post to this woman because I don't want to validate her ridiculousness. The point of this post is this:

(Also, my beautiful reader(s), this is secret information!)

Apparently New Principal (the one who showed up after Thanksgiving, keep up people!), got a FOUR PAGE MEMO from the Turnaround Director chastising her for what she is doing as a principal. Now, this memo was received before Christmas, so she had been principal (for the first time ever) for a grand total of three weeks before getting a FOUR PAGE MEMO. The secretary overheard her saying that she understands what the previous principal had been complaining about.

So, we get an email from the Fun Is The Goal Lady saying that we are going to re-teach these lessons she gave us earlier in the year about behavior. (Lesson #1: Attendance is Important!) There's like a song and a chant and some other B.S. (sidenote: how stupid does she think these kids are...reteach the EXACT SAME LESSON?) So we get the email last Wednesday saying to teach these blahblah lessons this week.

TODAY we get a memo from New Principal stating that CLASS TIME IS FOR CONTENT RELATED MATERIAL AND NOT BEHAVIORAL LESSONS.

So, to give you an update on my mood, I am SO PSYCHED that my principal and the company that is in charge of our school are going to wage a petty email/memo war instead of ACTUALLY HELPING OUR SCHOOL. Thanks so much guys, this is what they pay you the big bucks for.

Overheard

Today while working on their maps, Robert to Darrell, Jordan and Glen:

"When I grow up I'm going to have one boy and one girl. I'm going to name them Madagascar and Glory."


I kindof want to name my kid Madagascar now.

Chalkboard Watch '11

Update: I still don't have one.

This Is Me Following Directions

The social worker once told me that her first year at our school she was completely overwhelmed. She called the central office several times telling them that she needed another social worker at the school to help carry the load. She kept telling them there were simply too many children for just one social worker. They sent three people---three people to teach her how to better manage her time.
We just got ANOTHER new administrator. Now, we have a principal, a resident principal (like an intern), and 3 assistant principals. I still have 30+ kids in my classes BY THE WAY. I don't need more people telling me how to do my job, I need more people who are actually ALSO doing my job.
This is especially bothering me because it's not like these 90393438 administrators are actually helping anything. The one that's been assigned to the 6th grade...he just tells me "write it down" whenever I say anything.
"Tyquan is trying to incite a riot."....."*sigh* write it down."
After like, the 8th time of "write it down" I finally said, WHAT WHY. "Miss Vinson, anecdotal records....you need them." Right, Right. So I can take them to the meetings where no one listens to me? Or so I can...fail him?....at the end of the school year? I swear I could be like, "Daquan just killed someone!" and he would, "*sigh* write it down..." as he was walking in the other direction.
So anyway, here I am. Writing it down.

Presented Without Comment

I just got a new student named Raquan.

He asked me if I knew his brother. I do know his brother. I taught him last year. His name is Raekwon.

2011

So, in a rare moment of awesomeness, my principal let me leave for Christmas break 2 days early. I promised to have my room all moved and I got other teachers to cover my classes. I drove 13 hours with my brother and an hour after I got into town, I drove 2 more hours with my best friend to go see the best concert of my entire life.

While I was home, I thought that I should probably come back here a little early and really set my classroom up right. Then I thought, "wait, these clowns can't even give me a chalkboard. Why would I waste my vacation time setting up my classroom?" So I didn't.

My room looked like ass all day and even though I stayed until 5pm today, there's still a lot of work to do. They say maybe I'll have a chalkboard by the end of next week.

Things actually went rather smoothly today, considering it's the first day back and at 7:45 none of the children knew where they were supposed to be. I got about 25 new kids incorporated into the classes I already have and nobody was a jerk. mission accomplished.

Two weird things today though:

1. I have been teaching with the same woman for my entire 6 years. I remember walking past her classroom in awe my first year. How do they sit so quietly? Is he actually doing classwork?! Why is no one cursing? I thought she had like, magical powers or something. It was really weird today to walk into her room and see the exact same group of kids who had just sat quietly like angels in my classroom acting like lunatics in hers.

2. Some charity something or other that is affiliated with my school gives out holiday meals to some of the families at school. I left on Tuesday, December 21st. They gave out the Turkey and Trimmings on Thursday, December 23rd. Today, January 3rd, there was a formerly frozen, now rotten, turkey sitting in my classroom. It smelled up the whole school. GROSS.