Speaking of Bad Parenting

This entry is related to the last entry (SAW 5), and is dedicated to everyone I know that works in education.

Today was a horrible day. I have two classes back-to-back of kids who refuse to care and it makes me not care. You want to be shitheads in my class? Fine. Be shitheads, but you're going to the office. Get out of my room.

The first group is three sixth graders. One of them is a good girl. She does what she is supposed to. She is quiet. She is respectful. She is a little odd, but not obviously so. I like her. The other two kids? Well, they went to the same elementary and they seem to think that they run the show. One of them was trying to tell me that her friend's mom got a teacher fired. She said this because I had told them that they would not be rewarded with a fun activity on Friday if they didn't do work today. So I turn to her and ask if she was threatening me. And then told her that if she was, she would need to explain that to the principal because that was not allowed. She got mad and all 6th grade attitude with me. I don't care.

The other student, a boy, was imitating everything I said. Real mature. He asked if I was ever in a good mood. And seeing as I was having one of my 'wits ends days' I replied, "Yes. But not when you guys are here." I continued to tell them that I couldn't believe the way they were acting for being 6th graders. I have never met such a disrespectful group of students ever in my life. (That's not totally true...there were three shitheads when I worked on the north side of the metro...but they were 8th graders...technicality.)

So the bell finally rings for their class and the next group comes in. Not looking a whole lot better. It's the boy from the first classes brother, and two other boys.

Now like the other group, this group has one worker and two that piss away the entire class period doing absolutely nothing. This is nothing new. These two tend to spend every homework day doing absolutely nothing. But today was different. I was in a bad mood from the class before, and the brother was picking on the other two boys saying everything was stupid. Telling them to "make me" when they would ask him to stop, or not do something. One of the other boys was pretty worked up when the first boy took one of his things, used it and threw it away. I was done. I sent him to the office, stating simply to the principal's secretary, "Attitude".

After that hour, I needed to debrief. I went to the child study secretary who laughed as she said that she didn't know how we dealt with some of the behaviors that we get in our classes. But having thought about it now since the end of the day, I have realized the problem is three-fold.

1. The class sizes (for my room) are so small that the students don't think that classroom etiquette rules apply...I don't even know if they think any rules apply. That's not totally true. The rules apply to everyone else, but not to them.

2. Special Education is a double-edged sword. Some of the students have this learned helplessness and refuse to do anything on their own. Why should they? If they don't get it done, someone will sit down with them to do it? Why have internal motivation?

3. Lack of External motivation. I believe that the kids that are disrespectful in the classroom are not being motivated by anyone at home to do a good job at school. I can't really believe that the parents would encourage this behavior. Take for example the girl that was talking about getting a teacher fired. On what grounds? Not letting you sing and scream in class and actually making you do something? Sorry. Nobody told me when I was in college that my main job as an educator was to let you piss around for 13-18 years and then give you a diploma. My bad.

After today, I wish that we could go into meetings and be truthful with parents. Instead of saying that they child is delightful, I wish we could be honest and say, "Your child is a disrespectful brat." That might stun some parents into doing their job. Lying and telling them that we love their child makes them think that they are doing a good job of raising their children, when in fact, they aren't.

I know, some kids can't help it. But they have a label that covers that (EBD). Unfortunately for the kids I am speaking of today, none of them have that luxury.

SAW 5

So on Friday night, Sonny and I went out for dinner before heading to the theater to see Saw 5. I know, I know. But it's become a tradition. We have gone to see every single one (with the exception of the first one) together.

Anyway, that is not the remarkable part of the story. So we go to the theater and pay and get a Sprite and go sit down and are waiting through the commercials (remember when there weren't commercials at movies?) and we see this family come in. That's right, I said family. There were, three or four adults and two small children: one about 3 or so, and one in 1st or 2nd grade. Seriously.

Now I can't get over this. And in fact I have a hard time focusing on the movie because of these small children at the horror flick. I was certain that once the movie started, the family would realize that it went in the wrong door and actually meant to be next door at Beverly Hills Chihuahua, a more family friendly flick (I would guess), but no. They stayed through the whole thing.

Throughout the movie, I kept waiting for some crying from the kids. But I heard no peeps. At the end of the movie, I turned to look back and the smaller child was sound asleep, and as we were leaving, the older girl was carrying on a normal conversation as if she had just watched some Disney movie. I couldn't believe it.

