Third Week of June

Monday
The speeches began today! Granted, the students who gave their speeches today were, in general, the most responsible of my kids (those most likely to be ready for such a huge deadline on a Monday in June). Even taking that into consideration, however, I was proud and pleased with the speeches they gave today. They did a wonderful job! Also, I found myself jotting down book titles as I listened so that I could check them out from the library later on. That might be the best evidence of how well they did – that what they had to say made me want to read the books for myself!

Today was also the first day that I accepted creative projects from students, and it was quite entertaining. One of the best creative projects was a cake that was decorated to look like a concentration camp (to represent the place where the writer of an autobiography was sent by the Nazis). The student presenting this cake had constructed a small wood-and-glue cabin to represent the camp barracks and a wood-and-wire fence that looked like barbed wire. It was impressive and showed a lot of effort on the student’s part. Also, it was quite tasty.


Tuesday
Of all the days to have to be gone…
I had a sub today. There are four days left in the school year (counting today), and my students are delivering speeches and turning in their end-of-the-year projects all week (for very big grades). And I have to be gone. The real problem here is that when the Director of Human Resources says, “Let’s meet next week on Tuesday. How about at noon?” I don’t want to be the only one that tells him no! He’s sort of in charge of everyone in the whole district, and I need him to take care of some stuff for us… Argh.

I’m reminded of one of my favorite movies – Grosse Point Blank – in which one character is trying to persuade the main character Martin Blank to join his union of professional assassins. Martin’s response is to ask, “This union… are there going to be meetings?” The first man says, “Of course!” Martin says (emphatically), “NO MEETINGS,” and then sends a volley of gunfire back at the first man. That’s how I feel… With the possible exception of the HR Director and Boss of Everyone, I really wish I could just tell people, “NO MEETINGS.”


Wednesday
And the speeches continue! More fabulous speeches, more amazing projects… I’m going to save this and remind all of my kids how well it went next year when they gripe about having to do speeches or projects. Take that, lazy preteens. Institutional memory is coming back to haunt you.

I uncovered a scandalous conspiracy today. In my first period class, three students chose to decorate cakes for their creative projects. Conveniently, one presented her cake to the class on Monday. One presented his cake to the class today. And the last said she would be ready to present her cake to the class tomorrow. VERY suspicious… almost like they planned the timing so we would be eating cake on three different days this week. In fact, when I asked one of the girls about this, she smiled and refused to answer. AHA! Caught frosting-handed…


Thursday
One day left. You’d think I’d be all over this whole “getting ready for the end of the year” thing since I’ve been complaining about needing a vacation or being anxious for summer for the last four months. I’m not. I’m not ready at all. I still have to get all of the speeches done and the posters graded. I have to finish grading the mountain of work in the Late Work basket. I have to clean up my classroom and pack up my curriculum crates and inventory the books. I have to post grades and then use those to do report cards. I have to clean out the mess that is my closet (affectionately referred to in the classroom as the Closet of Doom) and repack it with 7th grade curriculum to make room on my bookshelves for the 8th grade stuff for next year. I have to finish my supply ordering. Oh, and I completely forgot about getting ready for my summer job! I have to make a final decision so that Mr. Chandler can complete our shirt order for the summer. I have to look over and make corrections to the bus schedule. I have to finalize our craft order and make a shopping list for everything we’re not ordering.

This post is making me tired. I need a personal assistant and a nap.


Friday
THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL! It’s finally here! And do you think it could go according to plan? Not a chance. I had lovely ideas about showing a movie. Since we studied medieval China in May, I figured I could show a movie that discusses ancient Chinese rituals and traditions – like Kung Fu Panda. But we weren’t done with speeches or book chats or creative project presentations. During the last hour of the day, we had yearbook signing. I planned to be there for the whole time, but an EA stopped me in the hallway and made me write in the librarian’s yearbook, and then a 6th grade teacher had a question for me, and then my phone rang and I had to run back to my classroom, and then… well, you get the idea.

After school, I went to the district office to interview the superintendent for my graduate class. She was very nice, but her secretary apparently only scheduled me for 30 minutes instead of the hour I’d requested. We were interrupted for a grievance hearing (that I, for once, did NOT have to be at), so I went back to school for a little while. Then I went to a going-away party at Edgefield for a friend of mine who used to be the counselor at my old school and is moving to Nevada. There were a few people from her new school and quite a few from my old school. Strangely enough, I spent most of my time talking with two of the teachers from the pod across the hall at my current school. Parties are not my thing. Oh well… Apparently I’ve skipped enough of them that my very presence is meaningful. People kept commenting on how amazed they were to see me there, how nice it was of me to come to the party, etc. I didn’t even have to come up with any witty conversation! (You see? There’s a reason I cultivate this anti-social persona… I don’t have to work as hard at social gatherings as everyone else. It’s enough that I’m there.)


Saturday
Weird. I’m sitting at the coffee shop blogging (avoiding my grad school assignments) while this group of people is holding some sort of political meeting behind me. It’s called the Coffee Party, and apparently it’s for people who want to gather and drink coffee and talk about various political issues. That sounds... like a recipe for disaster, actually. (It sounds a little bit like communism… It’s lovely in theory, but it doesn’t work in practice.) Anyway, I can hear the lady who is leading the meeting as she talks to the group. You know how some people have that annoying habit of asking themselves a question and then answering it? (Do I want you to be successful in life? Of course. Do I think you can only do that by graduating from Harvard and becoming a doctor? No, I don’t. That sort of thing.) This Coffee Party lady is doing that. After pulling out a chart and referring to it, she said, “What am I showing you this for? I’m going to explain why.” How weird… I think the Coffee Party is not for me.