A Day Off

Yesterday I took a "day off." I have been feeling under the weather for a week now and decided that if I didn't stay home things would only get worse. But what a price to pay for staying home. I spent most of it working on final grades for the marking period and calling the homes of students who are about to find an F on their permanent record. I made so many phone calls, calls I never have the time to make or the energy left to make them with by the time school is over. Not only did I work more than rest yesterday, but I returned to the aftermath of a storm today. At the end of every day, my classroom is littered with paper balls (I've been told this is a uniquely 9th grade thing to do), but the sheer quantity of paper balls was tripled in comparison to the normal mass. One student decided to try and speed up time and get the sub off track by moving the minute hand of the wall clock with the paper face. He succeeded in breaking off the second hand and leaving the clock stuck on 1:00. I managed to fix it this morning, and he came to tell me what he did without offering an apology. In addition to this, there is now a population of fruit flies occupying my room. We haven't seen a janitor in over a week. I am strict about not letting kids eat in my classroom, but they still throw all kinds of junk into the garbage bin and down into the air conditioning vent. They are complete slobs.

I just spoke on the phone with the sub who covered for me yesterday. Not too long ago I was in her shoes. And if I haven't made it clear, the thing I hate the most about my job is that it is a lot like subbing, except I have to go back every day. My students are incredibly disrespectful, loud, messy, and annoying. Of course, there are only a handful of disrespectful students, but they manage to paint an ugly picture of the entire class. The woman who covered for me is no older than me, still standing, but not likely to want to return any time soon. I apologized for my class' behavior and felt ashamed. Then she said, "It's not your fault." That's the thing: these students aren't my fault and yet I'm somehow responsible for changing them. I am doing my best to put in place the structures they need and the routine to succeed, but they have come to me with bad habits, bad manners, and teenage hormones. What can I do about that?

This week, as a staff, we have put several boys on behavior contracts. Now when they are defiant, it goes in their record and after five they are suspended. After three suspensions they get sent to another school. What does this accomplish? It gets them out of my hair, but it opens up a space for the kid who was expelled from another area school. Today I was walking to the gym with one of these contracted students. He showed marked improvement in his behavior on Monday and Tuesday, and my guess is that it was in anticipation of the all staff meeting being held in his honor yesterday morning. Today, however, only one day after being put on a behavior contract and he's back to his former ways. He told me today that he doesn't care if he gets suspended and doesn't know why he is coming to school anyway. He said he would rather just be on the street. This makes no sense to me. I think of students with this mentality as the ones who struggle academically, who lack confidence, and support at home. This young man doesn't fit that mold. He is very smart and could easily be one of the best students in class if he cared. His mom is active in his life, too. I just don't understand. I do know that he is deeply wounded by his father's absence and blames his mother constantly for it. He is lacking male role models and I've seen him be a completely different person in the presence of an adult male. I cannot see how taking to the street is a real option for him. And yet, today at the gym he decided to trespass into the aerobics room, use the stereo to play his music, and then threw two backpacks over a wall into the office of a personal trainer before taking off down the street. He is unmanageable and way beyond the scope of what I can do for him. He is likely to end up at the continuation school, but I can't imagine he'll do much better there.

I am trying to figure out a consequence for my students tomorrow for their misbehavior. I'm hatching a plan to have them all write a reflective essay about yesterday followed by a massive cleaning of my room. Anyone who does not comply will have to stay after school and scrap gum from under the seats. Sounds like a nice plan, huh? Except the last thing I want to do on a Friday afternoon is spend any more time than necessary with a group of kids who completely disregard what I say. I can hear my grandmother in shock right now, saying, "Gosh, in my day when an authority figure told you do something you wouldn't consider not doing it." That is not the case today. The question is how to value the backbones of my students without being their victim?