A Royal Tea Party

The Royal Wedding -- how exciting! The prince is getting married, and a lovely normal girl will become a princess. It’s the stuff of fairy tales… unless you’re a modern 8th grader carrying all of the typical cynicism and self-focus of 21st century teenagers. While my students have the attitude that the royal wedding is no big deal, I think it’s a rare opportunity that they are not likely to see again for many years. (Does anyone really see Harry settling down any time soon? And when’s the last time a president’s offspring was married while his/her father was still in office?) Such a thing hasn’t happened during my own lifetime since Charles and Diana’s wedding in the early 1980’s. I don’t remember watching that one, but I DVR’d a couple different broadcasts of Friday's royal wedding to watch when I got home from school.

To be honest, I didn’t really care that much about the wedding itself. It’s more about the event, and for my students, I want them to understand how important the events of other countries can be in the world, even if they don’t register on American teenagers’ radars. It’s the idea that American events don’t define world news – although we certainly act as if they do. Making a big deal about the wedding in class allowed me the perfect social studies opportunity to talk about international events and royal families and several other sorts of topics that don’t apply to the U.S. Furthermore, because I talked about it in class, I was also able to talk about another difference between the U.S. and the U.K. -- the conduct of the spectators. After I watched the wedding itself, I was so struck by the behavior of the British people at the event that it was vital to point this out to my students. When the wedding party was safely inside Buckingham Palace, the police constables slowly allowed the crowd to move up to the high fence surrounding the property. As they moved forward, the British citizens walked calmly, peacefully, even politely. They did not push or shove, they did not scream, and they were not out of control in any way, although they were cheering and obviously happy. It was amazing, and my students thought so as well when I told them.

There were several other pieces that stuck out to me, on which I pontificated to my students the following Monday, but that was the biggest and the one by which they were most surprised. At any rate, my making a big deal out of the wedding provided the open door for the other lessons and conversations, so I consider it a worthy effort. And, as a treat, one of my classes decided to have a tea party to celebrate. We had no idea where to procure crumpets, so one of my students brought English muffins (which, of course, are not at all English, but since they have “English” in the name, we decided they could count just this once). I brought jam, and we borrowed a toaster oven from another teacher. I brewed tea in my coffee pot, and another student provided sugar cubes (so that we could say to each other, “one lump, or two?” in our terrible British accents). And while we discussed what books we’ve been reading, we had tea and jam and English muffins and looked out the windows at the rain and spoke in incredibly bad fake accents and had a jolly time.

Teamwork

So I walked out into the pod area this morning in time to see Whitney – my tallest female student (and one of my tallest students of either gender) – with her foot up on a chair, while Brent – one of my shortest students – worked on tying her shoe. When I asked what they were doing, Whitney explained by saying, “What? He’s closer to the ground than I am,” while Brent nodded his agreement and grinned at me.

I do not claim to understand the inner workings of this particular friendship… but it made me laugh.

April Showers

Good grief. It’s like July and November all at once, all in the same day. I can’t keep this straight. And holy crap, how in the world is one supposed to get dressed in the morning? Sunglasses and umbrellas, short sleeves and close-toed shoes… The nursery rhyme I learned in grade school was about March coming in like a lion and going out like a lamb, but our Portland March went out like a dinosaur. …And not one of those happy, dying-out-in-their-sleep herbivores, either. Now April is showing us both the little lamb who frolics in the morning sunshine AND the roar of the angry, stormy lion. I really hope the May flowers are on their way.

One Day I May Ask You For a Favor...

I have this one student who has spent his eighth grade year doing as little as possible. It drives me crazy, mostly because I saw some interesting and insightful work from him last year. When you have a conversation with him, he can speak quite thoughtfully. And the books he chooses to read – when he actually chooses to read – are mainstream adult fiction books. Currently, he’s reading The Godfather. He’s about 150 pages into it and has been working on it for several weeks. (I sometimes get the feeling that the first 10 minutes of my class are the only chance he gets to read.)

