We Know Drama

So I guess in this school system, there are something like 60% of teachers that aren't certified. I know that sounds crazy and alarming, but many of them have been teaching for a long time before No Child Left Behind, and they haven't done the things to "update" their certification..or whatever. Anyway, yeah, I'm the most certified teacher in my school. What.
Well, earlier this year, letters went out with the gist of, "Get yourself certified!"
Nobody is beating down the door to be a teacher here, so nobody thought they had to worry about their job.
Well, everybody got fired. Seriously, we lost like 10 teachers at my school alone. It SUCKS. I understand that teachers need to be certified, and I can definitely go on my "being a good test-taker doesn't make you a good teacher" rant...but that won't help! This isn't a theoretical discussion about teachers...this is my life next year and it's going to be horrendous! The teachers that got fired are ones that have been around awhile and can keep their kids in line. Most of our certified teachers are people like I was 3 years ago..brand new. Or they are teachers that have been recruited from foreign countries. These guys are geniuses and probably amazing teachers..but they never get the chance because their kids scream at them all day. They have zero classroom management abilities and the rest of us have to spend the day cleaning up their messes. This place isn't for everybody and if you get chairs thrown at you, maybe its time to leave!
Insanity.

Oh, and the standardized test scores came back. We did horrible. Who is surprised?

Not School, but Still Funny

I went on a mission trip this summer. We were in Nashville, TN playing with kids one day.

I'm coloring with some kids when JaBazz (yeah...) comes up to me. He's six years old. "I need you to color a picture for me to give to my girlfriend. I want it to say my name."

"Okay, what's her name?"

"dunno."

"What's her favorite color?"

"dunno...that's her." He then points to a girl who's about 17 that came with me. Her name is Laurel. I draw the picture, then I have to stand by her as he reaches around from behind me to give her the picture. She never sees his face, and he runs off.

An hour later, he comes back to me. "I need two more pictures, I got two more girlfriends."
He runs off again.

Quite some time later, he runs up to me in the gym. "Heather, I been lookin' for you ever'where! It's my woman...she's two-timin' me!"

"I'm sorry JaBazz. That's too bad." He then tells me I have to go outside with him and see her. We go outside and there is Laurel talking to some other six year old.

"Look at him! I HATE him!"

"I'm sorry JaBazz, but I don't know what to tell you. This seems like a man problem."

"Well I don't know no mans!"

"Okay, well, there's Chris. We can go talk to him about it." JaBazz and I sit on the picnic table. "Hey Chris...I got a man problem. My woman's two-timin' me!"

Chris: "err..uh..what? Do you, uh, want me to talk to her for you?"

JaBazz climbs under the table. "yes please."

He calls Laurel over. She listens to Chris and has to pretend she doesn't know JaBazz is hiding under the table. "Well, gosh, I hope he forgives me! I feel so bad. Do you think he'll forgive me?"

From under the table: "okay. I will!"

Tales from 6th Grade Camp

Us poor schools get shipped up to northern Maryland every year for a free camp. It kind of sucks for me, but I love seeing my kids there.
My favorite memory:

• Bad little Montrell standing in a creek bed cradling his shirt that he has filled with frogs. And the same boy sitting bleary-eyed at the breakfast table the next morning telling me, "Well, our counselor wouldn't let us go to bed until we caught all 14 frogs that got loose in the cabin."

And then, quite possibly one of my most awesome teacher moments:

• We were called over the walkie-talkie that RonniAndre had cursed out his counselor and somebody needed to deal with it. He was told to sit by himself at dinner. While he's sitting at the table, he keeps moving around and trying to draw attention to himself. I walk over to him and say, "Little boy, you better sit down, shut your mouth and eat your food or I will tell every girl in this camp that you pee the bed." He looks at me shocked. "But I don't!" and I say, "Well, who are they gonna believe?" So he starts pouting and shoving in french fries. "FINE!" Well, a few minutes later he starts getting all silly again. So I say, "Hey, Lindsey, Come here." Lindsey walks over to me. "Lindsey, I want you to point at RonniAndre over there and laugh." She looks confused and does it anyway.

