Shoes (Again!), and Frustrations

Yes, I do have another shoe story!  In this one I had the same shoes as a student (kindergarten).  Yes, mine were much bigger than hers.  But they were the same style of silver flats.  She seemed to think it was funny that we were wearing the same thing.  The fact that we were was pointed out to me many times.

In other news, my day was incredibly frustrating!  The kids were amazing sweet little things, but I was running around virtually the whole day with no lesson plan.  The teacher had been gone the day before, so hadn't written out a detailed plan for today.  I was reading the tiny notes on her weekly plan as well as yesterday's plan to get a feel for the class.  The notes specifically said that the assistant did a lot of the instruction when the teacher was gone.  I was okay with this, so I just assumed that's how it would go.  However, when the assistant got there she told me that she couldn't lead the class because they had had a meeting at their school recently where some union rep told them that assistants couldn't lead the class without specific written instructions on what to do.  And since the teacher hadn't left specific instructions she was reluctant to lead the class because she was afraid she'd get in trouble.  Unfortunately, this left me in a really hard place.  I didn't know what the stations the teacher mentioned were.  The assistant did, but she didn't feel she could even explain them without breaking this new rule.  Ugh!  Whatever idiot made that rule really is not my favorite person right now.  

It really bugs me when people act like the instructional assistants are somehow less competent or capable than licenced teachers.  Yes, the licenced teacher has more training, but I have meet many, MANY assistants over my years of substituting that were absolutely wonderful, and more than capable of doing everything the teacher did.

Anyways, the assistant ended up calling the teacher and the teacher emailed directions over to her.  Then she was able to give directions for station time and lead her group without breaking the rules.  It was just frustrating that we had to jump through all those hoops when the day could have been much smoother (and might I add, more educationally valuable for the students) without it.

My Shoes Are From China

Yes, again, we are talking about my shoes.  Today a girl told me my shoes looked "kinda Chinese".  They are ballet flats with lots of differently colored vertical stripes.  So then I said, "Maybe they are Chinese!"  I took one off and looked inside and sure enough - they were made in China!

You learn something new everyday!

Anyways, I was subbing in a bilingual kindergarten today.  I think is a kind of weird that they call it that.  Because it's not actually "bilingual" in the literal definition of the world - the whole class is taught in Spanish.  The don't do anything in English (well, today they did).  Shouldn't they just call it Spanish kindergarten?  Other weird thing was that about half of the kids were native English speakers and I meet a lot of the parents who spoke only English.  So I was puzzled as to why the kindergarten was all in Spanish.  Wouldn't it make more sense to do a mix of Spanish and English - as "bilingual" implies?  There's probably a reason for it, but I did not get to the bottom of it today.  Maybe next time....

Learn to Summarize

Today I returned to one of the classes I subbed in last week - the second graders from last Monday. They were much like I remembered them. Small group, with mostly good kids and a couple pesky ones.

However, part-way through my afternoon with them (I only worked half of a day) I got a righteous headache. Making matters worse, my headache was repetitively aggravated by one particular little boy. He was trying to "help" me. And what I mean by this is that he was one of the most obsessive-compulsive uptight little kids I've meet. He was constantly telling me (sparing NO detail) how his teacher did every mundane task of the day - from where she stood, to what phrases she used, to who could work with who and why, etc., etc., etc. I wanted to rip my hair out. He told me how one boy didn't do his work. He pointed out how a girl near him wasn't doing something right. He showed me how I'd written on the overhead sheet and not on the roll like his teacher does. He explained in what order the class went to the library. He lectured me on how their teacher does one thing to get their attention but not the thing I was doing. It just went on and on and on. And to add to my annoyance, he absolutely could NOT summaraize anything. He gave me the supreme expanded edition with all the commentary and delete scenes he could come up with. He'd just start talking even though I hadn't called on him and was talking to someone else. And he wouldn't stop! I kept saying over and over that I didn't need the details and that it was fine the way we were doing it. Eventually I started telling him that I didn't care what way they normally did it. I told him that my way worked too and that was the way we were going to do it. But still he kept talking. Aargh! I had to try to ignore him but like I said, my head was splitting so this was not the most attractive option.

Another funny moment was when, near the end of the day a little boy asked me why I was wearing the shoes I was wearing (brown flat sling-backs in case you were wondering). I was puzzled by his question, so I replied, "Because I can't come to school barefoot!". He laughed a little but then persisted with his question. I told him I was wearing them because they matched my outfit. He asked why I wasn't wearing black (even though nothing on my outfit was black). At this point a girl chimed in with, "Because she's wearing a BROWN shirt, not a BLACK one! It was odd, I still have no idea why he was asking that.

A Laser Pointer and Lots of Kids

...put them together and you get lots of whining! As in, "Teeeeeacher! So-and-so has a laser pointer and he pointed it in my eye!!" The pointer changed hands at a few points I believe, but eventually it landed in mine where it stayed for the remainder of the afternoon.

