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Guest Artist: Advice for Teaching Middle School

Posted on August 28, 2010
Filed Under Middle-L Listserv, Tips | Leave a Comment

Here’s another plug for the Middle-L e-mail listserv. As I have said before, I am a big fan. I have also previously posted some great op-ed pieces written by Marion Brady, who is a big contributor to the list. Go subscribe now, I’ll wait.

OK. This is an example of the kind of great stuff you can find on Middle-L. A new subscriber wrote asking for advice on teaching middle school. She was showered with great ideas. One of my fave responses came from Megan Jones. She has some great advice, that is so in line with my own philosophies of teaching junior high (sorry, middle school), that I had to reprint it here. Thanks, Megan. (Of course, being the know-it-all that I am, I have to offer my own commentary.)

I teach middle school language arts (grades 6 and 7) and absolutely love it! Middle schoolers are a tough, but rewarding group to work with.  Some tips that have been helpful for teaching Middle school age students (learned from other teachers and trial and error) are the following:
1. Be real and yourself: students at that age are extremely self conscious and a person who is comfortable with who they are is an excellent role model.  They can also smell fake and insincerity from a mile away so look for something positive in each one and be genuine with them.
She’s on the money here. They can also smell fear (see #5). Just like free throws, dogs and ground balls. Be the Alpha.
2. Have reasons for things: These students are hitting a point where they are a little tired of school and want to know WHY they need to do things. Reasons like “so you can go to college” are not good enough.  Link activities and work to life skills and the world.
God, I hated it when they said, “Because it’ll be on the test.” Or, “You just have to know this.” Or some such. I do like to emphasize that there is certain knowledge that is required of an educated person, just because, but here again, she’s money.
3.  Be firm in the beginning and back off later:  the first few weeks they are testing the boundaries so if you say you are going to do something FOLLOW THROUGH.  They want to know what the limits are and that you will enforce them even if they say otherwise.  If you start firm then you can back off and go to fun, but if you start fun and try to go firm, it will be agony for you and the students.
As I have said before, the first line in my sub plan is always, “Kick #ss and take names.” You have to show that you have teeth and will use them. A wolfmother cares for her pups, but she sure isn’t adverse to grabbing them by the scruff of their necks, and shaking a little. Be the Alpha.
4. Don’t be afraid of a little sarcasm:  So long as it’s not mean, this can be really helpful and fun.  I like to think of it as humor of higher order thinking.  Throw it out and see how many of them get it.  I always tell my students that they can be sarcastic to me, but they have to be prepared to take it from someone who is better and has more experience with it.
I think I have also posted along these lines. It’s a fine line, but it can be a lot of fun walking it.
5.  Be confident: Passion is very important so it’s good that you love what you are teaching.  That enthusiasm is contagious, but also be confident about what is going on in your classroom.  Even if you don’t feel you know something very well show your confidence and if they ask something you don’t know, tell them that you will look it up: make sure that you do.  (Even if
they don’t remember and never ask about it again, you still have the information for the next time you are asked)
This comes from experience and knowledge. You have to be careful with this one; as she said in #1, they can also smell fakies. You do have to really know your material. Don’t just try to “stay one day ahead of the kids.” You HAVE to know your shtuff.
6.  Take them seriously: Middle school drama can seem unreasonable to adults, but keep in mind that their hormones are going crazy.  Basically their emotions are like ours only amplified by 10 so anything can be a big deal for them.  Take the situation seriously and nip it down because an entire class can be thrown into chaos if you don’t.
True that. However, you also have to remember that they also have fairly short memories when it comes to said drama. By next Thursday, they will roll their eyes at you when you try to delicately bring up the matter.
Hope that helps a bit!  Middle School is absolutely delightful to teach, even if they can be a little exacerbating.  Have fun with them!
THAT’S the bottom line. If it isn’t fun, you shouldn’t be there.

Normal Use

Posted on August 27, 2010
Filed Under Me | Leave a Comment

Just a quick little bit of circle-time sharing.

