boys vs the cones

As the faculty advisor of the King's Jr High Spirit Club (very prestigious), I take great delight in planning Spirit Week twice a year. Spirit week includes dress up days and daily competitions, all aimed at winning the coveted Spirit Cup. The highlight of Spirit Week this year was an awesome blackout volleyball competition between the 7th and 8th grade boys. This involved a completey dark gym, black lights, strobe lights, boys dressed in white and lots of glow necklaces.

Because I have 2nd block prep and I have a really hard time saying no to the jr high secretary (because she's my god mother), I got asked to guard the very expensive strobe lights during the boys PE class. Though there were cones protecting each of the lights, we knew that the boys could not be trusted to leave them alone. They were clearly instructed not to get anywhere near them during their warm up run, but of course, they did the following things:

- jumped over the cones
- ran around the cones
- pretended to kick the lights
-shoved each other into the lights and the cones
- punched the cones as they ran by
- aimed hockey pucks directly at the lights

Hypothetically, had it been a girls PE block, do you know what they would have done?

absolutely nothing.

"hope they have an awesome time..."

Every Monday, we have a student lead prayer over the intercom. I am not sure whether they volunteer or are chosen but either way, they are always clearly nervous. While they typically all pray for the same thing (good grades, no injuries during sports, etc) today was the best/worst moment of intercom prayer yet.

When praying for people suffering from the famine in the horn of Africa, an 8th grade boy said the following:

"and for the people in the horn of Africa (insert long awkward pause)...help them to...have an awesome time. yeah, i don't know." {end of prayer}

I felt so bad for this kid but also had to laugh because, wow...

the couch.

So i have a couch in my room that is a pretty hot commodity during "brain break" time. during my 4th block, I have one rather large, sweaty kid who always rushes to sit down on it and interestingly enough, he never has any competition for space.

today, however, was a new story. the large, sweaty boy was laying on the couch and the new korean exchange student decided he wanted to sit there too. large-sweaty wouldn't get up so korean exchange sat down on top of him. there was some wrestling that ensued and then this is what I heard:

random 8th grade boy: "large sweaty (of course he used his name) is flirting with the new kid"

large sweaty: "no i'm not, he's just sitting on my head."

what. the. heck.

and also, the economy.

Today I had the last of my current event presentations. Students were told they would receive extra credit if they could explain how their article was related to something we learned in Geography. Essentially all they had to do was make some sort of critical thinking inference, really not that hard.

The last girl to present asked if she would get points if she could "make something up" as she did her presentation. I told her I would give her points if what she said made sense.

Her article was about an injured Iraq war veteran. She read a very articulate summary about life after a traumatic injury and making the choice to stay positive. She then proceeded to make her attempt at the extra credit question. It started out great:

"This article shows how war can have a very serious impact on people living both inside and outside the country. This guy got hurt really bad defending people from a bad leader."

She should have stopped there. Instead she ended with...

"and also, the economy."

That was it. No explanation about how it impacts the economy, just "and also, the economy."

8th grade boys are...

...bad liars.

...interesting dressers.

...a variety of heights and weights.

...not worth dating (by 8th grade girls, not me. I am not Mary Kay...)

...often stinky.

and finally...

...full of farts.

Double Sided is Hard

I am always amazed at the reasons my students have for not completing their homework. Take this gem from yesterday:

Student: "Mrs. Haslam, you didn't give me the crossword puzzle."
Me: "It's on the back of your worksheet, did you check?"
Student: "Yeah, I looked. It's not there."
Me: "check again."
Student: "oh, there it is."

as my dad would say, "strive me gength"

Lavatory

One of my favorite students, whose identity I shall protect by calling him "C.S. Lewis", is a Korean exchange student who speaks with a British accent and dresses like a 50 yr old in the early 20's (thus his nickname). He is brilliant and way too smart for his age. He is also incredibly lazy.

When I had him last year, I got so tired of his excessive "lavatory" use, that I told him he could go twice and week. I am not against student bathroom use. I am against students using the excuse of a bathroom break to simply wander the halls because they don't want to be in class. This was what CS was doing which was why I restricted him.