Every quarter in my language arts class, I assign the students a reading project. They have 9 weeks to read 4 books and talk about them in front of the class. My do-nothing student reading The Godfather has avoided doing any "book chats," as we call them, for… well, for as long as I can remember. As I was working on grades on Friday, I was frustrated by his lack of initiative. I KNOW he’s reading; I’ve WATCHED him. He BEGS me for more time to read! He’ll even talk about his book if I sit down next to him while he's reading it. So I decided to trick him into earning a grade.

When he arrived in 6th period the next day, I waited until his back was turned and then grabbed his book off his desk. I walked to the front and set the book on the whiteboard tray. When he finally noticed, predictably because another “helpful” student pointed it out to him, he walked up to the front to get the book. While he was still at the front (before he could make the move to go back to his seat), I asked him, “So, what’s that book about?” He froze and stared at me.
“You don’t know about the Godfather??!!” he asked incredulously.
“I’ve never seen the movie. What’s it about?” I asked nonchalantly.
“That’s crazy. I can’t believe you’ve never seen it or read it. It’s a great book,” he said, and promptly launched into a description of the story, making sure to tell me how the movie and the book are different. While he paced and talked, several students turned to look at me with smiles or questions on their faces. I merely motioned for them to stay quiet and give him their attention again, and they smiled and nodded knowingly and let him go on. Finally, after several minutes of talking, my normally non-participatory student stopped and turned to look at me.
“Wait a minute…” he said, holding up his finger and shaking it at me. “What is this? Is this one of those things you do where you talk about a book and get points for it?!”
"You mean a book chat?" I said with a smile.
"Yeah," he said accusingly, "a book chat. Is this a book chat?!" He sounded SO offended by it that the rest of the class started laughing.
"It was a sneak attack," I answered, and mercilessly ruined his streak of F’s by giving him the points for his surprise book chat.

Later he thanked me -- quietly, so as not to ruin his reputation as a slacker, but still... I said to him, "one day I may ask you for a favor..." and waited to see if he recognized the quote. Fortunately he did. (He really has read the book!) His response was, "As long as you don't put a horse head in my locker..."

Spring Break in Tropical Spokane

I’m not even sure how to talk about my spring break. I ended up sitting in a Spokane hospital for four days while my dad had heart surgery. Add in the bronchitis that I’ve been fighting for 4 weeks now, and my dad’s crazy family (upset because my mom’s updates can’t be given to both sisters at the same time because one doesn’t text and the other can’t do conference calls), and my brother who travels without a clear plan and leaves to go shoe shopping when my dad is getting released from the hospital and needs a ride, and the infection my dad tested positive for, causing all of us to have to “gown up” every time we visited his room... And you have a complicated and stressful week.

I now know far more about Sacred Heart Medical Center in Spokane than I ever needed to. I was grateful for the convenient motel across the street offering a "medical" discount for family members of hospital patients and staffed by wonderfully kind people. I was introduced to Qdoba, which I'd never experienced before. (It's good -- kind of a mix of Taco Bell and Baja Fresh, but trendier.) I drank tea made by Thomas Hammer Coffee Roasters (whom I'd never heard of but really like). I bought a cute purse in the gift shop (random and unrelated, sorry). I made fun of the cardiologist's post-surgery hair (wild, bushy, silver). Guess what I did NOT do... That's right, I did not do one tiny little bit of grading!

The bright spot in the week was definitely Hannah, who had everyone smiling most of the time. While my dad was in surgery on Monday, Hannah had us chasing her around the hospital hallways, and she charmed my dad’s nurses immediately (once she was allowed in his room). On the drive home, she kept us entertained with her baby-talk chatter, and once we arrived at my parents’ house and she had access to her toys, she wasted no time in drafting all of us as her playmates. Have I mentioned how much I LOVE this girl?

I Heart Hannah

My niece Hannah stayed at my house last weekend, along with her parents, of course.

I adore this girl SO MUCH… She is beautiful and hilarious and joyful, and I just love her.

