End of Blog

There will no longer be entries in this blog because I am no longer a full time substitute teacher. I am glad to be out of it. I hated that job and learned quickly that I do not want to be a teacher.

Why substitute teaching sucks:

• You are always the new guy
• Kids walk all over you if your nice or defy you if you are mean and there is no such thing as a happy medium
• Teachers and staff regard you as below them or treat you as if you are a complete idiot
• You are criticized because you are not teaching the kids or doing a good job with the kids no matter what you do

Why I do not want to teacher:

• Pay does not equal to the amount of work you have to do
• Parents expect you to fix the child’s behavior problems
• Parents are quick to get mad at you if their child is unhappy
• The U.S. school system is a joke (see explanation below)
• When money is needed education is always the first to get cuts (thus lack of job stability)

So why is our school system a joke? Well it is a joke because of funding, investing, so basically money. There are other problems too such as the system’s inability to cater to children with ADD and other special needs. There is so much BS standard testing for both the students and the teachers. If you do not pass a standardized test then you cannot move up in grade, or you cannot teach students. I hate standardized test because since the test is so important you spend all of your time preparing for the test that everything else just goes out the window. Then you have the “No Child Left Behind” BS that does the exact opposite of its name. That is a whole other mess right there.

But lets get back into money. It is a common problem brought up many many times through out this country. Putting aside the fact that the U.S. spends a lot more on the military and religion and less on education. Also putting aside the fact that education is always the first to get cut. With the money education has very little of it goes to the students. It all goes to the administrators. What little is left is then passed down to the students and teachers but even then it is not distributed evenly and obviously not wisely. I have been to schools that can barely afford heat with the wall falling apart yet they have brand new laptops. I have been to schools where they cut supplies and money to art and science and give it all to the football team. I have seen a kindergarten class fully equipped with computers and a smart board while a high school class in the same district are using out dated science textbooks. I have seen a school that has a state of the art gym fully equipped taking up a large chunk of the physical school building, only the gym is only for students who are in a sports team and strictly off limits to the rest of the students.

I could go on and on. So that is my rant on how much our education system stinks. I will keep this blog up for reference only. But other than that there will be no more entires.

Last Post of the Year

This will be my last post for this school year. So what does a substitute teacher do during the summer, basically what ever I can get. Will I go back to substitute teaching next school year? Well, that all depends on whether or not I get a better job over the summer. Would I want to go back to substitute teaching? Hell, no. But if I had no other choice then I would go back.

What did I learn from this school year?
• I witnessed various different styles of teaching from very effective to just awful
• There are a handful of schools that I would not go to nor send of my kids there, they are just terrible
• I learned how to manage a group of people who do not want to be managed
• I revisited the awful life of high school and middle school
• I learned to be patient with people and really understand who people are and where they come from.

Some of the negative things I have observed:
• Abstinence teaching only creates a high pregnancy problem with high school and middle school girls
• Urban schools are really just as bad as people say and just as poor, they are truly children left behind
• With this coming generation, respect for women and female self-respect have just gone down the drain.

A few things that I have developed from this:
• Although I have more patients for people in general, I began to dislike children in large groups
• There are many teacher who are just jerks to their students and their colleagues
• Even the most mature student has a long way to go to develop
• If other teachers treat me like a student or an idiot then that is what they will get, I do not do well at all with negative reinforcement, I have gone to many schools that the teachers and staff treat substitute teacher as inferior to them both mentally and in status, it is a bit annoying, and really give you a bad impression of the school, with teacher and staff with an attitude like that it usually correlated directly with the students, whom are underdeveloped either educationally or socially
• If the staff treats me like an equal then they will get my best performance as possible, you get treated like crap by some students, it really helps a lot if you do not get it at both ends. I do very well with positive reinforcement; the better you treat me the more you will get in return.

Overall it was an interesting experience, it brought out the good and the bad in me, I have seen nightmare schools, and school who have a lot of potential. This was my first year of substitute teaching, I would not mind returning next year but I would highly prefer another career path. The pay does not equal what you have to put up with.

