They arranged for us to have a substitute on Friday so we could take a Step Up to Writing professional development course. After the course, we had the rest of the day to grade Chunk Tests, which was wonderful. The only problem was the substitute I had...you know, the ones they warn you about that take your stuff and don't monitor the students.
I really enjoyed the training, but that information would have been very, very helpful a couple of weeks ago when we started our research projects. The Step Up to Writing books are wonderful, but they can be overwhelming if you don't have any training in it. I struggled my way through teaching research projects, but I gave my students a very broad topic and told them to choose a subtopic to work with. I realized after our training that I really should have spent more time teaching them how to narrow down their topics. She gave us a very broad topic: payday, then she told us to write a topic sentence, two details, and a conclusion. I asked her what she wanted to know about payday and she just shrugged. I immediately realized what she was doing, and I felt guilty because I know that's basically what I did to my students. I know now how overwhelming it can be and I feel bad that I left them to do that basically by themselves, though I did help if they asked for it. Oh well, at least now I know what to do next year, and I'm learning everyday.
After the training, I went by my room, but when I saw who the sub was, I left and went to lunch. I've heard a lot about her,and I try not to judge by what I hear because people often exaggerate the truth, but she came up to me and told me she hated our students and if I was smart, I would go to another school district to teach. That kind of rubbed me the wrong way. In my opinion, if she hates El Dorado Schools so much, she shouldn't sub there. Anyway, I'll have a funny story about that later on.
After lunch, I went and began grading papers with the other two 10th grade English teachers (who are both new) and one 11th grade English teacher who helps us out a lot. That was fun, but we didn't get as much done as we hoped because we all do things differently, much like our students. For example, Seth has to have complete silence where the rest of us have to have music. I can't do my work at a desk, I have to be able to lay out on a couch or a bed...Needless to say, I sprawled out on the floor, and then was laughed at when Mr. Beck, the assistant principal, came to check on us. Still, we got more done that we would have had we not had a substitute.
One final story, and then I'm done for today. I had a student that was rather stressed and I told her I would meet her after school to help her on her English assignments that she didn't understand. (My students know I will TRY to help them with any assignment, but science and French are not my strong subjects. :) ) Anyway, I went during 6th period, when I have her, to ask if she was still going to meet me. When I saw the sub was engrossed in something, I just motioned for the student to come to the second door and talk to me. Of course all my other students came as well to tell me she was writing a girl up for something she did not do. (The girl who really did it confessed, but the sub did not believe her. I did because I know the students...) The sub saw the commotion, looked at me and said, "Excuse me, young lady, are you supposed to be in here?" I chuckled a little and was going to tell her who I was when my student rudely interrupted and said I was the real teacher. I felt bad for that. I apologized and said I just needed to ask a students a question. Then I "fussed" at my class for not doing their work and escorted the girl to the office. I told her on the way that the sub is in authority and even if they don't like her, they need to respect her authority. She didn't get in trouble in the office, but I did talk to my students on Monday about respect. I was rather disappointed in the way they acted, even though I don't care for her either. All in all, it was a great day.
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