Mr. Chandler and I babysat her on Friday night while her parents went to a wedding, and we had a lovely team eating Cheerios and pointing at things and singing (mostly me) and dancing (mostly her) and laughing (mostly Mr. Chandler). Hannah really likes Mr. Chandler and me, although I have to admit that part of our charm is that we both have extraordinarily curly hair (which she is not used to as her mother does not let her father’s afro reach its natural state). Hannah herself has the most interesting red hair, and I love it! She’s not talking yet, but she is definitely mobile. She crawls like nobody’s business, and she walks if you hold her hands. She’s very insistent when she’s walking, too; she will turn your arms if she wants to go in a different direction.

We went out to breakfast on Saturday, and because it was Hannah’s birthday, the waitress brought her a brownie with ice cream and a lit candle. I have no idea why – the child is barely one year old and does not eat sugar (or anything else, really, but that’s a story for another time). Hannah didn’t really care about the brownie and ice cream, but she was fascinated with the flame (fortunately only from afar). After splitting up for some random shopping, my mom and I met up with Hannah and her parents and her California grandmother for lunch. California Grandma had just flown in for a week-long visit. Hannah, of course, was the happy center of attention, and, to my delight, when it was time for all of them to pile into the van and drive back to Eastern Washington, Hannah wanted to hang out with ME. I adore her, and it appears the feeling might be mutual! Now I just have to figure out when I can see her again...


Here's something else I love: my Kindle. (Thanks to Mr. Chandler for celebrating the end of my grad school class in such a scrumptious and literary way!)

Be Nice to Teachers

I recently attended a conference sponsored by NEA at which the keynote speaker was University of Oregon professor Dr. Yong Zhao. He talked about how American politicians are not happy unless the U.S. is in first place, and they compare the U.S. (in an unhealthy manner that we urge children not to use) to any other country who IS in first place, regardless of context. As part of his amazingly compelling speech, he made a joke about how teachers caused the Wall Street crash and the mortgage crisis and the latest political scandals and global warming and the bird flu epidemic. There was a room-wide laugh, followed by a weird sort of collective sigh as each teacher at the conference realized that there truly are people out there who hate public educators. Meanwhile, I spend my weekends grading papers and scoring essays and taking classes to make sure I’m good at helping kids learn... *sigh*

On the bright side, Dr. Zhao also talked about creativity as the element of American education that is lacking in many other countries. He showed data from the U.S. Patent Office that was fascinating. Apparently, the U.S. issues more patents per year than all of Asia combined. Now, I certainly have no need for us to be in first place, so I'm going to brag on another country right now and say that I don’t think the Chinese need to worry. In our study of China in 7th grade social studies, we learned that the Chinese were the most inventive of the medieval people, responsible for everything from fireworks to playing cards to sliced bread. (Okay, I made that last one up.)

With politics invading public education all over the country, it can be depressing to work in schools these days. To show your support of public education, please wear RED on Tuesdays.

Cakes in Class

So much of what we do in middle school language arts involves writing – sentences, paragraphs, essays, reports, stories, answers to questions, etc. I have no regrets about working my students until their writing hands fall apart, mind you. But I do recognize that it can cause occasional academic weariness in adolescents. As a teacher, I believe in giving students a variety of learning opportunities that allow them to understand and to demonstrate their understanding through different strengths – multiple intelligences or modalities or whatever you want to call it. But as an English teacher, especially in the middle grades, I don’t often have the flexibility to work in the "fun" stuff. What amazes and confuses me is the unbelievably random nature of the creative projects my students produce when I manage to give them the chance.