This will be the last post in this blog. Thanks for reading. For reference this blog will still continue to be up over the summer, but I plan on taking it off line as soon as the new school year arrives. That is unless I continue to be a sub teacher.

Stay tuned at the end of the summer to see if I continue this field of work, or if I move on to another career.

Female Teachers and Bad Kids

There are some schools were the kids have some serious issues with respecting women. In most schools that I he been to students are corrected for such behavior. But this one alternative school that behavior is not corrected. In a school were 16 to 18 year olds have a history of rape and violence. You put in several young very attractive female teachers who distract the kids. The male students talk down to the teachers fondles them and call them names like “cum dumpster”. But these teachers do not correct them and just giggle when they do that. This time I blame the teachers for this. Since they do not even attempt to correct the kids, they do not even say “stop” all they do is just laugh when the students talk to them that way. These boys will just grow up thinking that it is okay to treat women like that. It is tragic.

Children Left Behind

I have been to a school where the students very seriously suffer from the damage that this “No Child Left Behind” program has done to our schools. The school suffers from low test scores and because of that they have faced severe budget cuts so much that this middle school used to have a computer lab, a teacher for every subject and several classrooms. Now the school is reduced the only two teachers a classroom aid who is also the lunch lady and the gym teacher. Two classrooms rest of them have been boarded up and their computer lab, which had consisted of one laptop per student, had been completely stolen because the school’s security system no longer works. The entire school shares one computer, which belongs to one of the teachers. The school is bug infested and there is little to no school supplies available to the students. The school will be undergoing more cuts, which would severely reduce even more resources for this school.

The result is a school of students who are way behind in the curriculum and with underdeveloped maturity levels. Lets face it these kids are bad kids who know have rough lives in school and at home. Fights in this school break out every second and the kids have little to no respect for themselves or others. It could be easily be called one of the worst schools in the district but who would blame the kids since everything is taken away from them, and they have nothing to work with. Teachers come and go because the school cannot afford to pay them. Anything new they get either gets destroyed or stolen.

It is the school that has been left behind.

High School with alkward staff

There is one high school that is less than a mile from where I live, so every time I go there I usually ride my bike there. It is kind of refreshing really; you get a quick 15 min work out first thing in the morning. Anyway, I always like going to this school mainly because it is so close to my apartment I can practically walk there. But another reason why I like this school is because it seems like a typical normal high school. The students are smart and their maturity level is about normal for their age. Compared to the redneck town’s high school, in this one, which is a mixture of rural and suburban kids, the kids are significantly more mature and smarter I would bet like 20 years more mature and smarter than the kids at the rural high school that I go to (See my previous posts on this high school). Compared to duck or you will be shot high school, the kids in this school are less aggressive and do not fight at the drop of a needle, plus attitude is virtually non-existent in this school.

So yeah I love going to this high school, which is in between suburban and rural. The students are actually normal, aside from the pregnancy problem, which is all over the state, there is nothing wrong with these kids and I do not go home with a shore head from banging it against the wall so much.

I would jump at any chance to work in this school except for one thing, the staff and the teachers. They just creep me out! It is not that they are weird acting; it is that they treat substitutes very awkwardly. In redneck town, the staff treats you like an outsider and no better than any of the students. In duck or you will be shot at school, the staff treats you like one of them and treat you like an equal. But in this school, the staff treats you like your are some kind of scary stranger. They all try to be friendly with you but in a way that it just feels weird. You kind of this weird vibe from them as if they are friendly on the outside because they are suppose to be but they really hate you inside. Just weird.

Language Barrier

There have been two schools that I have been to where there has been a sad case where a child who does not know English gets thrown into a special needs classroom. In one classroom, among the children with downs syndrome, autism, retardation, etc. there was one student who was fresh from Nigeria who only spoke French and knew very little English. In another school, there was a girl who only knew Spanish, among children who have severe behavioral problems.

So these students are trying to learn the language and become integrated into our society by learning slower than everyone else and being separated form mainstream society. Hoe does that make sense? There was only one school that kind of improved. A student there who spoke only French goes to regular classrooms with assistance from an aid that does not speak French. Close enough but there has to be some better way to do this.

