rubinc in nyc!

I forgot to mention this yesterday, but there’s no school today or tomorrow because of Rosh Hashanah. Woohoo!

Also, only one day after posting about Donors Choose, my overhead transparency proposal has been fulfilled (thanks, Martini!) and Ms. L’s lab coat proposal is one step closer to completeion (thanks, Mariel!). I think it’s no coincidence that both donors are Jewish…

Today was kind of nice, because I served notices to all my students that are currently failing with a note that read: “You can make up this work with me today during lunch, today after school, or next year when you are in seventh grade science again.” Almost all of them opted for one of the first two choices, and so I got to work with my struggling students in small groups and (I think, I hope) really help them catch up.

Ms. L is the 8th grade science teacher at my school, and she’s also a first year TFA teacher. She is incredibly awesome, and we spend a lot of time together lesson planning, grading, fighting with the copy machine, griping about our kids being ridiculous, etc…

Most recently, we combined forces to try and get some resources for our classes. There is this really awesome website called Donors Choose that does something they call “micro-philanthropy” - teachers post proposals for resources they’d like to have, and then random people can contribute as much or as little as they want towards fulfilling it. It’s nice because if a teacher wants $1,000 worth of resources they don’t have to try and find one person to donate $1,000, and if a random person wants to donate a few dollars to a good cause they have somewhere to send it where they know it will be put to good use. Also, everyone who donates gets a thank you package complete with endearing photos of and notes from kids. Ms. L and I currently have one proposal up each:

1. Ms. L’s Proposal -  This one is for lab coats, goggles, and rubber gloves for our kids, for when we start doing real labs with them. They are obsessed with the lab coat and goggles I wear to class, and keep asking when they can wear their own. The proposal is for a class set that Ms. L and I could share. It has $610 left to be fulfilled.
2. My proposal - This one is less exciting, but for something more immediately useful. Ms. L and I have discovered that our students have trouble taking their own free-form notes, and learn best if we give them structured note worksheets with blanks to fill in, pictures to label, charts to fill out, etc… We have also discovered that this only works if we fill out the same worksheet on the overhead projector along with them, since they have difficulty filling out the worksheets if we just go over the answers orally -  for a lot of them it’s because English is their second language. The third thing we discovered is that there exist awesome overhead transparencies that can go in your printer and be used to make projectable versions of our class notes. Unfortunately, these awesome transparencies cost about $1 each - which adds up pretty fast, given that each of us go through about two a day. I’ve already spent $50 on a box of them, but am not too keen on doing that again on my teacher salary. So, my proposal is for a few boxes of these lesson-enhancing miracles and an ink cartridge to use with them, and it has $210 left to be fulfilled.

I promise I won’t turn my blog into a guilt trip to give me money, but if you’re feeling generous Ms. L and I would really appreciate any little bit you have to spare. Also, it’s my birthday on Thursday, so you could consider it an early present

Now, as a reward for reading through my plea for money, this doesn’t really need much explanation:

Dear Ms. Rubin,

I’m truely sorry for what I was doing. I’m sorry for putting my pants up to my knees and started to dance. I’m sorry. It because since I came from recess I was still hyper. And I will Not do anything like that again.

Sinsearly,

David Perez

I’m writing from Boston, woohoo! I hightailed it out of school at exactly 3:00 and made it to Chinatown in time for the 4:00 bus, and now I have about 36 hours to pretend I’m still an MIT student.

Fridays are always frustrating because the kids are ready for the weekend and get annoyed if you try to actually teach them. The last period of the day, which is supposed to be 42 minutes long, ended up having seven minutes of actual instruction. Seven. I timed it. The class started 25 minutes late because they got out of gym late and took forever coming up the stairs, and it ended 10 minutes early, as 8th period always does, because the enormously difficult task of closing binders and inserting them into backpacks takes a long time to be completed. Argh.

Usually I leave school a few hours after the kids do, but since I left right at 3:00 today I actually caught the subway with two of them - including one of my homework club friends. It totally blew their minds that I was going away for the weekend, I think they’re still in that “teachers don’t exist outside of the classroom” frame of mind. Also, when the twins found out I wasn’t going to stay after with them today, they got mad at me! One of them even told me he wasn’t going to be my friend any more. I guess it’s sweet that they like hanging out with me so much… sweet, but also kind of creepy.