I like to assign them an unidentified “Creative Project” to go along with an essay, a speech or a presentation of some sort. I require them to represent whatever we’ve been studying in whatever way they choose. Over the last two years, this particular group of students has surprised me over and over again with their project choices. I have one boy who likes to make up songs or the occasional interpretive dance. (And let me tell you, if you’ve never seen a “too cool for school” 13-year-old boy flail erratically in front of the class while rapping about a book we read in class, you haven’t lived.) There is a group of about 5 students who routinely choose to record themselves acting out parts of books or historical events in their backyards, and then edit and polish a DVD to show the class. (This has become such a popular option that they now create blooper reels to add on to the ends of their movies.) I have several gifted artists in my group, and their abilities, as well as their posters, pictures, illustrations, etc., have frequently impressed the entire class, and I have other kinesthetically oriented students who create models, sculptures, dioramas, or other 3-D creations. Some of the students, who don’t necessarily have access to the same technology as others might, take immense delight in performing surprisingly well-organized dramatic skits in front of the class. (Admittedly, allowing 8th graders to create their own skits is occasionally a risk. For the last round of creative projects, there was a quartet of boys who decided to present a skit involving a disturbing and unfortunate portrayal of "The Birth of America" that I'm still trying to wipe from my memory... I'll let you think about that one on your own time.) At any rate, by far the most incredible projects are the cakes.

I’m not sure where it started, although I do have two students who are die-hard fans of both Ace of Cakes and Cake Boss. (In one of my unguarded moments, I must have agreed to this, but for the life of me, I can’t fathom why. Feed teenagers sugar during class? Seriously?) Anyway, in using cakes as the medium for their creative projects, the students decorate the cakes in a way that represents something from the unit we’ve been studying. There are all kinds of complications, of course, especially since we’re not allowed to serve homemade food to students at school. So the kids must decide whether they want to buy a plain cake and decorate it (expensive, but allowed to be shared) or make the entire thing themselves (far more impressive, but with less popularity with peers attached to it due to the non-sharing regulations on homemade food). For our most recent project, I had a grand total of 6 cakes, including one 3-layer spectacle with little plastic army men marching across a sugary meadow. We had so many cakes that I had to store them in the school’s walk-in cooler. Every morning, we’d get one of the cakes and take it back to class with us. (When did I agree to host a week-long cake party?!) I made them wait to eat cake until the end of class so that their sugar rush would be inflicted on me for as little time as possible, and then I sent them off to some other teacher who had to deal with the hyper darlings. Please don’t blame me… They’re just being creative.

Read Across America Day

For Read Across America Day, my school did a number of things to celebrate literacy and Dr. Seuss’s birthday. I was in charge of putting poetry on the windows using dry erase markers. I had my students write poetry, and if I had asked their permission, I would totally post some of their poems here. (But I didn’t. So I won’t. Maybe next time.) My favorite was a controversial poem called “Ode to Black Ops.” This ode extolled the virtues of Call of Duty – Black Ops, a video game played on… I have no idea which video game system. (I’m not actually familiar with this video game. When would I have time to play video games?!!!.) I had a couple staff members complain about the poem because of the violent nature of the game… but my principal agreed with me that the benefits outweighed the questionable nature of the game (although the poem did not describe the violence of the game). Seriously, how often do you see 30-some middle school boys pushing each other out of the way because they’re so anxious to read poetry?!

I tried and tried to convince them that “Ode to Black Ops” is evidence that poems can be cool and funny… Alas, they remain convinced that poetry is some evil estrogen villain waiting for them in dark corners, ready to scribble girly nonsense on their souls with pink glitter gel pens.

Fowl Weather

After a couple of weeks of relatively dry weather – and even some occasional bouts of sunshine – the rain has returned with a vengeance. And it’s not even a misty rain, either. It’s a heavy rain with huge, heavy drops that plop on you as you walk into the building. There are puddles everywhere, and water runs in rivulets through parking lots, in streets, down driveways, and from unfortunately leaky gutters. (...In case there was any doubt that we're in Portand.) Outside my classroom is the dirt baseball field, which is currently occupied by a huge muddy puddle because of the rain. There are two ducks who have taken up residence in the baseball mud puddle. I can see them from my window, and at the moment, they are happily splashing around while the rain showers on them. They have returned to the large puddle (which looks more like a small lake at this point) for a couple days in a row now. I adore ducks, especially puddle ducks. They are quite cheerful about the weather today, and they have cheered me up immensely.