Sleeping on the job

I was a one-on-one aid for a student at an urban high school. I usually try to avoid these assignments because the pay it not to well and usually the kid is either a spoiled brat or a complete looser (in a behavioral and academic sense). Which in turn is more work than a teaching position. There are times when I get lucky and think why the hell does this kid need a personal aid since there is nothing wrong with him, so by day just entails sitting in the back of the classroom and doing nothing. What a waste of money for the school, but hey I am getting paid to sit in a high school classroom. This one student had no academic or learning disability problems; he would just have some emotional problems, like have complete melt downs when something goes wrong. My job was to just calm him down in case he had a melt down. Which did not happen when I was there. Nice and easy day, I usually listen into the teacher’s lectures and watch their teaching styles.

It takes me back to those socially awful days of high school, but it was just interesting to play the role again one more time. Just like when I was in high school, I fell asleep during math class. Yes, 23 year old, who is suppose to be setting an example for these high school kids, falls asleep in math class. I felt bad at the time because the teacher noticed that I fell asleep, but after that I thought it was kind of funny. Just like back in the day.

Hillbilly School

Time and time again I return to the same rural high school. Every time I have the exact same impression. These kids are just below average. Unlike some urban school that I have gone to where the kids can be smart but do dumb things. In this school the kids are both. I do not know how to explain it but when you are in the classroom with these kids you just get an aura of hillbilly ness. The school itself is overall at a late middle school level and its major course is study hall. I was in for an environmental science teacher today. I look at her curriculum and lesson plans and apparently she only teaches environmental science for one class all the other classes are called “Applied Studies” also known as study hall. This is also the same school where the teachers flip out when substitutes use their computers. In fact in the classroom I was in today has a sticky note right on the monitor saying that no student or substitute is to use this computer. Oh, hillbilly school.

High School Speical Needs

The students that I enjoy working with the most are older special needs students. First of all they are so nice and polite. A big difference between a know-it-all playing it cool typical high school student who would try any trick in the book to get out of doing any work. I have gone to three different high school special needs classes and every time, I am greeted by the students, introduced, and befriended right away by them. Those students are just so polite and friendly it is so much fun to be in the classroom with them. Instead of telling them to stop talking or to put their cellphone/ipods away and to do their work and/or pay attention, in a special needs classroom I am actually working with the students, having interactive conversations. Aside from some physical or mental limitations working with special needs kids goes rather smoothly and productive. I prefer working special needs with older kids because at that point they have had some years dealing with their disabilities so basic skills are sometimes all ready in place, such as eating or going to the bathroom. There are times when one or two high school special needs students still need to be changed or fed, but that is rare. It is still better than having a classroom of younger children who cannot function with out constant help.

The last special needs classroom was in a nice suburban area. The students there were so polite, they all introduced themselves to me right as they came in. They knew exactly when to treat me as an equal and when to treat me as an authority figure. Such as when we played baseball together during gym and I was on one of their teams we played just like we were all good friends. But when we were in the classroom, they listened to every word I said.

One student had a panic attack that lasted a full 10 mins. It really felt like an hour, but it took me a while to get that 17 year old relaxed and calm. It was a bit weird holding a 17 year old like a crying child especially since he was bigger than me. But after the panic attack was over, another student came up to me to me and asked me if I was okay. I thought that was really sweet of him to be concerned about my well-being. You would not get that in a “normal” high school classroom.

Computer Use in Schools

There are times that I have a lot of spare time when I am in a class. Especially when all the students are doing what they are suppose to. So I just sit there and do nothing. Often times I bring a book with me, I do get a lot of reading done. But I also like to write a lot I have been brining my laptop with me more often to keep myself busy. For those days that forget to bring something to read or write with I try to get on one of the school computers to browse the internet. Sometimes it is easy when the school has one login for all the students with a fairy easy password that is very easy to remember. Or sometimes the teacher is nice enough to keep the computer logged on for me. I have been to two school where everyone is so nice and helpful when it comes to computer use. Sometimes another school official comes into the classroom that I am at, voluntarily logs into the computer that is in my classroom so that I could use it. In another school, they even offered me one of their laptops to use during my time there. All that is great, I rarely end up using their computers, but it is still nice to know that they give me that option.

