The Chronicles Of Nay

Happy Friday! The last couple of weeks have been super exhausting! This time of year gets like that. It’s cold, we are all tired, we are tired of each other, teachers don’t have patience, admin is only dealing with the big issues, parents aren’t answering communication from the school. It is an exhausting time to be a teacher!

We are gearing up for 2 days of testing next week. I swear that is all we do around here! Test Test Test! We start out the year with NWEA MAP testing (I don’t know what any of these letters mean) We do this test first month of school, The week we come back from Christmas break and the last month of school. That is 3 days of testing per administration. We then do quarterly tests, well quarterly! haha Those are done in class for each core content but we have designated days we are supposed to do it but that is done during our class lets say that takes 2 class periods an administration. Then we have Mid year benchmarks that is what we did a few weeks ago that is supposed to tell us how our kids are preparing and how far they are from being able to pass the state test. In Texas we call state testing STAAR. I should know this acronym… something about Texas academic readiness. It doesn’t make the kids do any better or worse if I know it or not! haha Texas tests math and reading every year from 3 to 8 then in high school they have courses that get tests. Then in grade 5 and 8 the students test in science and in grade 8 they test in social studies. The benchmark is 2 days of testing for 6th and 7th grade then another 2 days for 8th grade. The STAAR test is in mid April, again 2 days for 6th and 7th grade and 4 for 8th. Finally we have TELPAS. That acronym has something to do with English Language Proficiency. So my students that speak more than one language have to prove how well they read ,write, listen, and speak english. That test is 2 days because they can only do 1 of the tests per day (listening and speaking is one test and the reading and writing is another).

In case you lost count that is 23 testing days for my 6th graders. FWISD has 173 days of class. It is only February and the kids are over it. They don’t want to test anymore! Thanks to GW Bush and his NCLB crap it was decided that the only way we can tell if a kid is growing is to test them 23 days out of a school year. These tests aren’t even the quizzes we do to make sure that the students are learning in class. This is also not even the testing days that the 8th grade does.

Education is in a scary place. There are states and districts that are so hard up for teachers that they allow teachers that aren’t even certified to teach. With more of these tests being implemented and less time to teach it is only growing the achievement gap. When I was talking to a friend once about reading to her kids I told her that reading to her kids, all though it is always helpful it is not going to make or break her kids when it came to literacy. She has a PhD and I know her husband has some sort of degree. Her kids have seen her read and write papers. they understand how books work. a lot of my students have never seen their parents read a book.

I am on TikTok and I sometimes end up on hate the hate teacher side. Parents have this idea of what it’s like in a classroom based on what they remember from when they were kids. I promise not only have things changed but as a kid you have a different perspective.

I have been teaching for 16 years. I teach at a low income school with mostly minority students. I am talking about what I see every day! What I am about to say is not 100% of kids but it is a much larger percentage than you would realize. Before you say nope not my kid, volunteer in a classroom for a week. Sit in any classroom for more than 15 minutes. We teachers deal with so much more than we should have to. If you are going to get offended then stop here, go read a book instead of the rest of this blog! Ok, here we go:

I promise you, teachers are NOT out to get your kid, we don’t hate your kid. We have over 100 kids a day that we are keeping track of. I don’t have time to have a vendetta. I did not lose your kids paper. They have either not turned it in, they didn’t put their name on it or they put it somewhere other than where they are supposed to turn it in. I tell the kids from day 1 that there is a turn in tray for a reason… If they hand it to me I will lose it! So I don’t take papers from kids! They know where to turn it in. Your kid is not giving you the full story.

I guarantee you I told your student about that assignment, multiple times. I read the directions, I probably even gave them the answer to one or more of the problems, we did some together. They were probably talking during the directions. Or they were too busy doing something else besides paying attention. They were redirected multiple times, they were also asked about what they were working on and then days later asked about it again when it wasn’t finished. Your kid is not giving you the full story.

