Sometimes, you need to write, but not here. Not yet.
Nearly
Month: August 2024
Conestee Changes
We’ve been going to Conestee Park for some years now. We’d lived here for several years before discovering it: our now-sadly-deceased neighbor, Mr. F, mentioned that he went to Conestee every day to walk.
“What’s that?” we asked.
Once we went the first time, we kept going. Again and again. We know all the trails by heart now. A few years ago, they closed the off-road trails to pets and cyclists. They eventually reopened them for pets but not for cyclists. Instead, there’s another off-road section nearby that’s open to cyclists.
We’ve been going there regularly this summer, almost neglecting the Conestee we’ve come to love.
In the meantime, there have been so many changes in the area.
It’s a poorer area for the most part. There were few homes and a lot of trailer homes in small open areas in a forest.
Then the forests started disappearing. Across the street from this trailer home appeared a Dollar General — a sure sign of an economically depressed area.
Then the trailer disappeared and this monstrously huge home appeared. It’s across the street from a Dollar General and some trailer homes.
We’re trying to figure out who would build such a home in such an economically depressed area. We wonder that almost every time we drive by on the way to our now-favorite mountain biking trail, as we did tonight.
Saturday
I spent much of the morning working on school-related issues. My honors kids have turned in their first assignment (the famed/infamous 500-word introductory letter I assign the first day of school — “I didn’t know we’d have homework our first day,” some write), but it’s not for a grade (they don’t know that yet — I will apply it to extra credit later), so I read it as I would anything else: for information.
After lunch, which included (for me) a finely-sliced fresh habanero from a colleague at work, I started working to fix the pressure reduction valve that I had to take out a few weeks ago due to its leaking. I thought, “This should be a quick job. Just some Teflon tape to prevent leaks from the joint between the Shark Bite fitting and the valve itself…” but I knew it wouldn’t be that simple. It never is. Because the valve has 3/4 inch openings and our plumbing is 1/2 inch, I had to add a couple of couplings as well. And two of the four of the connections leaked when I put it all back together and turned on the water again. I turned off the water, pulled everything apart, and did it again, with more Teflon tape. The same thing. I tried a third time, putting an ungodly amount of tape. Finally, I got both of the leaks stopped and a third one started.
In the evening, when K and E went to mass to fulfill their Sunday obligation, I threw the bike on the rack and headed out for a quick loop at our favorite spot. It rained last night, but I didn’t quite realize how much.
Part of the boardwalk — K’s favorite part of the ride — washed out.
While I was gone, though, the Girl decided to bake. And my goodness, did she ever bake. Cupcakes topped with raspberry choclate ganache.
Second Day
“Mr. S, you’re my favorite teacher so far.” We were lining up this morning to head out for related arts (or “essentials” as the new nomenclature dictates — people in education love to rename things to show supposed progress and improvement), and he said this out of the blue.
“You’ve only had one class with each of your teachers so far,” I laughed. “How could you possibly form an opinion that fast?”
“Well, your class was the only class we actually did something in yesterday,” he clarified.
I am not one to begin the first day of school with a long lecture explaining all the ins and outs of my classroom procedures. Sure, I have a specific way I want students to turn in papers, but I’ll explain that when they have their first papers to turn in. Certainly, I want them to know about my website, which I work hard to keep updated daily, but I’ll show them that when I’ve created my first update so they realize firsthand how useful the site can be. Definitely I want them to understand how we’re going to get into groups for collaboration, and I want them to know where each group is to sit, but we’ll go over that when we get in groups for the first time. So the first day, I always make sure we work. We do some writing, some reading, some chatting. We work in groups; we work in pairs; we work individually.
And the second day, we go over procedures.
Are you kidding? We have too much material to cover! Any procedures I’ve neglected will have to wait until that first time we need it!
First Day 2024
Last year’s first day — exactly one year ago — was a little strange. In here, I wrote it was a good day, but that was not entirely true. My two on-level classes were, in a word, hyper. Several students were immediately chatty, immediately disruptive, and there were several more students who fed into that. There was a bit of attitude at times, and while I tamped it all down quicky, it didn’t seem to bode well for the rest of the year.
I was right.
Last year’s eighth grade was tough. We’d heard they’d be tough from sixth-grade teachers; we’d heard they’d drive us to insanity from seventh-grade teachers; and we saw the difference immediately.