I have CS again this quarter in Washington State History. On Monday, he asked to use the lavatory (this is what he calls it b/c of his english training by a Brit) and as soon as he left, the following conversation occured:

friends of CS: "Can we all leave the classroom so it's empty when he comes back?"
me: " sure, go stand outside and peer in the windows"
(mass exodus of 25 kids)

upon his return, CS: "what is going on here, where is everyone?"
me: "i don't know what you are talking about."
CS: "i can see them looking in the windows."

His classmates return, we all have a good laugh. CS walks over to my desk and said "Mrs. Haslam, that had to be one of the worst pranks ever."

Dumb Question

Student: "Mrs. Haslam, what section are we reading tomorrow?"
Me (thinking I'd inspired a love of Geography and this person wants to learn all they can): "Why?"
Student: "Because I want to know where to leave this note for whoever sits here."
Me: "Seriously, did you just ask me that?"
Student: "huh?"
Me: "do you think I think it's a good idea for you to leave notes for you friends to read during class?"
Student: "oh."

Jr High Fashion

observed: December 2011...

For those of you who missed it on Facebook a few weeks ago, I wrote that one of my favorite parts of teaching junior highers is that "in a sea of Juicy, Uggs and Citizen jeans, there will always be someone wearing sweatpants and dress shoes"

The Worm and Blind Justice

My third year of teaching was my first year of teaching single gender classes. I really loved having only one gender at a time, partially because I think I got to see my *real* students and not some semi-fake version meant to impress the other gender (which is funny because how impressive can a 7th grade boy really be?!) While I really enjoyed my girls classes, the boys classes were a source of constant entertainment (and frustration):

- after losing participation points for the whole class because he could not keep his mouth shut, I told a student he could earn those points back by doing something to entertain me. He offered to do the worm and I accepted. It was amazing.

- three boys in the back of the room could not keep their hands of the blinds. It was more annoying than anything else so I kept telling them to knock it off just because it bugged me. One of these boys started hitting the other two every time they tried to touch the blinds so I asked him what he was doing. He said he was offering "blind justice" and it was his duty to protect the blinds. A few days later he was back to touching the blinds and he informed me that "blind justice" had retired. On the last day of school, he drew a picture of himself as a sheriff with a "blind justice" badge on and stuck it to the window.

- one of my boys figured out that I really liked the tv show The Office. He decided from that moment on he was going to pretend to be Dwight and insisted that I call him by that name. I cannot tell you how many times I called on him to answer a homework question and he proceeded to tell me all he knew about "bears and beets" in his best Dwight voice.

- one of my favorite (yes, we all have favorites) boys decided about halfway through the year that he was a ninja. When he didn't know an answer on a test, he'd write "ninja". He was a hurdler in track and on the back of a quiz, he drew a ninja jumping over a hurdle. He asked if I would call him "grasshopper" instead of by his name and of course I said yes.

- my first semester of boys got to see my pregnant belly grow from hardly visible to being so big I was accidently erasing the white board. Upon my first visit back to school after having Micah, one of these boys told me "I'd really slimmed down."

Given that my husband would probably have done any or all of the above when he was in junior high, I like to think these boys are preparing me for stuff my son will try to pull in the future!

Top 5 Comments

My pregnancy seems to have shortened my patience just a bit...and so in that light, I thought I'd share the Top 4 "Things I Maybe Shouldn't Have Said" to students recently.

4. "Congratulations, that took 4 minutes." This is for a kid who goes to the bathroom every single day and spends FOREVER in there. He either has a really bad gastrointestinal issue or he is wasting time. Today I took out my iPod and timed him since I'm putting my money on wasting time.

3. "Student A...do you have a crush on student B?" (both boys) Student A responds with enthusiasm "NO!" to which I say "then STOP staring at him constantly!"

2. "If you two cannot stop talking to each other and wasting my time, I will tape you to the floor on opposite sides of the room."