The rule on our campus is that cell phones are to be turned off and in backpacks. If I took your child’s phone, it was more than likely not the first time I had to ask them to put it away. They were 100% on it. They were NOT checking the time and I want you to know 93% of the time they say they are texting you. 1) my guess this is a lie 2) if they are texting you… STOP TEXTING THEM! We should be working as a team, they should be paying attention not texting you! Your kid is not giving you the full story.

On that note, please don’t call your child to tell them to come to the office or meet you in the parking lot. Just last week I had a kid that her mom called her and I made her put it away and then she got an early dismissal like 3 minutes later! I wasn’t going to let her leave my classroom anyway until the office called for her! If there is something that your child needs to know call the office they will get your child the information like we did when we were kids! Your kid does not need to be “reachable” while they are at school!

When they say “I told the teacher and the teacher didn’t do anything”, we did what we could. There are a few factors here 1) I need your kid to tell me someone is bothering them in the moment. not days later! I can address it in the moment! 2) Many times your kid is involved in the situation, and when the kid they were pestering retaliated they wanted me to do something about it. I tell them them. “If you want me to write an infraction for suzy slapping you back then I will write one for you slapping her to begin with!” Usually they opt out of that situation then go home and tell you that I didn’t do anything. Your kid is not giving you the full story.

Correct I did not let your child go to the restroom during class. 1) Let’s keep in mind that I am responsible for all 30 of the kids in my room. Sometimes I know big picture things that they don’t know. 2)They just came from lunch they had 30 minutes! 3) When I do allow them to go they take advantage of it and I hear they stopped at other classes or were gone for a really long time 4) they are missing 4 out of 4 assignments! they need all the class time they can get. 5) our classes are 50 minutes, Most of the time they are just trying to get out of the room. I have been doing this a while, I can tell when a kid really needs to go to the bathroom. I would never refuse to let a student that really has to go go.

Manners are such a dying way of speaking. My bad is not an apology! Accidents happen, we bump in to people, especially when we aren’t paying attention. “oops sorry” is an acknowledgment and apology that you bumped in to someone. My bad is such a dismissive way to deal with it. Thank you and please go a long way in my classroom.

On a similar note, please, teacher your kids how to use paper towels and when they spill something to clean it up. Whether they spilt their own drink or my drink or a classmates drink please teach them how to clean it up and not use an entire roll of paper towels! They have what we call learned helplessness, and it’s not cute or funny that at 12 they cannot use a paper towel. They are getting away with not having to do things and people just do it for them! Well not in here! Part of that learned helplessness is that they don’t know how to ask questions. “Ms my chromebook is dying.” ok cool, what do you need? How can I help you? Why are you telling me this? Or one that gets on my nerves “I don’t have a pencil” Ask a question! May I use a pencil? May I borrow a charger?

We have gone away from requiring students to bring their own supplies so they feel they are entitled to waste my materials. I have gone through more pencils this year already than I did last year all year! I found a student wasting my glue stick on the table. just glue sticking the table, he wasn’t even glueing anything to the table. Just wasting my glue because he didn’t buy it! They never have a pencil, they break my colored pencils. I don’t know what happens to all my colored pencils all I have are the brown, white and black ones.

Please parents, let’s be on the same team! I am not saying not to ask, please let’s have a conversation, but if neither of us comes the table defensive we can hear each other out. In case you missed it your kids are not telling you the whole story. Kids lie. They are lying to both of us! So if we are a united front we can combat that a little bit. Again I am not sayin don’t believe your child at all, they have information that you do need, all I am saying is maybe let’s not just automatically assume that the teacher is to blame!

I am willing to talk to anyone about any of these things. Some of these might be a little specific but these are problems I see in my classroom daily! YES… Daily! Teachers have a hard job and when parents decide that everything wrong with education is the teachers fault it makes it so much harder! We don’t have any control over the policies! We are tired! Please, let’s work together, These kids are our future!