Oh my Gosh these last three days have been so intangibly amazing since I've been watching Parks and Rec and doing other equally absent-minded activities cooking's been fun too testing out the Martha Stewart in me although I could never be as good as a culinary convict unfortunately, I've also been a little addicted to facebook, but what else is new also, our cat Goose keeps licking my feet.
At this point, are you ready to take the computer screen and bash it into your brain? If this was one of those "pieces of art" essays that I read from my ever-intuitive students, then I'd be thinking to myself, "WTF?!"
For some reason, and if you have the answer pretty please track me down, students incessantly struggle with run-on sentences. Even some of the best students can't decipher when the sentence screams, "End now!" I don't know if it's because students, and Americans in general, are crazily busy, running from one task to the other. Or possibly it's a result of verbal (and written) diarrhea - everyone's favorite. Better yet, and yes Aristotle I think I've stumbled upon it, it could be laziness. No matter what the cause for the run-on sentence disease is, I think this disease has run on into my life this week.
Sadly, I fail to quench your thirst of my usual rant of bashing and bemoaning student behavior because I have only had the pleasure of a single day of infamy in the school house this week. The snowmaggedon, or blizzard 2011 as everyone's posting on facebook, has blocked entry into the fount of knowledge....sad day. Although the break has been nice because I've been imitating a sloth, trying to get it right, the snow days have been running on...count em, Dan-o...
1.
2.
3.
3 Snow Days
And these run-on snow days have sounded a little like the wretched, run-on sentence that I forced you to read when I so grandiosely opened this blog.
So, no earth-shattering acumen from the teaching world to offer the masses today...just a little metaphor, if you will. Snow days = one, big, hairy run-on sentence.
But I like big, hairy, sentences....that are punctuated correctly!
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Monday, January 17, 2011
Lesson Two: The Hyperbole
HYPERbole! Imagine Julie Andrews screaming, or singing, "HYPER," at the top of her perfect lungs and then beautifully singing "bole" to her lovely, Alpine, suspendered, green and red sported children. Although I don't resemble Julie Andrews, unfortunately, I use this method to teach hyperbole to my students. By exaggerating the "hyper" part of the word, it helps reminds those savvy minds that hyperbole simply means an exaggeration..such as, "I'm so hungry that I could eat a cow."
Now that you've met the hyperbole, let's roll.
Although this week didn't rank on my Letterman-like top ten list of the worst weeks in all of history, it wasn't great. Before Christmas, I told my students that whichever class earned the highest average score on a certain quiz would earn a pizza party (I teach six sections of the same class.....awesome...). Of course, the class that won is comprised of a large percentage of whiny, disrespectful miscreants who make me consider whether I really should get out of bed in the morning. On Wednesday, when we were discussing the pizza party in this particular class, they started to complain about the amount and type of pizza being bought. Just so you know, I purchased six pizzas for 20 people, with four different types making up those six. Even though it doesn't seem like a huge deal now, at the time, the fact that they were moaning about the pizza party made me seriously consider to cancel the extravaganza. This day of bemoaning, then, has inspired a post of hyperboles. So please enjoy the following list of hyperbolic behavior that I wish that I could do to my students/just do in general.
1. I hate all of their papers so much that I will simply burn them all...bye bye bad grammar.
2. If burning isn't a success, I will throw the papers into a food processor and watch the atrocities get ripped to shreds. Much like my heart is ripped to shreds when I read awful essays.
3. When a student is being especially disrespectful, I'll whip out my Harry Potter wand and yell, "Crucio!"
4. Lock them in a cage while I take a nap. And I might accidentally lose the key. Oops.
5. Throw them into the ocean with millstones tied around their necks; they could make friends with Aeriel and Flipper. Maybe even Shamu if they're lucky.
6. Fly across my desk and assail the one student who makes me curse the day I was born. By the time my flying episode has ceased, the student will be in a full body cast and will be forced to be tutored from home. How unfortunate.
7. Scream expletives at the top of my teacher-y lungs, thus scaring them into submission.
Now, if I were to do just one of those heinous, but oh so pleasurable, acts, my chances of ever teaching again would be slim since I'd be kickin' it in the cell block. But who hasn't fantasized about taking vengeance on those who make us want to temporarily contemplate suicide? Again, I'm being hyperbolic, so hopefully I haven't offended anyone too much yet. But hyperboles, or exaggerations, transform the mundane into a state of laughter that make everyday life much easier. If I truly do have a terrible day at school, why not throw a few ridiculous "if, then" statements out there to numb the pain?
