Day 86: Semester Review

Happy 2014!

I know it’s been over a month since I’ve posted, but it has been a busy few weeks.  The biggest reason I’ve been slightly scatterbrained is that just before Thanksgiving, my husband and I found out we were going to have a baby.  This is joyous news, and we – and my students, when they found out – are thrilled.  I’ve been spending lots of my free time either nauseous or sleeping, hence my lack of posts, but I’m hoping in the new semester and second trimester, I’ll be a little more organized and less exhausted.  I told my first period students shortly before Christmas break, as in the series of about five minutes, I –
– passed back a quiz, then looked perplexed when my students gave them back to me. They told me I had just asked for them to be returned, and I had zero recollection of saying so.
– dropped a handful of paperclips into my full coffee cup sitting on my desk, a good two feet away from my actual paperclip cup.
– yelled at a girl for going to the bathroom, minutes after I told her she could go.  Other students assured me I even used the word “bathroom” when talking to her, to assuage any thoughts that I had thought I responded to a different question.

First period looked about ready to call the nurse to take me away, so I told them why I’d been a bit off, and asked them to please keep it quiet.  At the bell, the Spanish teacher who teaches next door to me came up to offer congratulations, as a student received a text during her first period and announced it to the class.  Throughout the day, student and teacher congratulations came pouring in.

The next day, I asked first period which part of “keeping it quiet” involved a mass text.  They had the decency to look shocked, and started offering up all types of answers: “You can check my phone if you want – no texts yesterday!” “I don’t have a phone!” “I don’t have any friends!” I didn’t really expect it to stay secret, but I enjoyed needling them.

Anyways, the secret was out, so now I can munch goldfish in front of my students with impunity.  They’ve also gotten used to me being a minute or so late for class for bathroom breaks and they’ve gotten quite good at starting their bell work without fuss.  They mentioned this week that many of our daily bell work editorials have started coming from parenting blogs, and they were right; this week’s lineup included How Much to Pay the Babysitter and Bilbo Baggins is a Girl, both written by parents.  To counteract this effect, yesterday we tackled an Independent piece titled “Is it 1914 all over again?” and today, Rolling Stone’s now-infamous editorial, “5 Economic Reforms Millennials Should be Pushing For.”

I’m in the process of finishing my AP syllabus to submit to the College Board this month (super last-minute; I’m still a terrible procrastinator) and I look forward to grading the two stacks of AP essays this weekend that I’ve been hanging onto since 2013 (she said facetiously).  Have a wonderful weekend, and I’ll check in next week!