The Great 2011

I have convinced myself that 2011 will be my year.
I am healthy.
I am strong.
I am happy.
I am getting a little bit more fulfilled.

I know that I start each year out with a whole lot of optimism, and then eventually I get a little more down, until I am just like the previous year. I feel much differently now, though. I’m not sure what it is. Is it that I have decided to just give my life over to God? Is it that I have accepted who I am, and that I want to build upon that girl? Is it because I am beginning to branch out in Memphis? I suppose I can pinpoint the reason I feel strong and beautiful right now, but it is still fascinating.

Somehow, this week at school has been quite wonderful. Monday, we introduced our new Big Goal. We will get a class average of 6 on an End of Year Exam, based on the AP Literature Exam. It is insane. They freaked out. I am freaking out. I suppose. Mostly, though, I feel peace with it. If they don’t reach the goal, at least I had really high expectations of them. i don’t expect these kids to be able to pass an AP test yet, but perhaps one day. They just have to learn what other college-bound high schoolers are doing in life.

Tuesday, we started our poetry unit. I introduced poetry by showing some slam poetry, some Saul Williams, some KRS-One, and even some Taylor Mali. We also talked about Tupac, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, etc. We discussed sonnets, lyric poetry, ballads, epics, and dramatic poetry. We watched a short clip of Ethan Hawke’s version of the “To be or not to be” soliloquy. They seemed into it, excited even.

Wednesday was fun. We did some coding of poetry–ABAAB, etc. They got approximate rhyme, they got internal rhyme, they got free verse. It was great.

Yesterday, Thursday, we started on “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost. While 3 of my classes really understood what was going on, and they understood the symbolism and metaphor there, my 5th period was unable to get it. I honestly don’t understand where they missed such important lessons as looking further into a text, or not taking things so literally. I wonder if they understand sarcasm or double meanings or even tact. I am really going to have to take steps to ensure that they can analyze that text.

Today, we are took their quiz, and we are watching a movie.

Life is good.
It truly, truly is.

Vocab words of the week

lunchin’: v. joking/kidding, and sometimes it means lying. Example: “Ms. Curry, don’t listen to CR; she be lunchin’.”

neck: exclamation. This is yelled in a very annoying way when someone believes a lie that someone has told them.

I am thinking that I really want to do some sort of linguistic study on my students. I’m not sure that I will actually be allowed to do that, but I have been doing a lot of observation.

For example, a lot of my kids, and the adults also, say “on tomorrow” where I would say “tomorrow.” Example: “The test is on tomorrow.” I was thinking that I wanted to explore who said this and what sort of social/linguistic boundaries were drawn when they used it.

Also, a lot of my kids do not invert their verbs when questioning. Example: “Ms. Curry, what time it is?”

And, like all AAVE speakers, my kids do not know how to conjugate “be.” For example, “Ms. Curry be teaching us about inferences today.” When I say “don’t know how,” I just don’t think they know when it is appropriate to conjugate this. I see “be” in inappropriate places in their essays. I have tried to correct this ALL the time, but it’s not really working.

Anywho, not that anyone reads this, but if any Georgetown student wanted to come do a sociolinguistic study on my kids in Memphis, I would totally allow it.

The Week from Hell.

This has been the worst week ever.

The air conditioning is off at the school. They have turned the heat on at the school. Which means the students don’t want to listen to me, and the students don’t want to do any work. As Ms. K said, apparently 72 degree weather means they think it is cold enough to turn the heat on. I mean, it is Memphis and it is hotter than I’m used to, but 72 degrees is too hot, nevertheless.

I have been sick. I ate some sort of bad chicken, and so I was throwing up for the rest of the entire weekend. It was miserable. Monday was not good. Not good at all. It was miserable. Kids were miserable. I was miserable. We worked out of workbooks. I absolutely hate workbooks, but I had them do worksheets, while I counted down the minutes until 2:15, when I could go home.

Yesterday, in the hallway, I see this kid sprinting down the hallway with what looked like a music stand (turned out it was part of a fan that he had stolen from a teacher’s room). He started beating another kid with it. Turns out he got 127 days suspension (not sure why 127….I guess that’s the rest of the school year?) My kids rushed into the hallway, as did the kids of every single classroom. I really don’t know why we are so attracted to violence in this country…Personally, I never want to take part in a fight, nor do I want to see one. Ok, who am I kidding. I do want to see one. However, my kids’ amazement at the fight was just disgusting. When I finally got them to come back into the classroom and chill out, I had to have a little lecture with them that went something like this: “Is a 180 REALLY worth the mp3 player that the fight was really about?” Someone then called someone else a faggot, and I had to have this lecture:

Me: “Hey PS, how would you like it if I called you the n-word?”
PS: “I wouldn’t. You’re not allowed to call me that.”
Me: “Well, faggot is like the n-word. Unless you are an actual homosexual, you are not allowed to use it.”