While these hyperboles are not a likely reality, it's fun to dream, to imagine, to exaggerate. Because after the dreaming, imagining, and exaggerating come to a stop sign, then we can realize that the mundane, everyday life that requires us to travel to work, aiming to love the ones who crap all over our day, is more meaningful than any dream-like hyperbole could ever be.
Now that you've met the hyperbole, let's roll.
Although this week didn't rank on my Letterman-like top ten list of the worst weeks in all of history, it wasn't great. Before Christmas, I told my students that whichever class earned the highest average score on a certain quiz would earn a pizza party (I teach six sections of the same class.....awesome...). Of course, the class that won is comprised of a large percentage of whiny, disrespectful miscreants who make me consider whether I really should get out of bed in the morning. On Wednesday, when we were discussing the pizza party in this particular class, they started to complain about the amount and type of pizza being bought. Just so you know, I purchased six pizzas for 20 people, with four different types making up those six. Even though it doesn't seem like a huge deal now, at the time, the fact that they were moaning about the pizza party made me seriously consider to cancel the extravaganza. This day of bemoaning, then, has inspired a post of hyperboles. So please enjoy the following list of hyperbolic behavior that I wish that I could do to my students/just do in general.
1. I hate all of their papers so much that I will simply burn them all...bye bye bad grammar.
2. If burning isn't a success, I will throw the papers into a food processor and watch the atrocities get ripped to shreds. Much like my heart is ripped to shreds when I read awful essays.
3. When a student is being especially disrespectful, I'll whip out my Harry Potter wand and yell, "Crucio!"
4. Lock them in a cage while I take a nap. And I might accidentally lose the key. Oops.
5. Throw them into the ocean with millstones tied around their necks; they could make friends with Aeriel and Flipper. Maybe even Shamu if they're lucky.
6. Fly across my desk and assail the one student who makes me curse the day I was born. By the time my flying episode has ceased, the student will be in a full body cast and will be forced to be tutored from home. How unfortunate.
7. Scream expletives at the top of my teacher-y lungs, thus scaring them into submission.
Now, if I were to do just one of those heinous, but oh so pleasurable, acts, my chances of ever teaching again would be slim since I'd be kickin' it in the cell block. But who hasn't fantasized about taking vengeance on those who make us want to temporarily contemplate suicide? Again, I'm being hyperbolic, so hopefully I haven't offended anyone too much yet. But hyperboles, or exaggerations, transform the mundane into a state of laughter that make everyday life much easier. If I truly do have a terrible day at school, why not throw a few ridiculous "if, then" statements out there to numb the pain?
While these hyperboles are not a likely reality, it's fun to dream, to imagine, to exaggerate. Because after the dreaming, imagining, and exaggerating come to a stop sign, then we can realize that the mundane, everyday life that requires us to travel to work, aiming to love the ones who crap all over our day, is more meaningful than any dream-like hyperbole could ever be.
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Lesson One: Audience and Purpose
As I begin this, let's get a few things straight...
1. I'm cynical: Teaching today's youthful beacons of light occasionally turns a teacher a shade darker.
2. I'm optimistic: The sun will rise tomorrow.
3. I'm honest, but really it's not you, it's me.
4. I'm a mess, but there's nothing a steaming mug of hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps won't cure.
So with that lovely introduction out of the way, let's roll.
One of the first lessons I begin the year with includes life's most important questions that I'm sure are EVERYONE's greatest quandaries that keep them up countless hours in the night: "Who the heck is actually listening to me?" and "Why am I even doing this whole writing business?" Objective for the day: Define audience and purpose in this blog thingy. Very clear, obviously.
First, let's chat about audience. My audience here is really me, however, that may seem at odds since I'm describing who my audience is to some type of audience. I'm an English teacher; I don't have to make sense. All ironic confusion aside, this writing is an ode to none other than me (selfless, I know), helping me process the humor, ridiculousness, frustration, beauty, and joy that teaching, most of the time, is.
Now that we've talked it out, or beat around the bush, (or whichever idiom you prefer), let's welcome purpose to the stage.