Most eighth-grade classes are pretty calm at first. Most eighth-grade students are reasonably relaxed those first days, trying not to push boundaries, trying to make a decent first impression. Those kids (rather, many of them) did not do this. And it was a harbinger of things to come.
“This year’s kids are better,” everyone said. We met them all today, and I would have to agree: a night-and-day difference.
One less stress.
Our kids started school with the usual excitement: the Girl is starting her senior year (how in the world is that possible?) while the Boy is starting seventh grade (how in the world is that possible?).
“Enjoy your last first day of school,” I said to her, though that’s not quite accurate. She’s planning on going into bio-engineering, and she’s already accepting/planning on getting a doctorate, so she has plenty more first days of school.
As for the Boy? A snippet of a conversation from a couple of weeks ago says it all: “You have to pay for college?! You have to pay to sit in school?!”
Turned Upside Down
Our school district has a way of jostling teachers out of their comfort zones. Take this year, for example. We’ve known for a long time that we’ll have new standards for English. The logical way to let teachers transition to these new standards is to let them take their existing lesson plans and retool them as necessary to meet the new standards. True, they are, by and large, almost the same standards, but there are some new items on that list which will take some time to unpack and figure out how to teach. Perhaps letting us focus on that during the first year would be a good move.
We’re also getting new textbooks this year. This means that a lot of the stuff we’ve done in the past might not necessarily work with the new selections in the new textbook. A lot of it will, but not everything. The logical way to transition to this new textbook would be to give teachers a year or two to make the move over. After all, we’ll likely be using these books for six or eight years. We can take our time with transitioning and make sure we do a good job.
Or our district could manage these transitions as they actually chose to this year:
- Provide new standards (actually the state did that, but…)
- Provide a new text book
- Provide a detailed unit pacing guide that we must follow to the letter
- Provide a 35-question, 18-page mandatory test for the end of that unit, a test that has some questions that are not even covered in the unit
- Demand all teachers make the transition immediately
- And best of all, do all this the day before students return for their first day of the school year.
There are a lot of stressed teachers today. I had to talk an experienced teacher out of walking out and simply quitting today. This is her last year before retirement, and it’s not how she wanted to end her career. If she’d walked out, I wouldn’t have blamed her.
Reflections
Why would there be any way to see hate in a text written by a completely benevolent deity?
Why would there be any way to see prejudice in a text written by a completely benevolent deity?
Why would there be any way to see malice in a text written by a completely benevolent deity?
Meet the Teacher 2024
“Last year’s kids were a real challenge,” the seventh-grade teachers all admitted. And to be fair, they warned us about them this time last year: “This is some group!” We hear that a lot, and we put it down to a typical exaggeration: they’re never as troublesome as last year’s teachers make them out to be.
But last year, they were right. One-hundred percent accurate. Last year’s group was exhausting.
“This year is going to be so much calmer for you guys!” all the seventh-grade teachers have been reassuring us during these first days back. Today we met a lot of them.
It’s hard to tell after such a short exchange, but we are, indeed hopeful.
Band concert
Here’s a video of the Boy’s spring band concert.
Camping as a Teen
Supporters
Before Biden bowed out, a meme was going around among Trump supporters.
I’m not going to label his followers as this meme does, but anyone who can look at Trump and not see how completely unhinged he is almost all of the time, how uneducated he appears to be, how incapable of critical thought he seems to be — I just don’t understand.
I freely admitted that Biden was showing some mental deterioration. I never worshipped the man: I was only support him to do a job. Many Trump supporters, however, seem almost to worship the man. He literally can do no wrong.
And even if he does wrong they overlook it. The same individual posted this:
Nationals
Today, the Girl competed in AAU Nationals in high jump for the first time in her life, but it’s the fourth or fifth time she’s competed in AAU Nationals in general. It’s just that before today, it had always been in volleyball.
Unlike volleyball, though, these nationals did not take place a day’s drive away. Instead, they were a mere three hours away.
It was also by far the biggest track meet she’s ever participated in: three high jump mats with over 50 girls participating.
How did she do? She’d say “Meh” if you asked her that question.
But she placed twelfth out of fifty-one girls.
And of course, no matter how it ended, we’re all proud of her and her accomplishments this year.