Then I got pissed. Working in the educational environment, it seems that everything we do, as educators, is wrong. But if, as parents, you choose to piss your responsibility to do a good job raising your children away, then far be it from me to say anything. I was so mad. I texted my sister and she couldn't believe they were there. She texted back, "Can you say therapy?" No kidding. I am still mad even five days removed from the situation.

No Diggity. No Doubt.

For the last few days, I have been doing my best to listen to the actual radio instead of CDs. I am trying to not succumb to being old quite yet...

So anyway, today on my drive home, I was flipping through the radio channels and I hit the button for the top 40 station that I have programmed. I smirk to myself because they are playing Blackstreet's No Diggity. That song came out when I was in early college...that makes the song like 11-12 years old. And I was happy because I knew it. I jammed along and then when Pink's new one followed, I flipped to another station...that's enough trying to be young for today.

I wasn't born to tailgate.

So, Saturday was UND's homecoming. We went up there because it was MEA weekend, and because it was homecoming. Sonny was all gung ho to go and insisted that we go to "the Al" by 11am to do a little tailgating.

I will note here that if you ask me, 11am is plenty early for tailgating. Although, I can remember back when Sonny was just my friend and he would insist on getting there by 9 in the morning. Seriously, dude.

So, we get there and we wander around trying to find the people that we are looking for and we eventually do. But then Sonny needs to go and find some other people that he is supposed to meet up with. I come with him thinking that he knows where these people are. He does not. We wander aimlessly around the tailgating lot and then come back to where we started. I tell him that she call the guy he is looking for and then try to find him.

So he does and we set out again. This time, we find the friends. I guess they were at our wedding, but I don't honestly remember. Anyway, as we are talking to them, I see one of my sorority sisters and my cousin Chris.

We head back to our spot in time to grab a potato (people eat the strangest things at tailgating...I would assume hot dogs and burgers, but there is all kinds of crazy stuff out there...like the baked potato).

And it's during this walk back to the potato that I realize that I don't really need to tailgate. It's not really something I couldn't live without doing. I mean what is it, really? A bunch of people out drinking in the morning claiming it's because they love some sports team? I don't get it. But that's just me.

Day off

So, the past week has been crazy, to say the least. I feel like our family has not spent a night together in forever. Let me explain. Last Wednesday, we had conference prep until 5:30. Afterwards, I went and grabbed a bite to eat and ran a shopping errand because I thought my boys were gone for the evening at a lutefisk feed. They were actually home because Lukin was sick.

Thursday was conferences until 8 pm. Then I came home to a sick husband in addition to a sick kid.

Friday was sort of normal, except for my husband was still sick and so needed to go to bed pretty early.

Saturday, we went out for dinner for Sonny's uncle's retirement party. Then after, Lukin and I went over to the in-laws for cake and coffee, but Sonny did not. He went home and went to bed because he still wasn't well and he had to work in the am.

Sunday was somewhat normal.

Monday had conferences until 8 pm again and Lukin stayed at Grandma and Grandpa's because Sonny still wasn't well. So I came home and slept on the couch because the last thing a sick person needs is someone coming in and flipping through the channels as they try to go to sleep and tossing and turning to find a comfy position.

Tuesday, conferences only went until 6 pm, then I met up with my boys at the in-laws for dinner because some friends of Sonny's aunt, who is visiting, flew in from England. So we all had dinner together. Sonny went home as soon as he was finished and Lukin and I stayed until some time after 8 and then came home and game L-train a bath and put him to bed.

Tonight (Wednesday) was the first night in practically a week where both of us were around to put Lukin to bed. And even though I wasn't technically here at bedtime, due to my election judge class, the boys were waiting for me when I got home. And I have to say, it was nice to put Lukin to bed as a family at least once this week.

P.S. In case any of you were wondering about the entry with the kid with staph. Further testing showed that he was, in fact, negative for staph. Thank goodness.

Weekends

Why is it that the weekends always seem to slip away from us? I only had three things written in my planner for this weekend: dig for some school supplies at my in-laws, have some pants measured so my mother-in-law could hem them, and take my wedding ring in for its 6-month check. I didn't get any of them done. Strangely enough, I was at my in-laws both last night and this evening, so it's not like I didn't have the chance for the first two.

The only problem with the pants thing is that I have six pairs of pants for her to hem. If I give them all to her at once, what will I wear? I hope she can do them in a week's time so I can get them back, and wear them before I am done with this job.

(Okay, okay, it's not like I don't have at least 6 other pairs of pants that I can wear. It's just that they are not my new faves.)