Off to forget about school for a few hours, yay!

I’m starting to look forward to the hours between 3 and 5, since the students who stay after with me are so sweet. Today I had my difficult class for the two-hour double period from Hell, and the whole time I just kept counting down the time until they left and my after school buddies came. Today I had five kids stay for Thursday “Homework Club” - the twins and three other boys. It was funny because none of them actually wanted homework help, they just wanted to play with the triple beam balances and graduated cylinders I’ve been teaching them to use in class. I even let them use my tuning fork, and they were in hog heaven. One of them even spontaneously volunteered “I used to think science was boring, but now I LOVE science!” Aww…

Funny kid quotes of the day:

• [in response to me showing up to one class with my lab coat unbuttoned] “Wow, miss! I didn’t know you wore nice clothes under there!”
• “There you go, Ms. Rubin. That’s how you’re supposed to talk to them.” [A “good kid” in one of my more talkative classes, after I got frustrated with one group of students and angrily gave them all recess detentions.]
• “Don’t lie, Ms. Rubin, you’re not Jewish. You’re white!” [that was one of the homework club kids, when I was explaining why we have two days off next week for Rosh Hashanah.]
• “Black is a racist color.” [Another homework club kid, when he discovered that mixing the red, green and blue colored water from the graduated cylinders together made black. And yes, I did pause to discuss what racist actually means with him.]

I have some cute pictures of the homework club kids, but it’s super-illegal for me to put them online. So instead, here are some pictures of the totally sketchy day care I pass on my walk from the subway station to school:

You can tell how quality it is by its proximity to a gas station! Make sure to soak in how disfigured and unevenly colored Snow White’s face is:

Here is the other side of the building:

The main points of interest on this side are the deformed children that are pulling on each other a little too roughly:

And the pony that is giving you the Evil Eye:

That thing creeps me out every time I walk by it.

I am in a unusually good mood today, I think it has to do with the fact that the twins stayed after with me until 5:30 helping me and being adorable. One of them brought me three Oreos and presented them very ceremoniously, along with a “I meant to bring you five but I got hungry on the stairs.” And they both gave me a huge hug before they left, I LOVE those boys!

So, I’ve decided that kids are weird. I’ve also realized that I know pretty much nothing about what it’s like to be a middle schooler in the Bronx. Here is a short portion of the loooong list of things I absolutely do not understand about my students:

1. Their crazy slang. Sometimes they tell me a whole story and at the end of it I have literally no idea what the events they told me about were. I’ve figured out a few words - “beasting” means acting aggresively, or like a beast. “Tight,” which I thought meant cool, actually means “angry,” as in “Miss Rubin is getting tight, y’all better shut up!”
2. Their weird trends. One that is currently raging is to roll up a strip of white paper, color one end of it with an orange marker, and pretend it’s a cigarette. Charming.
3. Their denial of all responsibility for their actions. This one actually only applies to some kids, others will act out but then apologize afterwords, or at least own up to what they did when I call them on it. Others, though… the other day I turned around from the board to see a kid breakdancing on the floor, and had the following exchange:

Me: Dijonaise, why are you breakdancing in class?

Dijonaise: It wasn’t me!

Me: Dijonaise, I saw you!

Dijonaise: Oh, yeah.

What is that even about?

Speaking of breakdancing, today I saw them do something called “gettin’ light” for the first time. It’s when they all make a circle and do this clapping pattern, while one or two at a time get pushed into the center and dance off. I watched them from a fifth story window during recess, it was really cool. Some of the kids who have a lot of trouble sitting still and focusing during class are actually awesome dancers, now I understand why they are always wiggling around and hopping out of their seats. Maybe if I put my lessons to music and had them dance out the motion of particles…

Despite my continuing struggles with classroom management, today was actually pretty good for the following reasons:

