Monday's are bad enough normally, but when it's a Monday when you have to give a state test to students that you don't even know, that's just asking for trouble. You would think that even a high school freshman would realize that it's a bad thing if a teacher that has never met you before knows your name less than five minutes after you walk in the door. This was the case for one of the 21 kids that came in to my room for the English I retest this morning. Somehow, me telling him once that he could not in fact leave as soon as he was done and that he would have to wait until the end of the testing session was insufficient. He asked me three times, I guess hoping the answer would change. It didn't.
Then, he tried to talk after I had officially started the testing session (after delays that already made me irritable, like a late proctor and a missing test which took about 15 minutes to get straightened out). I had to move his seat, because he couldn't figure out how not to talk with people around him.
Next, he had the complaint that his desk wasn't flat enough. Really? He wanted to sit on the floor to take his test. I was sorely tempted to say yes, on the condition that he let me put a dog collar on him. I refrained, however, and told him no. Both times he asked.
He continued to be annoying, fidgety, and potentially misadministration-y for the rest of the exam session. I was so glad to see him leave, and God help him if he ends up in one of my classes (assuming he ever makes it out of English I).
Then, there was the icing on the cake of my student interactions for the day. One of my seniors came by to ask me why he had gotten a 56 in the class. Now, this student had failed to complete his Graduation Project by the deadline, and claimed to have gotten an extension from the administrator in charge of it. I gave him the benefit of the doubt during the semester, but every time I asked if he had gotten it in, nothing. His extended deadline came and went, and meanwhile, his grade in my class continued to plummet as he stopped doing any work in class. So then, this past Monday, over a month after the extension deadline he had been given, he turned in roughly 1/4 of what he was supposed to have done. The AP and I looked at it, and determined that, due to how little there was and the low quality, coupled with how far past the deadline it was, the grade on it essentially was still a 0. This decision was partially based on it being that bad, and partially based on the fact that his grades were so low overall, any points I could reasonably give him for it wouldn't actually effect his overall grade at all.
So, I explained to him that a: his project was no where near what it needed to be, b: with how late it was, he really didn't get any credit for it and c: even if he had gotten credit for it, his grade in the class was so low, he would still fail.
His response: But, I shouldn't have been penalized for it being late! I had an extension!
Um...yes, but it was late even with that. And it sucked. And you still fail. I didn't say the last two parts, though I wanted to. I told him I was sorry, but there was nothing I could do, as he had not done anything in class for the last several weeks.
His response: It's all right. I'll just drop out.
And he walked out the door. Now mind you, I like this kid. I wanted him to pass, but I wasn't about to just *give* him a grade. My students have to *earn* their grades, and he *earned* an F. Pretty consistently. This kid, I thought, liked me, too, as we had some pretty nice conversations during class about things unrelated to school, most of which involved him trying to convince me that WoW doesn't suck. I still think it does. Anyway, he apparently said some choice words that I wish I had heard once he was out in the hallway, because two of my coworkers then came into my room asking, "Was that directed at you?"
Hate to say it to him, and I won't unless he asks, but if you're unwilling to do the work for one final semester to get your diploma, and you want people to just *give* you a passing grade so you can graduate, you're barking up the wrong tree. And that's not just with me, but with all the English teachers. Good luck getting and keeping a job with that kind of attitude...
This rambling post brought to you by: it's my birthday, and it's been a kind of shitty day, so I need to vent. Thank you for listening.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Not everythng they write is poorly written
So, I had my students write their last journal entry for the semester on the best/worst part of the class and why they liked/disliked it. Most of them were fairly mundane. Several suggested I stop giving tests and making them read. It's only English class...why should they read? Some of them were very nice and told me they liked the class, and a few even mentioned having actually learned something. Go figure.
One, however, gave me a response that was quite entertaining, and for once it wasn't because of abysmal spelling or grammar. For a little background, there was one student in the class with quite possibly the worst case of ADHD I've ever seen, coupled with actual intelligence, and a complete and utter lack of common sense and tact. This resulted in quite a bit of him saying stupid and/or inappropriate things, and he was not well liked in the class at all. To be honest, I am quite happy to not have him in class either, and not because I dislike the kid, he's just exhausting and extremely frustrating as a student. So, one student gave me the following response in his journal:
I would have to say that the worst part of this class was [student name]. Please pass him, so no one else will have to deal with him in the future.
Very selfless of him. Luckily for all of us, this student managed to pass on his own, so none of my fellow English teachers will have to put up with his inattention again. Not that I blame the author for the comment...I'm sure he wasn't the only one in the class thinking it, he was just the only one that wrote it. Of course, this author was also one of the few kids in the class that actually understood the material before I had to water it down, so he probably picked up on the fact that this kid was simply incapable of controlling himself.