But in some schools using a computer is like some form of sin. This one school I was in a particular classroom where the teacher had left her computer logged in. So I went on and checked out the local news website just to kill time since all the students were actually quiet and doing what they were suppose to be doing. One teacher comes in and flips out at me for being on the computer and orders me to get off. Sheesh I was just reading up on the news. Anyway, yeah computer usage can be a touchy subject in some schools and no big deal in others.

Standardized Tests and Pirates

I was at this high school during their required standardized tests. My job was to supervise those kids who were not taking the test at the time. I was sitting in a classroom with one of the teachers that will be administrating the test, waiting for the morning announcements.

One student asked the teacher "why do we have to take these stupid tests" Well the teacher when on and on how important these tests are and how much she agrees with them and how beneficial they are to the students, etc. Etc. Immediately after that whole speech, the student teacher that was sitting next to her pulls out a stack of pirated movies and announces to the class, "Who wants to by? I got Road Hogs..." He mentioned several other movies that where still in the theaters. The teacher was completely okay with that and even bought one of the pirated movies.

I thought the timing was just too perfect.

Stolen Laptops

I was at this middle school that is located in what used to be an old police station. It was actually very cute little middle school with one teacher for each subject. It is an inner city school with some not so bright kids (they care about nothing but themselves, typical middle school child only a bit more extreme). The school had a nice set of decently new laptops for every student. They started with 15 laptops, which was enough for a full class to use. They used to have many projects based around their laptops and the kids really enjoyed using them. The problem is that those same students had broken into the school and stole most of the laptops from the classroom. So the entire school is down to five laptops and they are no longer used in the classroom, they are permanently stored away. What a shame for a few kids to ruin a great program for the entire school.

Good sub, Bad sub

I always laugh when a student would as me, “Are you a nice sub, or a mean sub?” My answer is always, “It depends on you.” Which is the truth, my days can be hellish or a lot of fun depending on whether or not the students behave.

I find that younger children, from grades four and down, really have a hard time with change. If you do not teach in the exact same style and order that their usual teacher teaches, than you have lost total control and respect from the kids. It can sometimes be the case for middle school students but I have seen it happen in elementary school more. I remember in one middle school science/reading class (unusual combination, I know). In the morning the students do science and in the afternoon those same students do reading. When I got there, the lesson plans for science were missing so I made the executive decision to switch science and reading, since I did have the lesson plans for reading.

“Okay, class we will have a small change in plan today. Instead of science this morning, we will be doing reading, and we will be doing science in the afternoon. I do not have your science assignment now, but I will be getting it this afternoon.” Their response, “No, we are not supposed to do that! We do science in the morning and reading in the afternoon!” It was all down hill from there. Children tend to defy you at any slight change in plans. It gets frustrating.

Most of the time all children think they can get away with acting up with a substitute. First of all, I go into different schools where each one has a different discipline procedure, so I am never familiar with how they handle. So I simply send kids to the office. It is never all of them who act up it is just one or two. But that always ripples throughout the entire class, so I have to turn into Mr. Mean. I really hate to, but sometimes I have no other choice. I really want to have fun with these kids, especially if there is a fun activity/game that we may be doing. Those one or two kids who take one-step to far end up causing a chain reaction causing all kids to act up. So then we have the typical “This sub is mean.” In one school, I came back a second time to a 1st grade class where my previous time with them could be described as total chaos. A few kids said, “We are going to have a bad day, every time he is here we have a bad day,” sure enough it was a bad day. Yet again the children could not control themselves.

When I have a good class, where kids shut up and listen and do not mess around the day goes smoothly. The kids and I have so much fun. I had a computer class once and everyone did so well and listened to me that we all finished half hour early and we played video games for the rest of the class.

If only more children had more self-control then every school day would be fun.

Students and Computers

The children in these schools have been a generation that has been with modern computers since they were born. So why are so many of them computer illiterate. I guess the obvious would be that many of them do not have a computer at home. Also some who do still do not know a lot about computers. I have noticed that many students may seem to know about computers, but only know as far as how to play games on them. They know more about their game consoles and where to find games on the internet or find and open any games that are installed on the computers. But they know little to nothing about using word processors, basic internet surfing, or basic computer functions.

