Education Turmoil

For the better part of this school year, the majority of my workload has been focused on lesson planning for the Biology long term sub.  (I am certified in Earth & Space science and have taught both Earth/Space science and Environmental science.)  I am pretty much winging it when it comes to lesson planning for this class.  I have NO prior knowledge as to where students struggle the most and where they need the most help in.  I can hazard a guess, but it can be hit or miss.    The long term sub has absolutely NO background in science. 

So, I have begged and pleaded with the administration to give me one of two things; 1) someone who is biology certified (hell, I'd just take a science minded person right now) or 2) someone who has strong classroom management skills.  Give me one, and I'll help as much as I can with the other. 

I have been told on MANY occasions that there are two whole pages of people who are certified in biology and would be willing to do a long term sub position.  Here we are, almost the end of February, and we still have the same sub in that biology class!  I am BEYOND frustrated!  We are doing those students a huge disservice by leaving them in that situation.  I can understand if there was no one available, but there are two whole freaking pages of people who are available! 

Sometimes I wonder why people are so down on teachers and so negative and willing to teacher bash.  I usually just brush it aside because most people have no clue what goes on in a classroom and would not last one day doing the job of a teacher.  But, when something like this, something preventable happens?  I stop wondering and join in on the bashing.

Love Stinks

I am not all about only showing love and appreciation one day of the week, but I do love any excuse to buy gifts for the people I love.  I mostly focus on my kids, of course, because I want them to have happy memories and constant reminders of how much I love them.  I don't think I go over board, they got sesame street socks ($1), a few pieces of candy, and a book.  I also got Kaitlyn some Valentines Day granola bars to share with her daycare class; they had their Valentines party the previous Friday and I handmade all the kids Valentines.

I bought my parents some flowers just to say thank you for always being so good to us.  They have done so much for us, especially when it came to buying our house.  I just wanted to say thank you because I know my brother and sister are at that point in their lives where the world revolves around each of them and they might not even get a text from either.  (My brother did send out a mass text to everyone in the family so he's getting there.)

I got Jerry a six pack of Sam Adams 5 hop beer.  He's a connoisseur and loves to try new beers.  He DVR's Brewmasters and is fascinated with the owner of that brewery.  I also planned on cooking a nice dinner complete with a chocolaty dessert.  Two weeks earlier he got me my favorite candy because we were at the mall and saw the kiosk.  (It was See's, which is the best chocolate in the world, and you can't get it in Florida on the regular.)

Want to know what else I got for Valentines Day?  Nada, zip, nothing.  I didn't get a "Happy Valentines Day" not even an "I love you."  He didn't even cheat and get me a card from the kids.  I didn't get a thank you for dinner or dessert.  He didn't notice that there were zero toys laying on the floor, which is a miracle in itself.  I even had to do the dishes after dinner all while Jerry yelled at me to move Tyler out of the way so he could teach Kaitlyn how to dribble a basketball.  (She was NOT having any of it, BTW.) 

To say I feel unappreciated and hurt is a huge understatement.  It really makes me wonder if it's all worth it sometimes.

