Respect

This last week was NOT a good week for substituting. I don't think I made any friends, but then again I don't really want to be friends with kids who are so disrespectful. Honestly, I don't know how teachers manage. I know if I were a permanent teacher, the one thing I would do it take all their phones hostage to be returned at the end of class. They are such a distraction to learning.

In an 8th grade math class I was asking a student what her teacher meant by MOD problems. She looked at me and in a voice that was so condescending told me they were math problems. Duh.

Oh the steam that came out my ears. We had a little chat about respectfully answering a question and then I sentenced her to the back of the room to work. Ten minutes later she came to apologize. I had to accept her apology, but the next hour (yes, I had her for two straight periods) I took her phone when she wouldn't put it away. And ya know, she sat there so quiet because she simply didn't know what to do without a phone in her hand.

In a high school chemistry class I stood at the front of the class to get started after the tardy bell rang. I waited and waited and waited for them to quiet down and for the TA (teacher's assistant) to take his seat and quit talking to his friends. I finally had to tell them to hush and even after I started class they continued to talk. And then they thought it would be all right to just leave class without my permission. And then they thought they could sit in the back of the classroom at the lab tables and work together. Did they work? Did they even get the books to read? No. One girl sat on the counter with her feet crossed, on her phone, munching her chips. There were two kids in there I knew -- one is in my ward and the other is Kiersten's friend -- and so I asked if their class was typically like this, refusing to work and not shutting up. They said that yes, even their teacher has issues. Well, I put a stop to it when I found that three or four girls had just disappeared together out the door. I made them move back to their seats, get out a book, and start reading. I then lectured them on respect and being responsible for their own education and that just because I was there did not make it a free, social hour.

Okay, done with my rant for the week. I haven't felt the need to state my expectations right up front when I introduce myself to a class, but I think I'm going to start doing so.

Some good news is Kiersten has completed her quilt for one of her projects. It only took her . . . years? We just have to wash it.