There are times when I take classes to computer labs or the students have some assignment that has to be done on a computer in the classroom. There are so many times where I had to step-by-step help the students save a file onto the hard drive. Others I had to show them where the word processor was. There have been many times where the students have to look for information on the internet. I remember students had to look up information on Abraham Lincoln. First they would go to google or yahoo and then right on the search bar they type http://www.abrahamlincoln.com then click on search. If they do not get the results they want, instead of clicking back or finding the search bar and typing in a new search query, they close the entire window and repeat the same two steps. It took me a while to explain to them the concept of a search bar. They still did not get it.

For one class I instructed the class to open up Microsoft Word so they can type up a paper. About 15 minutes later, half of them complained that the program was not letting them type. When I came to their computer, I noticed that they were trying to type a paper in Microsoft PowerPoint. I had a hard time trying understanding the concept that they has the wrong program up and that they needed Word not PowerPoint.

In a high school a student was writing up his works cited and said, “Why is this not turning blue?” he was typing in a hyperlink in to Word. In some computers the default is to make hyperlinks active in the document i.e. they are underlined and blue to signify that you can click on them and it will take you to the website. Well the student just though that anything starting with http would simply turn blue. He sat there starting at the text wondering when it was going to turn blue. Until we gave him the simplest answer we can think of to persuade him to keep moving, we told him, it does not have to be blue. (which is actually true).

In a high school computer lab, many of the students love to mess with the computers. Which results in broken hardware. So they unplug things and plug them back in. I constantly find broken mice. I also saw that a student tried to jam the keyboard plug into the wrong port causing the pins in the connector to break. I also find that students unplug the USB mouse from the back of the computer and connect it to the USB port on the front. To this day I do not know why they do that.

All those same kids, still have no trouble playing games on the computers.

High Schools

I have forgotten how much I hated high school. The more and more I spend time teaching in a high school environment the more and more it reminds me of my earlier high school days and how much I hated going each and every day.

The majority of what makes one’s high school’s experience is the students themselves. High schools are crawling with kids who are just plain stupid. The kind of kids who roll up paper balls and throw them at kids, goof off in class and pick on kids who are different from themselves because it is “cool.” Or the kinds of kids who do incredibly stupid stunts thinking that they can get away with it but end up getting in trouble or hurt. The kinds of kids who cannot possibly be trusted on their own, any type of freedom would result in something stupid being done. They are the kinds of kids who when you just observe them you feel your own brain cells begin to die. Lets not forget the ditzy girls too.

For example I had a whole class full of the stupid kids and one class full of smart kids. So I did an experiment; I would leave the room briefly and come back. In a classroom full band kids, arts kids, choir kids, and just plain geeks; I would come back to a quiet room where each student is doing what he or she is supposed to be doing. The other class was full of jocks, wannabe jocks, and students who do neither music nor art. In this class I returned to a broken ruler, obscenities written on the board, several desks in disarray, and doodling on the desks and walls. Apparently they decided to play a quick game of baseball using a rolled up paper, and a yardstick. They also played basketball with the garbage can and the rest of them just wrote all over the place with chalk and pen. Lets not forget the super bright student who thought it would be a good idea to throw the chalkboard eraser around the room causing chalk dust to fill the air and chalk to be spread out all over the walls, desks, and ceiling.

There is one high school that I would have loved to go to when I was younger. It was a charter school that specializes in art and science. This school has no sports teams nor anything closely related to sports. It just has art, music and science classes along with the basic high school classes. I have never seen such mature and well-behaved high school kids. It was like they filtered out all the jocks, wannabe jocks, and losers and created a school where children actually learn.