The-icing-on-the-cake of days

So, yesterday was a tip-top day (detect dripping sarcasm). It started out okay enough. But things quickly went sour as I went into my first class to find out that my 3rd hour class was going to have a parent observer. Great. Not only was I not ready for that class, but now I was going to have a parent watching.

2nd hour I am scrambling trying to get something together for the 3rd hour. Suddenly, the fire alarm goes off. Normally, I wouldn't care. But I had less than 30 minutes to crank out some fantastic lesson plan (because I had totally scrapped the lesson I had planned at the beginning of the week due to how difficult it was), along with some one-on-one work for, you guessed it, the student that had the parent observing.

Period 3 arrives and I head to class. It's usually warm in the this classroom, but it feels like it's boiling with me in front of the whole class and mom sitting in waiting. So I am greeting each of the students individually to begin. This is what I do at the beginning of every class, and I don't care if the mom likes it or not.

So I am waiting for one of the students to reply. Some are verbal, some are not. I am waiting at on a student that can at least say 'hi' and 'good' to answer how he is doing. Anyway. So I am waiting for the student to reply and he is touching my hand. And he is looking at it, and turning it over and studying it. The PSA beside him is telling him to keep his hands to himself. I don't mind because he is looking at me and I assume he is processing and will say 'hi' soon. The PSA repeats that he should keep his hands to himself. He doesn't. He is studying my fingernails now. They are shiny. He puts his fingernail under mine and pushes it. You know that feeling. It frickin' hurt and I jumped back and said, "oww", and continued on.

Then I went to get something off the pile of stuff I had brought and look down to realize that I am bleeding. Great. Mom is watching and I am bleeding. Class stalls while I get a bandaid from the teacher so I can continue teaching without having to take care of my wound. Class continues. When it is time for the one-on-one service, Mom doesn't like the activity. She says he is already good at that. Great.

Period 3 eventually ends and I head to period 4. At the end of period 4, I leave a few minutes early and head to the school nurse. She asks if I washed the wound at all, which I haven't because I have been in class. So I wash it. Then she puts peroxide and bacytracin on it. She asks me to fill out an incident report, and then I go about the rest of my day.

After school, we have conferences. Yay. The first one happens to be for the kid that injured me. Mom tells us that the student will not be in school on Friday because "he just tested positive for Staph infection, like MRSA". Are you effin kidding me?!? I don't mention what her son did because she is worried already that he is the worst student in the class. I think the incident was accidental so I don't want to tell her that.

I leave that conference and continue on for the rest of the evening. I didn't have any tough questions that I couldn't answer, and I managed to get to at least 2 of 3, or 3 of 4, at any 20 minute interval.

The time eventually hits 8pm. I am ready to leave. I want to ask my mother-in-law about what happened since she is a retired nurse. But as I go to leave, I can't turn the light off in my class. Seriously?!? There happens to be a custodian outside my room and I ask him to come in for a second and I tell him my trouble, and he casually says, "Oh that means your light is dead." Okay. What does that mean? I don't know, but he tells me that the light will turn off with the master lights at 11pm, and they should turn on again in the morning when they turn the master lights back on. Great. What a fantastic day.

Long week

I am tired and ready for bed but I thought I would make everyone feel better about the length of their work week this week.

26 hours down, 20 to go. Bleh.

Birthday fun

So, for those of you who haven't been paying attention, this past weekend was my birthday. It was fun to go to Fargo to have a little time away and get to see some family and friends. We spent the day swimming, shopping, eating and then swimming again. And it was all fun. Here's some photos from supper at Paradiso.


Seesters!


The best family photo we could muster.



Me and me mum


The BFF photo


The picture of the special educators (aka Vik and me)


Mollie, Ruby and Dave


The Sorority Sisters


Uncle Mike, Cousin Austin, and me


Aunt Dawn, Cousin Allie, and me


Aunt Michelle, Uncle Mark and Sabby

Youth of the Nation

So today this kid rushes out of my room to see one the 7th grade teachers hanging the state flags that the students created and the teacher asks if he will help him move the table around the corner. My student rushes right over to help, and I was proud of him for doing that. For about 3 seconds. As soon as the job was done, he asked what he got for helping. Then he asked if he would get candy. The teacher replied, "I don't have any candy. But I can offer you a thank you for helping me."

I smiled because that's all it should have taken, but the kid did not seem convinced. And I realized that the youth of the nation really are going to pot.

P.S. Two days til my birthday.