I know that’s not the real explanation, and I know that I wish I could give them some sort of lesson about the n-word, but that’s a fight for a stronger teacher. I can’t change the way that they talk, I can just give them a little something to think about.

Then, yesterday, my principal came up to me and sent me down to the Technology Training Center for a Reading Plus workshop. I actually think that it would have been extremely useful. However, when I got down there, I received the notification that the training was not that day, but the next day. So, my principal got me a sub, I left my 6th period (my rowdy, noisy, and highly annoying 6th period) to go to a training that was not that day.

And it’s only Wednesday.

Amazing Weekend

I had an amazing weekend with my momma and with Rhonda, Annie’s mom. They came down on Thursday evening, and were here until Sunday morning.

On Thursday evening, we went to the Soul Fish Café with Michelle. It is a great restaurant; my mom had the fried catfish, and Rhonda had the blackened catfish. Both of them absolutely loved their meals. I had the fish tacos; they were OK.

On Friday morning, Rhonda and Momma went with me to the ‘Dale. They seemed to enjoy it. My students were super excited to meet my mom, and they were really well behaved. I really liked that my mom and Rhonda got to see my 5th period class; they can now understand how difficult it is to get through a lesson with them. They suggested that I try to get an inclusion teacher for the class, and I think that now I am going to have one.

Friday afternoon, we went to this amazing place called The Cheesecake Corner, where were ate these gigantic pieces of cheesecake..It was amazing. We then went to see Wicked at the Orpheum. It was AMAZING. I still have “Defying Gravity” stuck in my head.

Saturday, we got up and went to see the ducks at the Peabody. We then walked around for a while, down on Beale, and then went to Gus’s Chicken, which had, seriously, the most amazing fried chicken I’ve ever eaten in my entire life. We then went to on a riverboat cruise on the Mississippi, and it was great. It was such a beautiful day, and the information was great. We then drove around, down to Graceland and the Pink Palace. We then did the carriage rides downtown. It was beautiful.

New Vocab Words

I have 5 new words that I have entered into my vocabulary:

green: adj. mean. Example: “Ms. Curry, why you so green?”

to go ham: v. to go crazy on someone. Example: “Ms. Curry went ham on PS yesterday!”

to mean mug: v. to stare down someone in a threatening manner. Example: “Ms. Curry, I had to fight DW! He was mean mugging me!”

the candy lady: n. the woman who illegally runs a convenience store out of her living room and sells to the high school students. Honestly, this is the weirdest thing that I have ever experienced. There is this woman who buys a bunch of slushies and hot chips and soda and then sells them to the high school kids. They come to her house, and she sells to them. Apparently, there is a candy lady in every black neighborhood in the South.

to false claim: v. to falsely proclaim that you are a member of a particular gang. Kids get the crap kicked out of them by the real gangs for this one.

Tacky Day.

Yesterday was tacky day. It’s homecoming week, and yesterday was Tacky Day. Kids were running up and down the hallway, taking pictures, wearing ridiculous clothes. And, there was a full moon. Everything was craazzy. Seriously nuts.

There was a fight in my classroom. The transformer blew, leaving my class of behaviorally deficient students in my classroom for about 2 hours.

The fight: It was in between 3rd and 4th periods. DW, who is in my 4th period, came into my classroom, sitting at a desk near mine. We were talking about getting his grades up, when another kid, who I don’t know, came into my classroom. He said, “What’s up” to DW. I thought they were all friends. DW then stood up, and the other kid punched him in the face. So, there was a great, lovely fight in my classroom. They really looked just like Alvin and Chessie, my cats, fighting each other, paws out. I told all the other kids to move out of the way, ran over to the emergency button, hit it, and then ran out into the hallway. Thankfully, there were several male teachers outside, and they ran into the classroom to break it up. Needless to say, my students couldn’t get calmed down to do their Do Now. so, I sent them to lunch.