Teen Pregnancy

I work in a state that bans teaching safe sex practices in schools. Instead the entire state teaches abstinence. I am strongly against teaching abstinence without teaching safe-sex practices. Yes abstinence is a sure way to keep from spreading disease and pregnancy, but relying on it is not guarantee that kids will not be having sex. In my opinion teaching kids about abstinence would simply promote more underage and unprotected sex. Not only do you fail to teach them safe sex practices, you simply create a taboo of the subject where defiant kids will have sex anyway. Secondly once those kids do come of age or plan to have sex they will not know how to do it safely. They will not know on how to properly use a condom, take birth control, day after pill, use dental dams, and any other practice that can keep them safe.

The state that I work in is a prime example on how teaching abstinence in schools does not work. Currently there is a serious teen pregnancy issue. Every school I have been to from middle to high (yes even middle school) there are at LEAST two pregnant girls in the classroom. The teaching of safe sex has been banned for years in this state and these children have supposedly taken an oath or something to not have sex until they are married. So how come some many girls are pregnant? It is because children have sex anyway. And they are having more sex now that ever. When I learned about safe-sex practices I learned that sex is a serious issue, and there are many many consequences that could happen if you do something wrong. In this state it is the exact opposite! The students here do not take it as a serious issue. Since they are just told not to do it and feed outrageous propaganda that any intelligent teenager can figure out. In fact many girls are getting pregnant because it is fashionable! It is cool to get pregnant! How can it be cool to get pregnant?

One girl for months has been pretending to be pregnant. She bought herself maternity clothes just to spite her mother and to be cool with her other high school friends who are actually pregnant. Finally she actually did get pregnant and then nine months after that she had a baby. Lucky for her, the girl’s mother took the baby in as her own. A fifty-year-old woman with a newborn, while her teenaged daughter continues to live her life and planning to have a second child.

High School Computer Lab

I substituted for a computer lab in a high school. There were no visual evidence of hardware abuse except for the smashed up mouse I found behind one of the monitors. The ball was missing and the plastic casing and buttons were broken. It was obviously either stepped on or smashed repeatedly. There was one thing that I did notice, the computer lab as very hot. The room has about 20 to 30 computers in it. But the room it self is not climate controlled. So the room is very hot! Add body heat plus the heat from the computers running 24/7 equals a very very hot room. I notice a large amount of problems in the machines including freezing up, poor performance, and failure to boot. I suspect it is because of the intense heat in the room. Regardless of the wishes from the original lab teacher I shut down all computers that were not being used. I shut down roughly about 5 or so computers. The temperature difference in the room drastically changed! It is amazing how much heat these things put out. There was like a 5 to 10 degree difference when all the computers were running vs. when less than half of them were shut down. They should really have some climate control in this lab. Or at least have the students shut down their computer when they are done.

ED Students

I hate working with kids who are emotionally disturbed (ED) in a mainstream school environment. I have worked with them in special ED schools and I have enjoyed the experience there. So I rather work with them in alternative or special education schools.

Now I have observed that ED students are aggressive, violent, disruptive, and have problems with authority. Basically your typical bad egg.

The problem with working with these kids in regular classrooms is trying to talk to them without having them make a scene. A simple whisper of something like “pay attention” would end up with a explosion where the kid just blows up at you and slams around causing the entire class to stop what there doing to calm the kid down.

The main purpose of giving these kids a personal aid in mainstream schools is to keep them from getting into trouble. So academically those kids struggle because it is difficult to keep them on task with out disrupting the class.

Also the kid can do basically what he wants as long as he does not bother the class. So aids would just sit there as the kid either sleep or draw on the desk.

In one school I was attempting to keep the ED kid active in class and to stay on task. When one of the teachers came up to me and told me that my job was only to monitor the kids behavior and not to worry about him academically. I wish they would simply put those kids in the existing special ED schools. They do much better academically and behaviorally in alternative or special education schools than in mainstream schools.

Nightmare Classrooms

There have been a few classes that I have gone to that could just be considered nightmare classrooms. Being a substitute there are many classes where the kids just take advantage of substitute such as excessive talking, or being overly disruptive.

But some classes are just over the top.

I was a science teacher for one school with a nightmare classroom. In this classroom the students would just laugh anytime I would raise my voice. Which would cause the class to get even louder. One bold student thought it would be funny to slap the back of my head. Others were playing poker with actual money in the back of the classroom. Others would hide their belongings within the shelves and cabinets in the classroom, belongings that should not be in school in the first place. Any attempt to bring the class to order resulted in more defiance and chaos. I eventually called up the principal into the room in an attempt to get the class back in order.

