Bloody kids! (warning: ranting ahead)

[Lovepotion69]

I've been substitute teaching since 1 March and it's not until now that the kids are getting on my nerves. I have great patience with them, and for the past two weeks I've been teaching two classes; a 6th grade and a 7th grade. The 6th graders are known as the worst one at the school, the 7th graders are cool.

The other Wednesday I got fed up with the 6th graders, but those you kinda expect to get mad with at some point. They're loud, run around etc etc. I ranted to the other teachers. Even had to call home to a couple of the students.

Today during physics class some guys began to throw their books on the desk loudly. Two girls were nagging about finishing early and finally I got really tired of it all. So I raised my voice and told them to get out of the classroom. They turned quiet. Kept telling them to get out, after all, wasn't finishing early what they wanted? They sat there quiet and finally I continued the class, writing up the notes on the board, but didn't say a word to them. Then I let them out early as I couldn't be bothered more with them.

I swear, now I understand why people look forward to the weekend! And why they go out partying. It's all about letting off steam. ugh.

Ok, so the good part is that I'm going for a birthday party tomorrow. The crowd probably won't be that fun, and I hear horrible rumours they might watch the Eurovision Song Contest on big screen, but apart from this it'll be fun.
I'm in big need of getting away from the school and kids. I need to get a bit drunk. Maybe I will tomorrow. Just for the hell of it.

Now, what should I wear tomorrow?

 

[raphy]

Now, what should I wear tomorrow?

Nothing. And take pictures for us.

 

[Xelebes]

Go crazy kamikaze seupukku style.

Buy a yard stick (or meter stick, you choose) and whenever they get loud and obnoxious, out of nowhere with a fit of rage, break the yard stick smacking on your own desk when they least suspect. It also helps if you fume a bit.

 

[OldnotDead]

Hey, LP69,

My brother recently retired from teaching. My SIL teaches. In fact within every generation of my family there is someone that teaches or taught. We all believe, very strongly, that the school year needs to be shorter and vacations less frequent but longer. Not for the kids' sake, but for the sanity of those who work there.

I saw something neat at our local wine store that probably would fit your mood for the weekend. It was a pewter wine bottle holder that had a handle designed for pouring. I pointed out to the proprietor that the way it was deisgned it was more akin to a beer stein handle than a decanting aid. he told me that was the idea - saves washing glasses!

Hope whatever anestetic you choose is most enjoyable and has the fewest negative side effects.

TGIF!

 

[Lovepotion69]

Raphy, one of the birthday boys (there are three) told me to come naked. I told him his girlfriend probably wouldn't be too thrilled.

Xelebes, actually two of the kids in the 6th grade told me I should have the disturbing guys write "I will be quiet and do maths" a hundred times in their books. They also thought I should have them go into a corner with a cone hat on. One of the annoying boys wanted me to use a ruler on his fingers. I told him that no matter how tempted I was, I'd be filed for abuse. Darn!

OldnotDead, I have teachers in the family too, but they are mainly university ones! I think I preferred the 4th graders. They were cute and adored me. hehe

Ok, I've picked out clothes. Either my plum trousers and a blue assymetric top or silver skirt and top.

 

[CharleyH]

I've been substitute teaching since 1 March and it's not until now that the kids are getting on my nerves. I have great patience with them, and for the past two weeks I've been teaching two classes; a 6th grade and a 7th grade. The 6th graders are known as the worst one at the school, the 7th graders are cool.

I'm in big need of getting away from the school and kids. I need to get a bit drunk. Maybe I will tomorrow. Just for the hell of it.

Now, what should I wear tomorrow?

LOL - I spent a recent half day with my brothers little bastards, and got forceful - kids are weird - when I was a kid I was much more rebellious than most- suspended in grade 8, and grades blank to - nevermind - let it be said I was at top, and yet for pointing out teacher's contradictions? was suspended multipy for a section 11: persistant opposition to authority - LOL- Kids who are bastards are two-fold - the ones who have a bad upbringing and the ones like me - too bored at the teacher's own boredom and inconsistancies

Think grade 7's are great? Wait til you get to grade 8 - lol - the words fuck off comes up a lot

 

[cantdog]

Middle school is the worst, say sixth grade to ninth.

I really dug subbing when I got to do the second grade, and I had a good time in the high school, but for some reason there was more need for subs in the middle school.

So I left them with a bang. The video was about the fossil record of pre-humans, Dr. Leakey, erectus, all that jive. I told them about the sulcus under the glutes, that little fold. I sketched the human ass on the board for illustrative purposes; I gave the ass dimples. I said the sulcus there was absolutely tied to bipedalism, but the discussion usually rested on the hard parts, hip angles, relative legths of arm and leg....

