Monthly Archives: December 2009

Vacation Hiatus

December 29, 2009
By
Vacation Hiatus

Has it really been that long? Is vacation almost over? I know there are some districts out there that get three weeks for winter break, but we go back on Monday. I haven’t even touched any of the piles I left behind in the classroom. In fact, since I took the day off that last Friday before break, I never did my annual Christmas clothes-gathering. Since I ride my bike to school every day, and because I go so early when it’s usually cold, I always wear several layers of sweaters and thermals and whatnot. Also, if it’s raining, I have rain gear layers and boots and etc. So over the course of the year, I end up amassing quite a collection of sweaters and spare shirts and jackets and school pants. In fact, by Thanksgiving, if I don’t make a conscious effort, I end up with nothing to wear out on weekends, but jeans and t-shirts. So usually every year on the last-day-before-Christmas-break, I tow my bike trailer and load up all my laundry, along with whatever else I think I might need over the break, as well as that year’s candles and caramels and coffee mugs and snickerdoodles.

Read more »

Playing God (Part One)

December 16, 2009
By
Playing God (Part One)

I’m out of action for family bidness tomorrow and Friday, so today was my last day of 2009.  I accidentally leaked the info early to one period, (the girls’ club) so they brought snacks today and sorta forced me into a “party” of sorts. I have never been able to resist a good snickerdoodle, or two, or ten. So that meant that I had to shorten things up in the other periods too…so it was sort of a nutty day today. But in the 2 1/2 days I had to work with this week… (Aside: I’m breaking a perfect record of never having showed a movie in class, ever in 20 years. But this time I’m having the sub roll the cheesy Outsiders movie tomorrow and Friday while I’m gone. They’ve been begging for weeks, and I’ve been telling them to “wake up” from the dream, but this will be my little Christmas present to them.) …we did a little Giver epilogue and what-have-you. Yesterday, we discussed a few “literary” type questions. #4. The denouement (resolution) of  The Giver is when Jonas slides down the hill on the sled with Gabriel.  a) True  b) False Trick Question! FALSE! There is

Read more »

The Ending (Also: ____ing beyond.)

December 11, 2009
By
The Ending (Also: ____ing beyond.)

We finished The Giver today. As usual, they all hated the ending. Well, hate is such an inexact word, as they would say in the Community. They don’t really hate the ending; they are frustrated by it, they find it unsatisfying. “Did they die or what? Did they make it?” “What do you think?” In my best Bob Newhart psychologist voice. “I hate when you do that!” “We’re going to read Lois Lowry’s Newbery Award acceptance speech on Monday, but…” “I read that already.” “Thank you for sharing; you’re very special. Then you’ll remember that she shares several different theories for the ending, none of which are hers. She won’t tell us.” “That’s not fair!” “I know. She gets letters all the time asking her. She wants us to decide. I sort of like it better that way. I mean, you’d feel cheated if the last line read, ‘Then Jonas opened his eyes, and he was once again on the Giver’s couch.’ Or if Jonas turned out to be a normal kid having a bad dream on Christmas Eve.” “Yeah but…” “Ok, let’s look at the ending. Right before he finds the sled at the top of the hill, he

Read more »

Sweet Release

December 9, 2009
By

They read chapter 19 in The Giver last night, and so the Q/A period before the daily reading quiz had a bit of a different tone. Many had read ahead, or read the book in a previous class (curse thee once more, ye cursed book thieves), so the release of the twin wasn’t the blow that it was for the rest of them. Still… This year they seemed to obsess on the box and the chute. “Why did he put it in a box? Where does the chute go? Was it really a garbage chute?” “It’s a little more dignified and neat. Probably to an incinerator. Yes.” “Ohhhh. So sad.” This year though, a brand new question came up. We were talking about how Jonas freaks out at the thought of Fiona sticking the needle into the old people she once cared for so gently. One kid makes the point that the babies don’t know what the needle is all about… “But what if the old person starts to question the needle? You know, hey girlie, I thought this was a release, why are you sticking me with that thing?” I remind them, like the Giver does Jonas, that these

Read more »

Thank You.

December 5, 2009
By
Thank You.

One of the reasons I’ve been lagging on posting this past week is that I was getting ready for our town’s annual Christmas parade. My boy and I have been rolling with the local bike posse in the parade every year since he was 2 (he’s 10 now). I used to tow a modified kid trailer with a drum set on it, and he would pound away as we rolled through our quaint downtown amid a steady stream of screams of “MISSSTERRRR COWWWWWARRRRDDDDD!” from the sidelines. But for the past couple of years, he’s been playing the trumpet in the school band, so I switched the trailer to more of a throne/rickshaw setup, and we roll with him riffing on “Jingle Bells” and “Old Saint Nick” from the rolling lawnchair. Well, they used footage of us from last year’s parade in the local commercial advertising this year’s parade. So for this whole past week, I’ve been getting the “I SAW you,” line from all sides. We were talking about it in one class on Friday (the parade was that night) and one boy suddenly (finally) picked up on the fact that I had a son. “You’re a parent?!” He was

Read more »

Random Featured Post

You Gotta Have a Shtick (or a stick).

One of the things I like to say about teaching junior high is down at the bottom of this page in the footer. You’re too lazy to scroll, aren’t you? Fine. “Five shows a day, 180 days a year.” And there aren’t many crowds tougher than 7th graders. “This is boring.” The worst of all sins. Most of us who teach junior high have a shtick. A role we play, some isms we like to use again and again. Idiosyncrasies we play up for entertainment/attention value (oh the sharing I get when we talk about that word idiosyncrasy during “Monsters are Due on Maple Street“). The key is to make the shtick such a natural part of the classroom routine, that it doesn’t distract too much. Well, sometimes we need the distraction. There’s the Raffle King. There’s the Timer. There are the clickers. The Cage. Mental Floss. Nutty videos. MYOB. All of these are stalwart features of my classroom shtick. And as of a few years ago, there’s also the Quiet Stick. (four or five years ago – me visiting another teacher’s classroom before school) “Leenie! What the shiggy are you doing? Where’d you get this, and WHY ARE YOU [...]

more -->


Mr. Coward has been teaching on the beautiful central coast of California since 1989.

Archives

December 2009
M T W T F S S
« Nov   Jan »
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031  

Recent Comments

Links

Privacy Policy

Tags

cartoons Charlotte Doyle Class Activities clickers CPS CTEL Flashback grammar high school idiosyncrasies irony Mailbag Me mechanics middle school teaching Monsters on Maple Street Moodle online learning oral reading Outsiders CHapter 5 Outsiders Chapter 7 RaffleKing Ray Bradbury Reading Richard Cory Seventh Grade Behavior Stories of Seventh Grade substituting Teaching Teaching Tips teaching with technology teaching with technology teaching writing Technology techology testing The Earth Men The Giver The Midwife's Apprentice The Outsiders Tips Tips for teachers Tom Sawyer Wiki Writing