Balance

I knew it would happen. Yesterday was far too easy and fun of a day. Life always balances out. I don't know where to start

1. I got lost on the way to work today. Ok not really lost, but who hides an elementary school inside of a high school. Well that would be my silly district, an elementary school and a high school housed in the same building. Of course the high school's name is on the big sign out front. The elementary school sign is tucked in a corner and was only visible if you happened to be arriving from the south, I of course was driving from the north. Maybe the elementary school is in the witness protection program.

2. Upon arrival in the office I was warmly welcomed by the secretary, told about a free luncheon for teachers, told there was an afternoon assembly, and pointed toward my room for the day. The school's janitor was waiting at my door to unlock it for me. He also warmly welcomed me and said just to ask if I needed anything. Maybe this was going to be a good day!

3. I accepted this job a few days ago, so it was not an unexpected absence for the regular teacher. The teacher had time to prepare for a substitute. I start reading through the teacher's lesson plans-the plans are vague beyond belief. Example:

9:00 - 10:30 Reading Block with Room 107. See notes.
10:30 - 11:30 Social Studies with Group A. See notes.

I start wondering, what is group A? Am I switching classes, are different classes coming to my room? I don't know because her plans don't give any details. I also have no lunch count sheet in my room. So back to the office I go. Of course the office is empty. I wait for over 5 minutes and no one comes. Finally I run into the secretary as I was walking back to my class.

Another piece of good news. The school doesn't take lunch counts. No explanation, but I don't care. Its the part of the day that I despise so I'm just glad not to have to deal with it. She tells me the fifth grade is split into 3 groups based on behavior. And she tells me that its my lucky day because group A is the good behavior group. Excellent news for me.

4. Students begin to arrive, the teacher has left a note on the board telling the students to behave and to grab a paper from the table to start the day. It is a handwriting paper, and for some stupid reason the teacher only left enough papers for about 2/3 of the class. So all ready 1/3 of the class has a reason to start goofing off.

5. Attendance. You can pretty much figure out which students are going to be a problem as soon as you start to take attendance. This is probably a good thing. You know exactly which names to learn, and which names to leave in the note at the end of the day. Here is a hint, students, if you have a substitute be quiet for the first 15 minutes of the day, and then you can probably get away with murder the other 6 hours because the substitute probably won't know your name.

6. I'm not even done with attendance at this point and I have students yelling across the room, arguing with each other, out of their seats. We start the reading lesson and I have 2 girls who are refusing to work. I start to wonder, if I have group A and they are the good students, what the hell is group C like? Are they convicted felons?

7. The principal and her assistant stop by my class several times throughout the day. It does nothing to stop the behavior of the rowdy students. They just keep screwing around without a care in the world.

8. Assembly---this deserves its own separate post.

9. Birthday celebration. A girl's mother arrives with cupcakes for the entire class. Just what this class needs--Sugar. Luckily the day will be over in 30 minutes.