Ask Me Again Later

I always say a good seating chart is among the most effective of classroom management tools, at least in 6th grade. Combining personalities and academic strengths in an engaging, but not overly socially stimulating, way can make a class both fun and functional. 

In general, I think I have knack for effective grouping; whether it's from experience or intuition or a combination of both, I can't say. Even so, I do have my rare failures, and first period yesterday was definitely one of them. 

Rather than the subdued quiet that usually follows a seating change as the students get acclimated to their new group, the class came in raucous and stayed that way despite several sharp redirections from me, and eventually only buckling down under threat of losing their brain break. 

In between the wrangling and the warnings, I stepped over to my desk and scribbled a reminder to try again before our next class. One of the students followed me to fetch her iPad which was charging nearby. "Are we your favorite class?" she asked with a giddy grin.

"Sometimes," I answered, and it was true.

But not that day.

The Oven Ordeal Continues

It was a maddening conversation. 

"I know you received an email saying the appointment was confirmed, but that was only tentative," said the operator on the call I had made to avoid a cancellation of my oven service appointment. I had hastily contacted her company after checking my home phone messages, even though I had updated my contact information twice to my mobile number and explicitly stated that the home number was not monitored.

"But tentative and confirmed are opposites," I pointed out with irritation.

"You confirmed with X company," she answered, "but we are Y company," she finished, as if that was obvious and therefore explanation enough.

In the end, I really just wanted my stove fixed, and even though I postured by asking her if the call was being recorded, and later, her name, I accepted the appointment she "confirmed" even though it was 5 days after my other confirmed appointment.

"What if they cancel the appointment?" I asked.

"They won't," she replied, "because it's confirmed."

"But it was confirmed before," I pointed out, "and it was canceled."

"It's confirmed," she insisted.

"What if it's not?" I repeated.

"It is, because I confirmed it," she told me.

"But that's what they said before," I replied petulantly.

"That was Company X," she answered impatiently.

And so I let it go.

Over the next 10 days I received many communications reminding me of the service appointment scheduled for today betwee there, tooen 1 and 5, and I organized my workload to be able to book home and meet the technician. By 2:30, I hadn't heard a word, and so I packed my things and prepared to leave school. 

Before I did, though, I thought to check the home phone. Sure enough, there was a message from someone at 10:30 a.m. saying that they would be at my home in 20 minutes. Fuming, I called the number back, but it went straight to voicemail. In essence, I said that I expected someone at my house before five, and then I headed out to my car.

I hadn't gone three blocks when the phone rang. "This is your technician," said a voice way too friendly to have received my last message. "I'll be at your house in about 20 minutes."

"I'll be there, too," I said skeptically. "See you then."

and Local

The cashier smiled at me as I set my purchases on the scale of the produce stall at the farmers market this morning. "Oh you have some dried apples!" she noted, and then looking at the rest of my selections added, "and some wet apples, too!"

We both laughed and wrinkled our noses. "Somehow, that doesn't sound very appealing," I said.

"Right," she agreed, "let's just call them fresh."

It Takes All the Kinds

After we did a few errands, we headed down to the Tidal Basin to enjoy the sunshine after Hurricane Nicole dumped a load of rain on us yesterday. Many other folks had the same idea, and there were loads of people out and about downtown, strolling and jogging and biking and playing ultimate Frisbee and kickball.

As we circled the basin looking for a parking spot, we passed a dapper young man extending his selfie stick with a big cheesy grin above his bowtie and plaid suit. He was posing on the bridge over the inlet gates with the Jefferson Memorial behind him and his pet rabbit on the railing. Heidi and I both giggled as we drove by. 

"That was worth the trip down here!" I said.

"It sure was," she agreed.

The walk wasn't too bad either.

Thank You for Your Service

On a rainy holiday after all the puzzles are done, if the movies are sold out, and the oven is still broken, there seems to be only one thing left to do: clean out the attic.

Or, rather, begin to. There's a lot of junk up there that was once treasured possessions, but somehow I felt it was very easy today to part with many things, especially if they haven't been used in years. So I thanked an entire carload of crap for its service and sent it on its way to spark joy in someone else.

The Spirit of the Assignment

 It was a mystery.

A student claimed to have written 500 words, and Google word count confirmed it, but there just wasn't enough on the page for it to make sense. "Come over here," I invited the young writer, a squirrely and mischievous sixth grade boy whose angelic appearance belied his naughty behaviour. 

He beamed at me and happily complied.

"Share your document with me, and let's take a look at it," I told him.

Soon I was looking at the loaves and fishes of personal narratives: three short paragraphs that were somehow comprised of exactly 500 words, which happened to be the minimum for the assignment. "Well," I said, "your narrative is not really complete."

"But it has 500 words," he insisted.

"I know," I agreed, "but that's the minimum. If you can't write a whole story with that many words, your narrative will have to be longer."

He slumped in his chair. "I can't think of anything else," he sighed.

"Well, let's work on it together," I offered. "Tell me about this car trip-- what were you doing? What did it look like out the window?"

He gave me a few details, and I showed him how to expand and elaborate on his minimal description, and we took turns adding to his story, he on his iPad and I from my computer. 

"Now let's look at the end," I said and scrolled to where the story abruptly stopped. I noticed that his document went on to the next page, which is not unusual for kids who are learning to type their drafts: they often inadvertently hit return when they are editing and revising. I clicked my cursor to the end and swept it up, intending to delete the extra white space. Imagine my surprise when 200 or so words of gibberish, typed in white, were revealed as I highlighted them.

"What's all that?" he asked innocently.

"I think you know that's how you got your 500 words" I answered. The bell rang then, and he rose to pack his books and rush out of the room, but we weren't finished yet. Let's just say there were tears in his eyes when I handed him the late pass 10 minutes later, and I'd like to believe his remorse was more than invisible words on the page.

Maybe Yes, Maybe No

"Next year I think we should go through the checklist with our own writing pieces to show the kids how to do it," I said to my friend and colleague, Mary, today. Then I paused. "I mean, if there is a next year."

She nodded. the two of us are on year 30, and the psychology of being able to retire but not being sure if we're ready to retire has been intense. Thank goodness I have someone trusted to work this through with.

"Is there going to be a next year?" she asked.

I shook my head. "Lately it seems increasingly unlikely."

She shrugged.

I laughed.

We continued our conversation about tomorrow.