1. I got an elevator key! You need one to call the elevator (so the students can’t use it), and so far I’ve had to rely on the kindness of nearby teachers to get my cart between floors. I also got a key to the teachers’ bathroom, woohoo!
2. My “bad” class was taking a test. Usually giving tests is stressful because it’s hard to make them sit still and not talk, but their homeroom teacher was there so they were perfectly silent and I got to grade papers the whole time.
3. Two of my students stayed after with me until 5:00 to help me with various mundane teacher tasks. They are twins, and since they are in different classes I’ve never interacted with the both of them together until now. I LOVE these two kids, they are some of the few that actually act like the 12 year olds they are. One of them is the kid who always asks random, yet urgent, questions in the middle of class, and he had quite a few saved up for me:
1. “Have you been on a date?” When I replied in the affirmative he got really excited and started firing off even more, “A real date? At a restaurant? What did it feel like? Were you nervous?”
2. “Are vampires real? I saw a thing on YouTube about them, is it true once they bite you you’re one of them?”
3. “Do you ever take your white jacket [lab coat] off? Can you take it off?”
4. “What do teachers eat for breakfast?”
5. “Can I stay after with you every day?”

They also both told me about the girls they have crushes on (both of whom I also teach) and asked for advice about how to proceed. One even showed me a note he had written to the target of his affection, and it was the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen. I really wanted to make a copy of it, but he ended up hiding it in her desk so she’ll find it tomorrow. I don’t remember it word for word, but it definitely involved the phrase “I really like you actually I love you but I am too shy to say it.” She better like him back or I’m failing her…

My best guess is that it’s drink Red Bull and snort Pixie Stix, because when they come in on Monday they are REVVED UP. I even had my first fight today, it was a girl vs. a boy in the hallway coming in from recess. Fights are crazy, because once it starts the involved parties go into crazy mode and completely shut out all outside input. Thank God two other, more experienced teachers were nearby to help me break it up.

Today I gave them grade printouts with all their missing assignments as 0’s in an attempt to motivate them to make up their missing work. I’ve been telling them all year that they have to do their homework, it’s part of their grade, if they get a 0 it really brings down their average, etc… but when some of the most delinquent students saw they had, say, a 27% average, they totally freaked out and acted like they had no idea that not doing any homework and randomly walking out of class would negatively impact their grade. I’m hoping to get into the routine of giving them weekly grade updates to make it more clear how their behavior and work affects their grades, which should in turn (theoretically) inspire them to actually come to class, do their homework, and not fight with scissors.

I had a few funny exchanges with kids today. The same kid who frantically asked about world peace last week once again interrupted my lesson (today it was on how to use a ruler - a task that most of them actually don’t know how to do correctly) with another irrelevant, yet apparently urgent, question: “Ms. Rubin, what do scientists do?”

Also, all the floors of my school are just one long hallway, and the fifth floor is half as long as the first four. So the elevator that is in the middle of the hall on floors 1 - 4 is at the end of the hallway on floor 5. It can be a little disorienting the first couple of times you ride it, but after that it’s pretty easy to figure out. Unless…

Student: Ms. Rubin, when you get in the elevator, can you feel it going sideways?

Me: Um, what?

Student: You know, the elevator. Can you feel when it goes sideways?

Me: I’m not quite sure I know what you’re talking about…

Student: When it goes to the fifth floor, and it goes sideways to the end of the hall. What does it feel like when you ride it?

It took me about five minutes and one diagram to convince her that the elevator does not actually move sideways when it goes between the fourth and fifth floors, it just goes up and down and the halls are different lengths.

Grad class number three was tonight. I feel like the most useful part is hearing all the other middle school science teachers share their crazy stories, and finding out that all the weird things my kids do (e.g. crumple up blank sheets of paper so they can demand that I let them get up to throw them out) are actually weird things that all middle school kids do. It’s nice to know that I’m not the only one going through this…

Today seemed like it would never end. I’m still sick, and when I woke up I seriously considered calling for a sub before I remembered that I don’t have any sub lesson plans on file in the office like I’m supposed to, so I can’t. Ugh. It was funny to see how the kids reacted to me being sick, a few were very sweet about it and told me to feel better soon as they left. Others just came into the room, looked at me, and blurted out “Miss Rubin, you look terrible!” Wonderful. My favorite was when I sneezed - a kid said “bless you,” I said “thanks,” and then he held out his hand and said, “where’s my ticket?” (I give them raffle tickets if I notice them being good when those around them aren’t, and I have a drawing on Friday for candy). Nice to know I’m teaching them good values - only do something nice if you think you’ll get a prize for it.