Also: got probably the most interesting scantron sheet ever this semester. This was from a student that could not possibly pass the class because he did not complete his Graduation Project. Instead of answering the questions on the final test he bubbled the following on his scantron:
Side 1: HAPPY DAYS!!
Side 2: COWABUNGA!!
But hey, he scored a 2/100. Not that much worse than the kid that supposedly actually tried and got a 27/100. Yeah, that class didn't exactly do great on the exam...good thing they got their ridiculously inflated Graduation Project grades as their Final Exam grades, as the class average on the test before the curve was a 53%. Clearly remembering things is over rated.
Note to self: I am better at writing blog posts when I don't do it right before bed. Please remember that for next time...
One, however, gave me a response that was quite entertaining, and for once it wasn't because of abysmal spelling or grammar. For a little background, there was one student in the class with quite possibly the worst case of ADHD I've ever seen, coupled with actual intelligence, and a complete and utter lack of common sense and tact. This resulted in quite a bit of him saying stupid and/or inappropriate things, and he was not well liked in the class at all. To be honest, I am quite happy to not have him in class either, and not because I dislike the kid, he's just exhausting and extremely frustrating as a student. So, one student gave me the following response in his journal:
I would have to say that the worst part of this class was [student name]. Please pass him, so no one else will have to deal with him in the future.
Very selfless of him. Luckily for all of us, this student managed to pass on his own, so none of my fellow English teachers will have to put up with his inattention again. Not that I blame the author for the comment...I'm sure he wasn't the only one in the class thinking it, he was just the only one that wrote it. Of course, this author was also one of the few kids in the class that actually understood the material before I had to water it down, so he probably picked up on the fact that this kid was simply incapable of controlling himself.
Also: got probably the most interesting scantron sheet ever this semester. This was from a student that could not possibly pass the class because he did not complete his Graduation Project. Instead of answering the questions on the final test he bubbled the following on his scantron:
Side 1: HAPPY DAYS!!
Side 2: COWABUNGA!!
But hey, he scored a 2/100. Not that much worse than the kid that supposedly actually tried and got a 27/100. Yeah, that class didn't exactly do great on the exam...good thing they got their ridiculously inflated Graduation Project grades as their Final Exam grades, as the class average on the test before the curve was a 53%. Clearly remembering things is over rated.
Note to self: I am better at writing blog posts when I don't do it right before bed. Please remember that for next time...
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
this post brought to you by the "snowpocalypse"
Ahh, snow in the south: cause for mass panic, and the absolute shutting down of the state for several days. Since it's been about 6 months since I posted, I figure it's time for me to write something again. Ahh, a posting schedule I can stick to: once in a very great while.
So, after spending the past couple of days doing a whole lot of nothing because I'm actually caught up on grading, I bring to you some choice excerpts from my most recent batch of really shitty papers. Mind you, in my students' defense this time, several of them have no right to be in a Junior English class. But as someone did them the "favor" of passing them along, I have a Junior class that is collectively lower than any other class I've taught before. Arguably even the freshman class I had when I was student teaching...
Our first excerpt comes from a student that shouldn't be required to have a literature class to begin with. This child has no aspirations beyond the farming and tree care that his family has done for generations, but thanks to NCLB, we inflict literature he will never use on him. Now, to explain how truly un-gifted this child is in the mental department, I will tell you that, when we were talking about the phrase "carpe diem" in relation to the American Romantics, he asked why they didn't just all use English, instead of using those other languages that don't make sense. So, anyway...his paper is about trees and their care. Here is a single...sentence, which I use only for lack of a better term.
Pruning techniques is a big part to know when you are pruning a evergreen tree you should know how much to take off an how much not to take off if you take off too much off a evergreen tree it will start to change coilers as well as getting riley dry it will go from being dark green an flimsy to dark brown an dry and it will not be a party site that you were looking forward to seeing and in about two to three weeks it will be dead so becarefull pruning them.
Like so many students before him, not only did he blissfully ignore the rules of spelling and punctuation, he also apparently missed the whole "don't use second person (you) anywhere in your paper, or it will become a how to paper" thing.
One of my other kids informed me in a research paper on recycling that, "If the planet recycled enough glass bottles and jars the planet can stack them the people should be able to reach the moon and half way back to earth." There's some physics in there that my poor English teacher brain can't handle, and some improbable actions such as planets stacking things. Of course, earlier in the paper, he mentioned that, "If the planet recycled paper the people can do different things." Maybe one of those different things would be a mastery of subject-verb agreement, which at the moment seems to escape at least this student, if not more than half of this class.