1. "If you do not stop looking out the window at the snow, I WILL tape your eyes shut."

Baby Talk

There is quite a buzz around school now that the word is out that we're expecting. Apart from the constant name suggestions, a couple comments stand out as so funny/random that I feel they need to be shared:

Student 1: "You should name it Martin Luther King Jr."
Student 2: "um considering how famous he was, that would be...like...plagarism."
Forget about the racially offensive nature of naming a white baby after one of the greatest African American leaders of all time...this kid is just worried about plagarism. and that doesn't even make sense!

From one of the students in the previous conversation..."when it's born, you should put a beanie and glasses on it and send the picture to the whole school." what? WHY?

and my favorite from today:

"Can I be the baby's step dad?"

What this boy meant to say was "god-father" but instead said step dad and upon explaning that the only way that could happen was if we got married, he looked mortified while his friends made fun of him as only 8th grade boys can. I walked away laughing and immediately started this post.

People = Pollution

We were talking in class today about the impact of overpopulation and I brought up that one of the problems caused by this tends to be an increase in pollution. While this probably spurred some critical thinking in most students, the only one who said anything out loud said the following:

"more people, more farts"

This is funny/wrong for so many reasons. As if human farts actually contribute to air pollution. As if a boy should say this in a class with his female teacher! As if this should EVER be said out loud in class!

After my classic "that's inappropriate" comment and painfully long teacher stare, I had to turn around and laugh to myself.

more farts. geeze.

The Difference Between Boys and Girls

I'm back and I promise to try to be more regular in my blogging. I am sure I will have no shortage of funny stories with this bunch of students!

Beyond the obvious body part differences between boys and girls, I've discovered in the last two weeks of teaching single gender classes, that boys and girls are different in almost every way. I feel as though I can best express this through the responses I got upon announcing I was 3 months pregnant.

1st block girls class- After a big lead in, I say "I'm going to have a baby" and they scream, clap, a few even jumped out of their seats. Each then proceeds to tell me I should name the baby after them. I laugh to myself thinking how some names I've liked in years previous are now forever off limits to me because I'd be afraid my kid might turn out those students.

2nd block boys class- After NO lead in, I say "I'm pregnant" and they are silent except for one boy who asks if I'd been craving pickles and ice cream.

8th grade girls lunch table- After yet another dramatic lead in, I annouce the upcoming real baby (I say real baby because these girls had me give birth to a pretend baby named Willis last year) and the girls scream, freak out, jump up and hug me. Word travels to the other two tables full of 8th grade girls and a similar scene occurs.

8th grade boys lunch table- Upon hearing all the screaming and fan fare, the nearest boys table asks what the commotion is about. I say "I'm having a baby" and the boys response? "oh, neat."

Sack of what?

In Washington State History, my students are hard at work (or hardly working depending on the kid) on their explorer biography project. Today's assignment was to show me their rough draft since it's due tomorrow. As I was checking I came upon my student who might possibly be the world's worst speller. Even knowing this, I found it absolutely impossible not to laugh at what was written on his paper. In an effort to spell Sacajawea, he wrote the following:

Sack-of-jewea

I kid you not this was what was on his paper. I started laughing, he started passing his paper around to show his friends so I wrote his spelling up on the board so we could all enjoy it together. It was a good thing.

Really? Really.

I appreciate a student's right to question their teacher. I actually even encourage it because I want students to learn to challenge things and formulate their own beliefs. I would say these two things are true of every single student in every class I've had so far except for one. We are not even three weeks into the 2nd semester and I've got one student who at least once a day tells me that I'm wrong...only to have herself proved wrong every time. Today was the last straw for me. Maybe it's the fact that she combines telling me I'm wrong without raising her hand. I might be more willing to hear her comments if she raised her hand first...or really I'd just pretend I didn't see her hand raised and never hear her comments ever again. I already moved her to the back of the room so her incorrect comments were from farther away. Sadly that did not make a difference. Here's how it went down today:

Teacher: "You find population density by dividing total population by total land area"

Student (w/o raised hand): "that's wrong, it's the other way around"

Teacher: (giving her the benefit of the doubt cause I was sick today and could have been off my game) "well I don't think so but why don't we just check"

Teacher: (after referencing the textbook, said with a serious frustrated tone) "actually you're wrong."