Speaking of my Friday raffle, today a kid stole my candy bag off my cart. I had it on there for the first two classes, and when I went to get it for the third one it was just gone. Luckily I had some other little stuff in the cart I could give out as prizes to my second two classes, but I was (and am) pretty mad. I can’t believe some kid was cheeky enough to steal from me, even if it was only sixty cents worth of tootsie rolls! I’m also mad because I’ll probably never find out who it was, and now I have to be all crazy and protective of my candy. This is why we can’t have nice things.

The best part of today was after school ended, when I went to the first meeting of the technology committee. I joined on a hot tip that all members get their own school laptop, so now I have a macbook I can keep at school and no longer have to haul my computer back and forth if I want to plan lessons or enter grades during my prep periods. Yay! All I have to do is go to a meeting once a month and talk about how the school should spend its technology budget…

I’ve been waking up with a sore throat for the past few days, so it wasn’t too surprising this morning when I woke up with a full blown cold. It’s difficult enough dragging myself out of bed and to a full day of having the life sucked out of me by preadolescents when I’m feeling well, so today was not very fun for me or my students. There were a few highlights, though:

• There was a part of my lesson that involved kids getting up and drawing on the overhead. None of them really cared about the lesson, but they all wanted to draw on the overhead. “Javier,” who always wants to be called on and sulks if I ever pick someone else, got mad when I picked “Jose” instead and called me a racist. It’s actually not the first time that’s happened - I think they think “racist” means “white person who does something you don’t like,” regardless of whether or not race has anything to do with it (which is usually the case, given that for three out of my four classes it would be literally impossible for me to call on a kid who isn’t black or brown). Anyways, I pointed out to Javier that he and Jose are the same race, so me picking Jose over him is not racist. Javier go flustered for a second, then observed that Jose has big curly hair and he himself has a buzz cut, and said, “Fine, then you’re a haircist!” I’m actually not sure if I’m supposed to find that funny or be mad, but it was hard for me not to laugh.
• When I was leaving the school at about 4:30, I saw one of my kids across the street and called out “Hi, Jonathan!” He waved, but this other nearby kid I’ve never even seen before was apparently also named Jonathan, and he waved and yelled “Hi, lady!” back. It was adorable.
• At the end of the last period, which is always rough because they’re ready to go home, and which was especially rough today because I wasn’t feeling well, I was lining them up for dismissal. I was getting frustrated because there was generalized chaos and it took waaay longer than it should have. I finally got them ready to go and walked them out, and this kid who was towards the back must have seen the expression on my face because he came over and said, “Not a good day, huh Ms. Rubin?” I sort of nodded while I thought of what to say, and he just gave me a huge smile and said, “Don’t worry, tomorrow will be better!”

Tonight was my school’s “Curriculum Night,” in which the parents are invited to the school to meet the teachers and see what their kids are learning. Out of the whole seventh grade (~120 students), a total of five parents showed up. Five. I stayed at school until 7:00 for five parents, only two of which actually had kids in my class - and of course those two kids are perfectly well-behaved and awesome. I understand that a lot of the parents have to work (often more than one job), take care of other kids, run busy households, and so on, but it was still pretty frustrating to put in a twelve hour day for a 4% turnout. Oh well, I guess that’s what phone calls home are for…

I did this infamous TFA teaching activity where you have them write the steps for making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and then attempt to follow their steps literally with actual peanut butter, jelly, and bread. For example, in response to “first you get some peanut butter,” you reach into peanut butter jar with your hand. Or for “and then you spread it everywhere,” you go to spread it on the student who gave that direction. It’s supposed to illustrate the importance of writing detailed and specific procedures for labs, but I think what a lot of my students took away from it was, in the words of one kid, “Ms. Rubin doesn’t even know how to make a sandwich!”

Also, I fell asleep on the subway for the first time today. Thankfully I woke up in time for my stop, but I wouldn’t be too surprised if I sleep through it at some point in the future.