I Do Got This

On the first day of testing, I was suffering a crisis of confidence when the experienced coordinator disappeared, off to troubleshoot problems in individual classrooms. I was unsure how the testing platform worked and a little afraid of messing anything up. 

"Here's a help request for you," one of my colleagues in the command center said. "Two students can't log in to their tests in room 87."

"What if I don't know what to do?" I said.

"You literally helped hundreds of students start their tests when you were a teacher," she scoffed. "You can do it."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," I laughed as I headed out. 

She was right, of course. I was able to get both kids into the test right away. And when I returned to the command center, I figured out how to restart tests on the clunky platform, too.

"A teacher needs help with a student's behavior in 278," she said a little while later. "Wanna go?"

"I don't know that kid," I said.

"I don't either," she replied, "but you taught here for over thirty years; I'm pretty sure you can resolve a sixth-grade behavior issue."

I laughed again. "I'm going to express doubt whenever a problem comes up," I told her. "Just so I can hear you tell me how competent I am!"

Can't Say No to the Boss

The bins were packed, and almost everything was ready for testing tomorrow, when a knock came at the door. Stopping my work on the sign-in sheet, I called, "Come in!" and was surprised to see the principal standing at the door with a small cardboard box. 

"Are those the bins?" she asked, gesturing at the organized stacks of materials against the wall with a note of surprise in her voice.

"Yep!" I assured her. Considering the test was less than 24 hours away, I expected her to be pleased, but she seemed a bit disappointed.

"I have these bookmarks," she held out the box. "One for every student."

"Uhhhh," I hedged, raising my eyebrows. "Can we give them to teachers when they pick up their bins in the morning?"

"They're in stacks of 25," she sighed. "It might take too long to count them then." She looked again at the 70 bins, bags, and baskets of test tickets, examiner manuals, and dictionaries, already packed and in alphabetical order. "I can put them in," she offered.

"I'll help," I said, and showed her the list of examiners and the number of students in each group. Then I opened each bin, placed the bookmarks she counted out and gave me inside, reverse-stacked them, and then restacked them when we finished each group. Only one basket of dictionaries tumbled out, and we were finished in about 20 minutes.

"I have something for each testing day," she told me, and I made a mental note to pick whatever it was up before we packed the bins next time!

SOL Week Eve

I dreamed about testing last night. Somebody somewhere needed to take a test, and I could not get there to give it.

It was not a nightmare.

A Good Night's Sleep

The handyman was arriving bright and early this morning, so in order to let Heidi sleep in a bit, I thought it would be a good idea to take Lucy out right before he got here. That way, she could take care of her morning business and greet him without barking up a storm.

That was the plan anyway, except that Lucy refused to get up. She snuggled in closer to Heidi every time I whispered my invitation for her to go out. Short of dragging her off the bed, which would have woken Heidi up and defeated my purpose, I could not get that dog up. When Heidi began to stir, I sighed and left the room, closing the door behind me.

I needn't have worried, though. I saw the truck through my kitchen window and opened the front door, so there was no knocking or ringing; hence, there was no barking, either. A couple of hours later, Heidi and Lucy tromped down the stairs, both looking quite refreshed.

Discretionary

"Are you going to be at school tomorrow?" a friend asked me at dinner last night.

"Nope," I said. "We only work as needed."

"Who decides what's needed?" her sister asked.

"We do!" I laughed. "As long as the testing gets done." 

"Sounds like a pretty sweet setup," my friend noted.

I could not disagree. And when I heard there was a lockdown at school today, I was doubly glad I'd missed it.

Animal Testing

Then there was the mouse. 

Four kids sat taking a standardized test in a tiny basement room of the school. It was the final makeup opportunity of the testing window, and I was initially just glad they had even shown up, unlike the seven other kids on my list. 

Each of them had a different story. One was chronically absent and just happened to be there today. One had been out sick for a week. One was completely test-avoidant and tried to miss any scheduled testing day. And the last was super anxious about doing well, and consequently spent way too much time on each question.

So there we were, about to enter the second hour of testing, and no one was even halfway through. That's when the test-avoidant guy jumped out of his seat. "There's a mouse!" he pointed, dancing a little jig.

There was indeed a tiny mouse scurrying along the baseboard at the far side of the room. "It's just that we've been so quiet, he probably thought the room was empty, and it was safe to come out," I told them. "Now he knows otherwise," I shrugged, "and he probably won't bother us."

"How can you be so calm?" the chronically absent student asked incredulously.

I was about to answer when I noticed that the student who had been out sick had her test suspended because she had been guessing too quickly. "Is it because of the mouse?" I laughed.

"Ya!" she shuddered.

I resumed her test, and although it wasn't suspended again, she was flagged for rapid guessing. "I need a pass back to class," she gasped the moment she submitted it.

Chronic absentee guy was right behind her, but the other two? Put their feet up on their chairs and settled in, one pondering deeply over each question, the other staring off into space, intentionally wasting time.

My attention wandered around the room, over the cinder block walls and scuffed tile floors, and I sighed, wishing that mouse would come back.

Gracklin Rose

We went over to some friends' house to let their old dog out, because they were stuck at work. Their backyard is small, but today, as I stood in the kitchen overlooking it, a wildlife drama was unfolding. 

A fledgling bird sat peeping plaintively in the middle of the grass while 3 pairs of grackles swooped around. At first, it was unclear if they meant to harm or help it, but then one of the iridescent purple and black males deposited some sort of juicy worm right into its gullet. 

I was still suspicious of the others, especially when the daddy grackle had to puff up all his feathers a few times, but in the end, it seemed like a cooperative effort. A little research revealed that fledgling grackles are ground-bound for 3-5 days. They are obviously very vulnerable, but their parents stay nearby to feed and protect them. 

Just as I saw today.