Nobody even asked to have the word sulcus defined. You could hear a pin drop after one stifled giggle. Ass studies were evidently not a usual part of the curriculum.

I was not invited to sub again, but I was pretty well ready to can the whole gig anyway. It paid for shit and the kids felt subs were there to abuse and screw with. I got more respect as a high school teacher at twenty years of age, when actually, at forty-three, I had a great deal more to offer them than the callow twenty-year-old I had been in the days when I had a teaching credential.

Good fortune, LovePotion. They really are worth the heartache. It's easier as a real teacher, though.

cantdog

 

[Guest]

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Junior high (aka middle school) kids are the worst. Old enough to wise off but not old enough to know what jerks they are. I think more teachers must burn out in junior high than in elementary or high school.

I have one friend who swears by the Clint Eastwood approach. He goes into the classroom and says very little, and what he says is said in a very tight, controlled tone of voice. The idea is to present an image of tightly controlled psychopathology that might snap at any minute. He also says he glares a lot. When he wants order he'll slam a meter stick down on a desk. One time he slammed it so hard it shattered. He stood there with the broken stump in his hand glaring at the class, and he never had any trouble with them after that.

I talked to a cop who works in a middle school as well. He too believes in projecting an air of menace but never acting on it. He says it's vital that you never get angry or physical with the kids because it's the threat that gets them. Once they see the actuality, you're sunk.

And then there's the old dictum that says go in there tough and be a real bastard. You can always loosen up later, but if you go in there loose, you can never get tight on them.

---dr.M.

 

[cantdog]

I published, with a group of my close friends, a counter-newsletter, which we called an "underground paper" and distributed it at the high school where I was a student.

I did the cartoon below for it. The original was done in pen on a mimeograph master, which probably wants explanation nowadays, but they confiscated it. This will give you the idea, though.

High School Is A Crock. The real difference between high school and prison is, prisons don't have yearbooks, and they all graduate one by one. I taught there for a while!

Wo.
crock here

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I published, with a group of my close friends, a counter-newsletter, which we called an "underground paper" and distributed it at the high school where I was a student.

I did the cartoon below for it. The original was done in pen on a mimeograph master, which probably wants explanation nowadays, but they confiscated it. This will give you the idea, though.

crock here

I remember mimeographs. We published an underground paper on mimeo too. I still remember the smell of the solvent.

But Cantdog, your link didn't work for me.

---dr.M.

 

[Guest]

I remember mimeographed exams. I loved the smell, but not the tests. The link didn't work for me either. P.

 

[SlickTony]

That's the reason I abandoned pretty early on the thought of teaching as a career. I had thought I wanted to be a teacher early in my life, and then when I lived overseas I had a job teaching English to middle school students. I decided then that I'd rather have a job hosing down walls in a slaughterhouse--at least dead pigs don't talk back. I was very glad I had the chance to find out early, rather than go to the trouble of starting the studies for a degree in education and then finding out.

My HS published a literary magazine every month. In my junior year (I think) the PTBs came to the decision that none of the things that had been submitted were suitable, so they declared that there would be no literary magazine that year. A bunch of angry and literate seniors decided that by damn, they would have a literary magazine, so The Elf was developed and published off-campus.

Oh, the fuss! Oh, the outcry! Oh, the scandal! The offending students were stripped of their various awards they'd won that year and prohibited from taking part in the graduation exercises. Their attitude was mostly "oh, well..." because they mostly had scholarships already that wouldn't be affected by this.

A magazine did come out the next year. It had two of my poems in it, IIRC. A guy submitted a short story which was rejected. All submissions had to go through the Assistant Principal, a jumped-up math teacher and coach who bore a striking resemblance to Adolf Hitler (except that he couldn't have the toothbrush moustache, as in those days, nobody, not even a teacher, could have a moustache) and even managed to sound like him at pep rallies. This man had no more understanding of, or appreciation for, literature than a dog.

My classmate's short story was rejected by this man. I had the opportunity to read it later and what struck me about the work was that its author had been seriously, seriously impressed, even scared, by William Faulkner. But really, when you're 16 or 17 there's a good chance your writing is going to be somewhat derivative. Mr. M***** didn't reject the story for being a pastiche. He rejected it as "the stupidest thing [he'd] ever read."

Whar's mah slingshot?

 

[cantdog]

The link

Yeah, it doesn't work now. Okay, I'll put it in my profile for a while.

Just a sec.


cantdog