Regular readers (I think there are a few of you) know that I HATE cell phones.  I don’t really like talking on the phone at all, actually, but we’ll cover that issue separately. However after, ahem, a run-in shall we say, with a bum on a bike while I was skating, which resulted in 5 stitches in my lip the day before school started last year,  my wife has of late, “requested” that I carry a hell phone on my daily skate. So for the past few months, I’ve been carrying a prepaid phone with enough minutes to last me a lifetime. I think I’ve used about 10. A few weeks ago, I took a fall, and crushed the phone in my pocket.

My wife was at BestBuy the other day getting me a replacement, and of course the salesman was trying to upsell her the extended service plan for the phone. After listening to the guy’s spiel, she asked,

“Would it be covered if my husband broke it with his butt?”

My 11 year-old boy stifled a laugh, I hear.

“No m’am, that would not be considered normal use.”

Needless to say, the extended service plan was not purchased.

Answers

Posted on August 26, 2010
Filed Under Back to School | 2 Comments

I know everyone is hanging on the edge of his/her seat (everyone is a singular pronoun, and the currently correct usage is either his/her or to alternate now and then; everyone should take out his book, everyone remembered her pencil, and etc.), waiting for the First Day Quiz answers.

First Day Quiz Question One:
What was the most common computer issue your gallant narrator had to fix for people yesterday, during our one prep day?
a) printer not working
b) mouse not working
c)  software that used to be there isn’t any more
d) monitor resolution
e) can’t play dvd’s

Answer: d. While all of the above were things I had to deal with, believe it or not, screen resolution was my number one complaint. When IST reimaged our computers over the summer, they must have changed the default desktop size. All day long it was, “How do I make my fonts bigger? I can’t see my icons.” Guess our staff IS getting a bit long in the tooth.

First Day Quiz Question Two:
How many kids  whom I flagged for needing (a lot of) extra reading help, were also recommended for AVID (in 7th grade for Pete’s sake)?
a) 0
b) 1
c) 2
d) 3
e) 4

Answer: d. As I started looking to see if any of these kids were already in EL reading (there were a lot of Latino surnames), I realized the three of the kids near the bottom were not only not in a reading class or an EL class, they were in AVID! How is a kid who can barely read going to take Cornell notes? OMG! This issue could be another whole post by itself.

First Day Quiz Question Three:
How old was the sixth grader who was enrolled in my first period class?
a) 9
b) 10
c) 11 1/2
d) 13 1/2
e) 15

Answer: d. As I was looking through my class lists, I noticed that I had a boy and a girl in the same class with the same last name. Hmmm. Twins? Haven’t had twins in awhile (since the year I had 3 sets).  And nowadays they don’t usually end up in the same class. So I look on PowerCheese to check the birth dates. Waitaminnit? The girl is 13 1/2? The boy is 12. Wha? Why are they in the same class? I go to the counselor, who’s never heard of the girl. She checks the system. Wha? The girl went back to Mexico in 2008, and never got taken out of the system. And she was still in 6th grade! The scheduling software just gave her a generic schedule (without an elective, since there was nobody to fill out the request card). She was literally a ghost in the machine.

First Day Quiz Question Four:
How many doughnuts did mrC eat yesterday?
a) None. He wouldn’t do that to his body.
b) One. Just a little taste; couldn’t resist the pink frosting/rainbow sprinkles.
c) Two. There were maple bars too.
d) Three.  There was another rainbow sprinkle one under the glazed.
e) Four. That last plain one looked so lonely at lunch time.

Answer: e. I cannot lie. Well I won’t anyway. The scary part is that if there were any more left at lunch, I would have eaten them too. D’oh! I haven’t gone into a doughnut shop and bought doughnuts in over 20 years, but free doughnuts are a whole ‘nother matter.

First Day Quiz Question Five:
What/who did mrC  inject with epinephrine, practicing with the EpiPen?
a) himself
b) Nurse Maureen
c)  an orange
d) a practice dummy
e) our principal

Answer: c. Our school nurse (whom we share with 5 other schools…yeah I know…) had a whole bunch of dummy EpiPens for the (10 minute) training. At first nobody would test them on her (see!) own outer thigh, because nobody believed they were dummies. C’mon. Then when everyone starts asking if there will be one in every one of the girl’s classrooms (jeeze Louise, she’s carrying one!), Nurse Mo says that each patient is limited to two. “But why?” Now we have to school them that epinephrine is a major ingredient in meth. Oh.

Then I got to jab an orange with a real one.

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