6 out of 7

So with the sub I decided that genetics is just too hard a subject for the sub, who has no science background, to teach and way too hard for students to figure out on their own.  I felt like they needed a solid foundation and I was going to (hopefully) give it to them.  I decided to go into the classroom for one day and teach.  I have been out of the classroom for almost two years now being a science coach.  I was a bit nervous because I'm not used to going into a classroom cold and I always hated covering other people's classes because the majority of the time I didn't know most of the kids.  I love teaching my own students because I know their quirks and how to get them to work, but that takes A LOT of work and a lot of time building a rapport with the students.  Let me just say that I survived, but could not do it on a daily basis.  I lost my voice after only one day.  I guess my "teacher" voice is out of practice which is odd because I'm not a quiet person.  Of course a "teacher" voice is a little different because sometimes you have to project your voice so that the students in the back of the class can hear you.  (I normally walk around the class when I talk, but I was using an overhead and it was at the front of the class so I couldn't really move.) 
I had to do this 6 different times with a short break after 5th period and a planning period during 6th period.  I am NOT used to teaching 6 classes in the same day.  I'm spoiled and came from a school who was on a block schedule so I taught four classes at the most in any given day.  With a block schedule, you have longer periods; 90 minutes as opposed to 50.  You get a lot more done this way and you can have the students do a variety of things in one class period.  It can get exhausting with so many transitions, but at least you don't feel like you have to rush through everything because you only have 50 minutes.  If there is a disruption, it's not big deal because you have a lot of time.  With 50 minutes, you really can't afford disruptions.  You can't even really afford questions from the kids, which is sad because they were asking some really good questions.  I had them write their questions down and turn them in so I could hopefully answer them later.  Anyway, if I can't find something else at the district office or continue coaching, then I'm going to have to apply to a school who uses a block schedule.  Not too many do, so I'm hoping to probably go back to my old school who still uses it.  Fingers crossed!

Blame it on...ME

So, the hubs got locked out of the house today by Kaitlyn.  He apparently leaves the kids in the house and loads up his work stuff and daycare stuff into the car.  BTW, Kaitlyn is 3 and Tyler is 1.  Kaitlyn decided it would be a good idea to latch the sliding lock, the kind of lock you find on public bathroom doors, while he was taking things to the car and she couldn't figure out how to get it unlocked.  He tried to come in through the front door, but again, the bar on that door was locked as well.  We have a security bar on our slider so there is no way in hell that he will be coming in through the slider.  I guess he resorted to taking the hinges off the door, but even then he couldn't manage to get the door opened.  Finally after 30 minutes and before he decided to break the door, Kaitlyn figured out how to unlock the door.  I'm sure she got in big trouble and he's going to drive the point of never touching the door or lock for the next month because that's how he rolls.  He calls me and tells me what happened.  Then, get this, he blames...ME!  Yes, it's my fault that he got locked out of the house!  Because I locked the latch on the front door at night, so no one can break into our house while we sleep, and I didn't unlatch it in the morning before I left for work (which I NEVER do) he got locked out of the house.  Not that he made a bad decision to load stuff into the car first instead of children, not that he should unlatch the door while he's letting the dog out, not that he should have had this talk with Kaitlyn about not touching the door or locks, but because I didn't unlatch the door.  Ok, from now on I'll unlatch the door, along with my bazillion other things I have to do because he doesn't pull his weight around the house, so he doesn't get locked out of the house ever again.

Nuts!

This new substitute is driving me nuts!  He knocks on my door at LEAST 3 times a day.  Usually he asks me the same questions over and over, like duh, it's not that hard dude.  I had to explain to him 5 times how to grade the tests and he still didn't get it until I actually graded one for him.  He was like "isn't there an easier way?"  I wanted to scream "how much easier do you want me to make it?"  Seriously?  He just asked me today about scissors and not having enough.  I told him to look for the scissors and if he couldn't find them to let me know ASAP so I could speak with the other sub to see where they are.  Of course he doesn't let me know till the day he needs them and how much help can I really be when you give me NO advance warning.  I give you lesson plans AND make copies for you AND even hand write answer keys a week in advance and you can't even give me a day warning that you'll be needing supplies????  WTF?

The students will be starting genetics and I have little confidence that he will do the pre-planning necessary to be able to help the students out.  I will be going above and beyond and will go in for two days to teach them genetics.  Now, if anyone knows is familiar, it's going to take A LOT more than two days to teach genetics, but I want to give them a good foundation and hopefully the sub can keep them above water the rest of the time.  I don't even want to think about DNA and RNA right now because my head might explode if I do.  (I am hoping beyond hope that we will have a certified person in class by then.)  I'm going to make it a little fun using a Sponge Bob genetics lab that I found online to make it a little less daunting for the students.  They always like the Sponge Bob worksheets I use at the beginning of the year to talk about Experimental Design so I'm sure they'll love the genetics stuff.

Argh, I just want someone in the class that knows what they are doing so these kids can stop suffering.