Student: (who responds this way EVERY time): "oh."

Now that may not have been the most diplomatic way of handling it BUT I didn't feel good and I am so over this.

That's What the Book Said

My newest pet peeve after having this bunch of students for one week:

"that's what it said in the book" in response to my telling them they had the wrong answer. That seems to be the general comeback of this group. As if saying "that's what it said the book" somehow makes a wrong answer right. As if I am going to say "oh ok, I am not familiar with what it says in the book." As if I don't basically know the book by heart now. My response to this is usually something like "show me where it said that" and it's amazing how no one can ever find their proof.

today M (the name has been changed to protect how much she bugs me) insisted that she couldn't find one of her definitions. "It wasn't in the chapter or the glossary" she said. I said "how much will you give me if I can find it in 2 seconds..." and then turned right to it (both in the chapter and the glossary mind you). she mumbled something as she walked away but I think she got the point.

Parent Night

Yesterday evening was one of the highlights of my year: Parent Information Night a.k.a Back to School night. Last year this night was approached fear and trepidation because I felt the need to "prove myself" being a first year teacher who barely looks old enough to drive a car. This year I felt much more confident, especially last night since it was the second PIN of the year. I thought it best to reflect on my fourth PIN of my teaching career and share some highlights with my vast readership:

- first comment of the night was literally "yeah, my daughter told me you would be young" to which I laughed and then felt like I was going to be carded.

- I had the pleasure of having the mom I shall deem "stinky face" twice since I have her daughter for both Geography and Washington State. "stinky face" looked like she either wanted to barf or kill me, I am not sure which one. Both of her questions made it very clear she is going to be my helicopter parent of the semester.

- crackberry dad didn't put down his cell phone for the entire 15 mins. it took all of my strength not to make a joke about how cell phones are not allowed in the junior high. I didn't but now I wish I had.

- the mom of the kid who I have already kicked out twice for talking (in four days) chatted my ear off, I wonder where he gets it?

and for my favorite highlight: one of my co-workers, who shall remain nameless, mircowaved fish for dinner in the teachers lounge before PIN leaving the entire building smelling like...well you can imagine.

James Bond

Today's WSH daily activity was to design a WA state flag. Only rules were "it needs to be in color and it needs to connect to either Washington's past or present. As you can guess, I got a lost of flag's with apples and trees. Salmon galore and the occasional Space Needle. What I wasn't anticipating was the following that can really only be described through the conversation I had:

Student: "Here's my flag"

Me: Looking at the helicopter and mountain on fire "Can you explain this to me?"

Student: "Sure, that's James Bond and he's chasing that bad guy who set the mountain on fire."

Me: "and what does this have to do with Washington State?"

Student: "nothing."

Me: "ok. well. you can either take this assignment seriously and do it over OR you can turn this in and see what happens."

Student: "i think i'll do it over."

His second edition work of art had a train on it with the following in the smoke cloud: "Washington Is Cool."

Creativity is Key

Today students turned in their fifth portion of their Washington State History Settlement Project. The only criteria for today's assignment was that students had to write three different journal entries about the unfortunate deaths of members on their Oregon Trail journey. One creative student decided to forget about the value of historical accuracy and wrote the following:

"Recently Pocahontas and Sacajawea got into a huge fight over which way to go. Pocahontas wanted to go Southwest but Sacajawea wanted to go Northwest. They started arguing but then Sacajawea grabbed a knife and pinned Pocahontas and Mom tried to pull her off but she cut Mom. Older Brother came by and saw the gash on Mom's arm and saw Sacajawea on top of Pocahontas (which I think he loves) and shot Sacajawea. She died before dinner from the wound. We are now caring for her baby."