RonniAndre was good for the rest of the trip. :)

The Classics

Well, since school is out, there is no mayhem to document here on the blog. So I decided that whenever one of my old stories comes back to me, I'll write it here as a way to keep everyone entertained, as well as let it live forever in internet history. There's a reason I started this blog: two years of ridiculousness that I'm pretty sure I would think was a figment of my imagination 20 years from now.

Here's one:

(While the kids were doing a word search):

"Ms. Vinson, is Bender a word?"

"What? Use it in a sentence."

"Err..Okay." (long contemplative pause) "I don't want to go there, 'cause I already ben der."

Clowns, Tigers and Jesus, Oh, My!

Again with the end of the year activities. On this lovely day it was the circus. Not just your regular circus, no no. The SOUL circus. That's what it's called. I swear.
We strolled in an hour late ('cause that's how all the real gangstas do....or because our buses were late and our principal had to give the kids a nice little raging monologue before they left and then we got lost going across town.) Someone was in our seats. We stood in front of other people for 10 minutes. We got into our seats just in time for....intermission. yaaay.
Then there were some cool acrobat-y people and little Chinese men that jumped around all crazy. After that, they put up the rickiest looking "cage" I have ever seen in my life and I spent the next 20 minutes determining which tiger was going to kill me first, what were possible escapes from this tent in a parking lot and which children would I be willing to throw in front of me to distract Mr. Tiger.
Then those people that swing from scarves on the ceiling came out, and they were great. A couple of other things that were pretty entertaining for a circus.
AND THEN
some loud music....wait, is that gospel music? Yes, yes it is. The "Ringmaster" said, "It's time for us to get back to our roots....the church." Then these mimes come out and do a mime of the gospel song that is playing. What?
I mean, I'm all about some converting the heathens and whatnot, but who's idea was it to hype up some kids on funnel cakes and death defying stunts and then randomly throw in the soul-saving?
OH. SOUL CIRCUS. I get it now.

The Loves of My Life

Dance, Dance

Today we went on one of our many end-of-the-year field trips. This time it was to the skating rink. We took about 80 kids. In case anyone was wondering, the skating rink is EXACTLY THE SAME as it was whenever you were there last. All skating rinks across America are basically identical, as are the children and situations that go on inside. Middle school kids going around in circles and working really incredibly hard at being cool, some succeeding more than others.

The only thing different from the ghetto skating rink and your normal one is what happened about an hour before we left. A huge group of kids had circled up, and some were yelling. At school, this usually indicates a fight. But for those of us who have chaperoned a dance, or basically any time free time, it was as expected: a dance-off. The dance-off consists of everyone standing in a circle, with two people on the inside "battling." The crowd decides who does better, and the one who lost goes back into the circle and someone else comes to battle the winner.

The DJ had realized that everyone was leaving the rink to go watch the dance-off, so he got in on the action. They cleared the floor and proceeded to have the dance-off in the middle of the rink, with the whole crowd standing around deciding who won.

Even after all this time in the ghetto, I've never seen something that was basically a scene out of Step Up. It was amazing.

Today they found kids in the ceiling.

Monopoly Outtakes

Rolling the dice:
"Sweet, seven."
"That's eight, boy. Stay in school."

"So, Baltic is like the ghetto."
"yeah, and you the slumlord, yo."

"Why my house gotta be by the train? I can't get NO sleep."



more to come...

Don't Make Me Go Crazy White Girl On You

So we went to the amusement park. It was pretty awesome. I also got the admiration of all the other teachers with the following encounter:

It was Math & Science Day, so there were tons of school kids there. Tons of Baltimore City school kids. Kids that like to break in line for the rides and cuss out innocent bystanders. There were 3 boys who were in front of us, and they decided it would be okay to let 10 of their friends up there too.

Um, no.

We were in the zig-zag of the line, and as the "leader" passed me. I stuck my hand out.

"Hello, how are you?"

"Uh, fine?"

"Okay, good. We're going to be needing to get in front of you."

"What?"

"Yeah, you're whole group here? You got in front of us, we get in front of you. Cool? Great."

I climbed under the bar and motioned for the other teachers. To which I hear:

"SHIT! Vinson is GANGSTA."

The funny part? by the time we got to the ride, I knew all their names and we got along great. I saw some of them later and they waved and called out to me. I love kids.