Other than that my class today was pretty good. They got loud easily, but that probably had more to do with the fact that there were 28 of them crammed in a room! But for the most part they listened and we got stuff done and they were pretty polite. So I have very little to report. Which is good I suppose, because I need to start getting ready for the weekend! I'm heading out of here in a little over an hour to go to Vancouver! Once there Dani and I will venture forth to the holy grail of books - Powell's - my love, my sanctuary! And yes, there will be cupcakes! So thank you kids for making my day easy!

Substitute Bailout Program

So I had a new experience today, which is getting rarer after doing this whole subbing thing for three years. So everyone has been hearing a lot about the government bailout programs of banks and auto companies, but I bet none of you have heard about the new "Substitute Bailout Program". I can't really blame you though, because I'm it. I am the bailout program.

You see, I got my job for today at around 9:30 - right about the time I'd given up on getting a job! I arrived at the school at around noon (not because I'm slow, but because that was the time I was supposed to get there) and learned very quickly that I was taking over for another substitute, who apparently, had had such a terrible morning with the class that she didn't want to stay until the end of the day. (She knew this at 9:30!!) So I was defiantly mentally prepping myself for battle. And the kids had those looks on their faces like they smelled fresh meat. The former sub informed me all the ways the class was horrible to her before she left. So I braced myself for the storm and stood in front of that riled up group of kids who just watched their previous teacher leave in defeat and stood my ground. I told them immediately what I expected from them and that I was sure that they were going to do a better job this afternoon. About thirty minutes later, during their lunch time they got a visit from the principal who lectured them on their behavior and read off the list of names of kids who the sub had said were misbehaving. The offenders had to stay in during their recess with the vice principal, who made them write letters explaining their behavior while he filled out behavior referrals.

When I got them all back together after recess we did literacy block and writing. And actually, for the most part they were pretty good. Not sure what did it - probably had a lot to do with the fear put in them by the principal and vice principal, but I kind of like to think that I had a little something to do with it. They seemed to respect me, which the first sub reported that they did not do for her. And oddly, despite me right off the bat telling them what they were and were not going to do and sticking to it, they seemed to really LIKE me. At the end of the day some of the biggest trouble-makers of the morning list were asking me if I would come back tomorrow!

If Only Kids Hired Teachers...

...because I think I'd have like 100 jobs by now!  And while currently, the kids' opinion of me isn't seeming to make much a difference in the job hunt, it does make me feel good.

Today I got one of the sweetest notes today from a kid in the class I was subbing.  The girl, who is in second grade (although the job listing said this was a first grade, it wasn't - it was second), wrote "Dear Miss Barnes, You are nice and you are a fun teacher it helps me learn.  I wish you were my 3rd grade teacher please can you? Love, *name omitted* P.S. Please, please and please."  And at the bottom of this note was a cute little picture of stick-figure me writing swiggles on the white board with stick-figure girl sitting at her desk, smiling and writing.  Even though I'd only been with them for about two hours at this point, I was still so touched by her adorable little card.

The class was actually really sweet as a whole.  I kind of wished I could do a full-day with them.  I also had fun seeing the 3rd graders who I've subbed for a lot this year across the hall.  The only times I've been at this school this year has been for that class, so it was fun to see another room.  I left my sub number with the teacher so maybe she'll request me back sometime!

Thank You Teacher

This morning I got called for an afternoon job in a bilingual kindergarten.  There were no special instructions pleading for a Spanish-speaking sub, so I took the job.

When I arrived I read in the note that one little boy in particular could be quite the handful.  When the assistant arrived she also mentioned this boy and showed me his behavior card.  However, as was the case yesterday, we had more problems with a different child than we did with the one who usually had the problems.  The normally difficult child still had a few moments.  The most charming of these I believe was right after I had called clean-up time.  All the children started putting away the blocks and toys from choice time - except for this one.  He grabbed himself a stack of unifix cubes and walked in big loops around the room breaking off the cubes one at a time and dropping them on the floor - much like Hansel and Gretel did with the bread crumbs.  It was annoying.  After a bit of this and him completely ignoring me telling him to stop, he came back to get more!  I then picked up the container of cubes and said to him, "You're done."  Oddly, at this point he completely calmly retraced his steps and picked every cube back up!  And for the rest of the day he was mostly really good!  He listened.  He sat still.  He cleaned up more than any of the other kids later in the day.  It was shocking really. 

Cutest part of the day though was when we were sitting at the carpet getting ready to go to recess and this boy raised his hand.  He was sitting right in front of me, so I called on him and he stood up, saying, "Teacher, I just wanna say thank you for coming today and helping me to be a good boy and make good choices!"  Then he threw his arms out and gave me a big hug.  So I told him thank you for making good choices and working hard.  He seemed mightily pleased with himself.  It was cute.  Hopefully if I ever go back to this class he'll remember how much he admires me. :)