rubinc in nyc!

Ms. L had to leave early today, so I ended up covering one of her classes in the afternoon. I was nervous about having my old students again, because I figured that they probably still think of me as the first year teacher I was last year. But the whole “we love Ms. Rubin now that she’s not our teacher and we’ve mostly forgotten how terrible last year was” mentality seemed to carry over, and it ended up being the most enjoyable period of the day. We did the work Ms. L left for us, but also just discussed how eighth grade was going and reminisced about seventh grade. It was very fun, I got several hugs, and even the infamous Tareque was well behaved.

Because this was the closest school day to Halloween, there was general anxiety about be egging and assorted shenanigans. We ended up having a rapid dismissal, which is when we basically shove the kids out the door, lock it behind them, and leave the building as quickly as possible. I usually stay after school for a few hours to work, so it was kind of nice to have an excuse to cut out right away and get home by 3:00. Happy Halloween!

I am in an infinitely better mood today than yesterday, in large part because my biochemistry test is over and Lauper appears to have finally moved. My kids were much better behaved today, partially because I did a neat demonstration with iron filings under the document camera. I told them that I had planned to give each of them their own iron filings to play with, but after yesterday decided they are all banned from labs (in reality the iron filings I showed them are the only iron filings I have, and even if I did have enough I would never give them out). Anyway, they seemed to get the hint, and in general were on good behavior to try and earn back lab privileges.

Also, I showed one class the Bill Nye on Buoyancy, for which the song is Sure-Floats-Alot’s “Bill’s Got Boat.” They ate it up, and begged me to replay it over and over. They were singing along and dancing in their seats, it was pretty fun. Maybe I should start to use music as an incentive…

I am in an extremely bad mood today, since during the Coke vs. Diet Coke Density Lab not one but THREE students totally disregarded my instructions to keep the cans flat on their desk, and their goofing off resulted in dropped cans that exploded all over the lab. Each time I made the kid clean up the mess, pay me the 75 cents for the can, and I called their house, but still - how freaking hard is it to just follow directions?? It drives me crazy that my seventh graders are less mature than the first graders I see for AIS.

My grumpiness is being magnified by the fact that I have my first exam in my graduate biochemistry class tomorrow, and unlike when I was in college and studied like a premed, I know I’m not at all prepared. I’m just hoping that everyone else sucks as much as I do so the curve is in my favor.

And lastly, some kid drew this totally creepy picture of me today. I guess it was supposed to be a nice gesture, but I find it disturbing:

I also think it means that this kid has a crush on me. Ugh.

I did the seven-layer density column demonstration today, and as always the kids loved it. The thing that I noticed this time around, however, was how many of them were worried about the fact that I was “wasting” the materials in the column - honey, soap, vegetable oil, etc… A couple of them just commented to themselves or their neighbor that I was wasting things, and some just outright yelled “Miss, why are you wasting your money on that?!” or “If you’re not gonna use that stuff, give it to me!” I wonder if that’s a product of not having spare kitchen supplies to mess around with at home… I tried to convince them that it wasn’t a waste, but they remained pretty skeptical.

And speaking of conserving things, we have to Maria Gonzalezes in our school - one in seventh grade and one in eighth. I recently found out that they are dating each other. As far as I can tell, the basis of the relationship seems to be the fact that they have the same name. I wonder how long it will last… (the relationship, not the fact that they have the same name).

I know I’ve already mentioned Darling, the poorly named motormouth who has a habit of taking her entire class down in flames with her ridiculous antics. I’ve been pleasantly Darling-free for the past week because a fight she got into resulted in a classroom removal, which in turn resulted in her class being calm and lovely and learning lots of things. Today was the last day of the removal though, and the whole time I was teaching her class I was sad to think that she would be back tomorrow and ruin everything.

But fortune smiled upon me, and - I realize that me being happy about this makes me a terrible human - Darling broke her ankle after school today! Apparently they were re-planting some trees outside the school, so there were some large holes around. Darling, who is in the habit of running around like a crazy person, ran right into one of them, got covered in mud, and snapped her ankle in the process. So she will probably be out for a few more days, and even when she comes back she will have severely limited mobility and no longer be able to run around and slap people. I really think this was a divine intervention. Although, as my AP put it, “It’s too bad her mouth couldn’t fall in a hole and stop working.”

Oh, and my email-happy student emailed me over the weekend to ask me, “Why are you always so plain?” I’m hoping she’s referring to the fact that, unlike the other female 7th grade teachers, I don’t wear makeup and jewelry, and not just calling me ugly.

First of all, after I responded to that student yesterday and told her that I stayed home because I was sick and Ms. Rubin is my real name, I got the response:

Are you lonely?

I guess she was asking if I was lonely without all my students? Still, weird. And she just emailed me again a few minutes ago:

When are we [classmates] going to get our paychecks? (PS, Your 27…)

Um, they get their paychecks every single Monday without fail, so I don’t know what that question is about. And I also don’t know why she thinks I’m 27, or that I need reminding of my (not actually correct) age. I guess I should brace myself for a lot of weird emails from this kid over the next eight months.

We read this article today about scientists who are working to turn turkey carcasses into oil, and on the reading response sheet I asked them what else they’d like to see turned into oil. The best response by far was, “Humans (if they’re already dead).” The runner up was one seemingly demure girl who wrote, “Poop, pee, and maybe vomit.”

This afternoon was pretty fun, since based on the success of last year’s staff vs. students basketball game we had a staff vs. students flag football game after school. Like last year, my crippling fear of team sports and airborne balls kept me from actually participating, but it was still fun to watch. The best part was spending like an hour hanging out with one of my morning first graders, whose mother teaches at the school and stayed to watch the game. I learned all the intimate details of her upcoming Halloween costume (”Belle! With a gold dress! And white shoes! And my very own white gloves!!”), as well as the latest in first grade humor (”How did the horse read the newspaper? With his HORSE SHOES!! Hahahahaha!!!”). Also, one of my least favorite students from last year got absolutely clobbered by a large male teacher, which was very satisfying to watch. What a nice way to end the week.

My perpetual winter cold has temporarily gotten the better of me, so I stayed home and slept all day.

I did get this nice email from a student, though:

Ms.Rubin, why weren’t you in school today? And what’s your real name?

One nice thing about teaching in a NYC public school is that I got a free flu shot today. I’ve never actually got one before, but I figure I might as well - though I think it might already be too late, as I’ve already been coughing and sniffling for the past week

Another nice little bonus today was that we had a fire drill at the beginning of my double period with the Sidewinder’s class. Lovely child that he is, the Sidewinder started screaming “Fire! Fire!” during the drill, and promptly got nabbed by an admin. As a result, I got to enjoy the double period free of his screaming and writhing

The best thing of all that happened today was when I was walking to my subway stop, and I ran into my former student Emily (I wrote a student profile about her last year). She gave me a huge hug, and asked me “which high school should I go to so that I can be a science teacher? Because that’s what I decided I want to do.” I wanted to cry, I love that kid so much.

Lastly, this isn’t really a perk, but I thought it was pretty funny: We were doing the lab today where we test various materials for electrical conductivity (thanks again to Ben for making us awesome conductivity-testing kits!) and I suddenly heard Tyfany yelling “But it’s real! It’s real!” I went over t investigate, and it turns out she was upset because “my ring is conducting the electricity but it’s made of real gold and only metal things conduct!” She was actually getting really angry about it, as if I was personally telling her that her ring is fake. Fortunately I was able to convince her that gold is a metal before she had a total meltdown.