Another student has an apparent flair for sweeping over-generalizations coupled with unintentional puns. His paper is on obesity. "Did you know obesity is growing bigger in bigger in America than anywhere else. The reason obesity is so big in America is because everyone has lack of exercise and diet." Not sure how obesity happens with a lack of diet, but I can certainly see the problem with everyone lacking exercise. Later in the paper he goes on to mention that people have a "more greater" risk with multiple risk factors...
The student writing about "the Horror/Thriller genre" apparently felt it necessary to provide definitions of every form of the words horror and thriller, with an individual citation after every portion of the definition. I'll give her props for actually citing her work, but I really didn't need to read a full page and a half of definitions of words that most people know the definition of. The worst part is, she had done that one the first draft she turned in, and I had marked on there for her to stick to one definition of one form of the word, if she really felt the need to, and still I ended up with dictionary vomit in her paper.
I really think I should invest in stock in red pens. This batch of papers looks like I had a fight with a razor blade in close proximity to them. It definitely looks like I lost.
On the plus side...I have a solid 2 weeks in which I won't have to look at research papers, unless one of the 8 kids from this class that didn't turn in a paper decides to do so tomorrow, on the last day of class. But why would they do that? They only had an extra 3 days to write it, on top of the 2 extra weeks they had when they failed to turn it in when it was due, before Christmas...
Oh yeah, I get new kids on January 26th. Three days after that, I'll get to collect papers from my seniors that are supposed to be revised versions of their junior paper. Guess it'll be time to break out the razor blade, er, red pen then...
So, after spending the past couple of days doing a whole lot of nothing because I'm actually caught up on grading, I bring to you some choice excerpts from my most recent batch of really shitty papers. Mind you, in my students' defense this time, several of them have no right to be in a Junior English class. But as someone did them the "favor" of passing them along, I have a Junior class that is collectively lower than any other class I've taught before. Arguably even the freshman class I had when I was student teaching...
Our first excerpt comes from a student that shouldn't be required to have a literature class to begin with. This child has no aspirations beyond the farming and tree care that his family has done for generations, but thanks to NCLB, we inflict literature he will never use on him. Now, to explain how truly un-gifted this child is in the mental department, I will tell you that, when we were talking about the phrase "carpe diem" in relation to the American Romantics, he asked why they didn't just all use English, instead of using those other languages that don't make sense. So, anyway...his paper is about trees and their care. Here is a single...sentence, which I use only for lack of a better term.
Pruning techniques is a big part to know when you are pruning a evergreen tree you should know how much to take off an how much not to take off if you take off too much off a evergreen tree it will start to change coilers as well as getting riley dry it will go from being dark green an flimsy to dark brown an dry and it will not be a party site that you were looking forward to seeing and in about two to three weeks it will be dead so becarefull pruning them.
Like so many students before him, not only did he blissfully ignore the rules of spelling and punctuation, he also apparently missed the whole "don't use second person (you) anywhere in your paper, or it will become a how to paper" thing.
One of my other kids informed me in a research paper on recycling that, "If the planet recycled enough glass bottles and jars the planet can stack them the people should be able to reach the moon and half way back to earth." There's some physics in there that my poor English teacher brain can't handle, and some improbable actions such as planets stacking things. Of course, earlier in the paper, he mentioned that, "If the planet recycled paper the people can do different things." Maybe one of those different things would be a mastery of subject-verb agreement, which at the moment seems to escape at least this student, if not more than half of this class.
Another student has an apparent flair for sweeping over-generalizations coupled with unintentional puns. His paper is on obesity. "Did you know obesity is growing bigger in bigger in America than anywhere else. The reason obesity is so big in America is because everyone has lack of exercise and diet." Not sure how obesity happens with a lack of diet, but I can certainly see the problem with everyone lacking exercise. Later in the paper he goes on to mention that people have a "more greater" risk with multiple risk factors...
The student writing about "the Horror/Thriller genre" apparently felt it necessary to provide definitions of every form of the words horror and thriller, with an individual citation after every portion of the definition. I'll give her props for actually citing her work, but I really didn't need to read a full page and a half of definitions of words that most people know the definition of. The worst part is, she had done that one the first draft she turned in, and I had marked on there for her to stick to one definition of one form of the word, if she really felt the need to, and still I ended up with dictionary vomit in her paper.
I really think I should invest in stock in red pens. This batch of papers looks like I had a fight with a razor blade in close proximity to them. It definitely looks like I lost.
On the plus side...I have a solid 2 weeks in which I won't have to look at research papers, unless one of the 8 kids from this class that didn't turn in a paper decides to do so tomorrow, on the last day of class. But why would they do that? They only had an extra 3 days to write it, on top of the 2 extra weeks they had when they failed to turn it in when it was due, before Christmas...
Oh yeah, I get new kids on January 26th. Three days after that, I'll get to collect papers from my seniors that are supposed to be revised versions of their junior paper. Guess it'll be time to break out the razor blade, er, red pen then...
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