She was a little too sympathetic to the class and officially gave them free time when we still did not even finish the assignments. She did, the its just a substitute give him some slack speech. Which I hate it when they do that because it does not solve the problem with the kids disrespecting substitutes or any other adult. It just give them the impression that substitutes just do not know what they are doing and they are not as authoritative as the regular faculty. She should have gave them the speech that, you should respect all adults and listen to what they say. It is our job to make sure that you get a good education and make something of yourself out of life, regardless of who is teaching the class. It is important to respect authority, because that is part of life.

In another nightmarish environment, I was a math teacher for a private school. The students only listened to me when I shouted at them so normal voice was ineffective. I was so tired of shouting after this class. This was a middle school class with a mixture of 7th and 8th graders, so I was not surprised the only way to keep them in control was to shout at them (especially for a substitute). Other than that it seemed usual routine for a normal middle school class. What really floored me and what caused me to label this classroom a nightmare classroom was the boys in the classroom. Five boys constantly kept sexually harassing one girl. I would stop them and seconds later they where at it again. There were two times where I was so close to grabbing to stupid boys and throwing them across the room. One time the boys had the girl cornered in the back of the classroom molesting her and getting their hands all over her and under her shirt, etc. I flipped out at them and they scattered. I was so outraged by seeing this happening in the classroom that I had to step back for a few seconds to cool off. BUT in those seconds those boys re-gathered with the girl on the opposite side of the classroom. This time they had her on one of the desks holding her legs open. I rushed over and stopped them just as one boy was about to get on top of her.

First of all, what where these boys thinking? Why would you do that in a classroom, during class, with two adults in the room? Did they seriously though they could get away with it?

Secondly the class had a male teaching assistant whose primary job was to keep the kids under control. He just watched the whole thing happen and did nothing to stop the boys from molesting the girl.

If I was the principal to the school, those boys should have been out of there, but days later I returned to that school for another classroom, and I found out no discipline action was taken for those boys

Mind Blowing Alternative School

I went to a special school where young adults go to earn their GED. Many of them are around my age or older. The majority of the people here have either been dropped or kicked out of school or have been in jail for a significant amount of time. The majority of the female students are mothers whose fathers are unknown.

So you would think that many of these people would want to try hard to get their GED and make something of themselves, or at least to get better jobs or move on to bigger and better things. Yeah they want to earn their GED, but they do not want to work for it. Many of them have the equivalent education of a 4th grader. Their school work borders elementary and middle school level. It is not even close to high school level. They struggle and give up. In my observation, half of them sleep, play on their cell phones, or talk loudly to each other the entire class period. They really do not care about learning anything all they want is to just get their GED. That is fine, but some of the stuff that we are teaching them are everyday issues anyone would need to know, such as writing, very basic math and science.

I thought a science class there the day before the 2007 lunar eclipse. So I thought it would be fun to mention it to them in case they may want to check it out. They did not know that a lunar eclipse was. Some thought it was a TV show. When I explained what a lunar eclipse was, one student thought I was making it up and said “You can see the earth’s shadow on the moon, man that’s bull shit”. The students in this school do not have any learning or mental disabilities; they simply have made bad decisions.

What really blows my mind is the fact that the majority of these students are parents of not just one child but many! Not to mention these students have the maturity level of a 6th grader! During my experiences at this school I would swear I was teaching a middle school class. I have to tell 20 year olds continuously to: stop talking, stop throwing things, put your cellphone/Gameboy/PSP/iPod away, sit up, wake up, watch your language, keep your hands to yourself, don’t worry about your neighbor just worry about yourself, open your book, follow along, stay on task, get to work, why are you all gathering up at the doorway when we have five minutes left in class, sit still and pay attention. My mind is just blown away! They care about nothing, they act immaturely, they continuously reproduce, and they lack focus, analytical thinking, and they cannot stand still or even be quiet for one minute! Believe me I timed it.