When the students came back from lunch, we were working for a little while when the transformer blew. Of course, the kids were jumping up and down, excited for the prospect of getting out of school early. Of course, they didn’t get out of school early, but they thought that they were. So, there was lots of jumping up and down, there was lots of insanity. I understand, but as a teacher, it was quite difficult.

Oh, children.

Updates in Ms. Curry’s classroom.

This week was very interesting. Ups and downs, goods and bads.

I was teaching the “The Lottery” this week, and one of the character’s wife is a “scold.” One kid asked what that meant, and another student said, “Like Ms. Curry. Makes us do stuff all the time.” I did not give a punishment. He was completely right!

I think I made a breakthrough with one of my students. Not sure. I at least think I know how to make him pay attention in class. He kept falling asleep in class, so I asked him to go stand up for a minute. He went and sat on the bookshelf and was more involved in my class than he had ever been before.

I’ve decided to teach “The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind” to my kids. It’s going to take a while, it’s about 250 pages, but I think that it will be worth it. I’m going to make reading groups, based on their reading levels, and hopefully we can get through it in 6 weeks.

My behavior tracker is going well. The kids hate seeing anything below a B, which really means that I only had to give them one consequence, and they really love it when they get an A. Ms. Curry loves it too. It means her classroom is completely orderly and wonderful.

I’m becoming fluent in 10th grader:
to check: verb. to publicly ridicule someone in a playful or serious manner.
real talk: noun. conversation that is serious. This phrase is usually used when conversation had previously been playful, but now must turn serious: “Real talk, guys, I think I’m going to be sick.”

I will keep you updated with other phrases as I come across them

My school was featured on the news on Thursday for a fight that they think was related to gangs. There was a gun involved. Mr. A, my favorite veteran teacher at the Dale, helped me scrub gang symbols off of one of my desks this week. Some kid had used a Sharpie. These are the big gangs of Memphis. I just became so broken-hearted. So many of my students have gang-related tattoos on their bodies already. They are 15, 16 years old, and already they are involved in this stuff. I overheard some girls talking about what they had to do to get “in” the other day, when they were talking about what I think is a new gang starting up. These are my babies, and it makes me so angry at rappers, movies, and all that jazz. Everything that encourages my students to further destroy their own lives…Oh, and the Gangster Disciples wear Georgetown gear all the time. Now I’m really upset.

Need Books

Does anyone read this blog?

Probably not.

However, if you do, I NEED books!!!! Any kind of books–used, new, early education readers, novels, magazines, nonfiction, poetry collections, whatever my kids can read. We NEED to have independent reading time. I have a lot of students who are reading at 2nd or 3rd grade levels, and I also have kids who are reading at the college level. I need them to READ!!!!!!!

Help me out.

Insubordianate/Definant to School Personnel

So, I wrote up a girl for being constantly insubordinate and defiant. She then refused to go to the office and told me I was a liar.

Ironic.

Teaching

August 25, 2010

First couple weeks have been challenging on so many levels. Spinning a bunch of plates on sticks, trying not to let them crash has been increasingly difficult with more and more students. SPED students, discipline issues, investing students in their education, lesson planning, LOCKERS (Oh-the bane of my existence!), testing, testing, and more testing!, calling parents, and so much more.

I also had a couple of cops bust in on my classroom during 6th period yesterday. I have no idea why. About 6 cops, literally pushing my students against the walls, searching for something. Patting them down and using the metal detector. It was just awful. I think the worst was seeing little Jonathan, who I think is adorable, being treated like a perp. It was just awful. I just wonder if there was an actual reason for that, or if they were just searching them because they are black kids in an inner city.

I really did prepare myself for this. I knew that there were going to be some cultural things that I wasn’t used to; I’ve watched Dangerous Minds, and I worked in ATL. But, seeing it happen right in front of you is different.

Montrell and Renard have parole officers. They ask me if they can call their POs. Montrell wears an ankle monitor. Students wear those hideous grills, and they come in through the metal detectors 3 times a week. It’s awful.

Ms. Roberts (aka-Danielle, a corps member) had to write up a few students for talking about my ass– “Ms Curry, you know, next door, has one fine ass for a white girl.” I was MORTIFIED.

Oh! And I coach soccer, too. It’s fun. We suck, but that’s ok. I love how structured my life is.

My students are brilliant. I love each and every one of them, even Paula, who consistently is insubordinate. I absolutely cannot wait until next week, when we start content.