So one day, not too long ago, I woke up to the song, "Lean on Me," and images of students enthusiastically entering a classroom that symbolized freedom, hope, and other cheesy ideals, with their spongy brains ready to soak every ounce of wisdom that was spewing from my knowledgeable fountain. After they thoroughly drowned in this waterfall of infinite wisdom, they would excitedly discuss some obscure ideology, such as Marxist literary criticism seen in the work of Poe or Chaucer. After exacerbating such an enthralling subject, these great, teenage minds would produce writing that would put even Shakespeare to shame. Then the teacher and students would joyously discuss literature and its implications happily ever after.
Wow...I must have been really naive. Although I may have been slightly hyperbolic, this is close to the 9 out of 10 that I was according to the how-ridiculously-stupid-can-I-really-be scale. Now, I told you that we were welcoming purpose to the stage; here it is.
Unfortunately, but like most people it seems, I'm a little "over" my job. It's only my second year at this gig, and sometimes I think that I'm ready to pack my bags. The desire to travel away from teaching doesn't really have anything to do with teaching, actually; it's all of the other beautiful pearls that I have the privilege to handle that explain the jet to the door. Let me illuminate and introduce you to some of the said pearls (students' voices or at least what I speculate they're thinking in those noggins).
1. Miss Bass is the dumbest person in the world, and I will argue everything she says because she has no clue what she's talking about.
2. Miss Bass has a nice *** (I'll let you use your critical thinking skills to figure that one out).
3. Just in case I didn't complain enough about the homework assignment, I'm going to do it again just so Miss Bass can figure out that I really hate it.
4. I'm in high school, and I still can't seem to capitalize "I" or the first letters of sentences, or use punctuation for that matter.
Phew...now that I've introduced you to the pearls, the purpose has already been served. It really doesn't seem that bad, right? So, blog, we're going to dialogue about the tests and trials that add spice to the least boring job in the world - teaching. Hopefully, through taking out my sarcastic angst on keys that will be pulsating with my furious thoughts, I will realize that no matter how much I may whine like my pubescent students, that this teaching gig is right - especially for me.
1. I'm cynical: Teaching today's youthful beacons of light occasionally turns a teacher a shade darker.
2. I'm optimistic: The sun will rise tomorrow.
3. I'm honest, but really it's not you, it's me.
4. I'm a mess, but there's nothing a steaming mug of hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps won't cure.
So with that lovely introduction out of the way, let's roll.
One of the first lessons I begin the year with includes life's most important questions that I'm sure are EVERYONE's greatest quandaries that keep them up countless hours in the night: "Who the heck is actually listening to me?" and "Why am I even doing this whole writing business?" Objective for the day: Define audience and purpose in this blog thingy. Very clear, obviously.
First, let's chat about audience. My audience here is really me, however, that may seem at odds since I'm describing who my audience is to some type of audience. I'm an English teacher; I don't have to make sense. All ironic confusion aside, this writing is an ode to none other than me (selfless, I know), helping me process the humor, ridiculousness, frustration, beauty, and joy that teaching, most of the time, is.
Now that we've talked it out, or beat around the bush, (or whichever idiom you prefer), let's welcome purpose to the stage.
So one day, not too long ago, I woke up to the song, "Lean on Me," and images of students enthusiastically entering a classroom that symbolized freedom, hope, and other cheesy ideals, with their spongy brains ready to soak every ounce of wisdom that was spewing from my knowledgeable fountain. After they thoroughly drowned in this waterfall of infinite wisdom, they would excitedly discuss some obscure ideology, such as Marxist literary criticism seen in the work of Poe or Chaucer. After exacerbating such an enthralling subject, these great, teenage minds would produce writing that would put even Shakespeare to shame. Then the teacher and students would joyously discuss literature and its implications happily ever after.
Wow...I must have been really naive. Although I may have been slightly hyperbolic, this is close to the 9 out of 10 that I was according to the how-ridiculously-stupid-can-I-really-be scale. Now, I told you that we were welcoming purpose to the stage; here it is.
Unfortunately, but like most people it seems, I'm a little "over" my job. It's only my second year at this gig, and sometimes I think that I'm ready to pack my bags. The desire to travel away from teaching doesn't really have anything to do with teaching, actually; it's all of the other beautiful pearls that I have the privilege to handle that explain the jet to the door. Let me illuminate and introduce you to some of the said pearls (students' voices or at least what I speculate they're thinking in those noggins).
1. Miss Bass is the dumbest person in the world, and I will argue everything she says because she has no clue what she's talking about.
2. Miss Bass has a nice *** (I'll let you use your critical thinking skills to figure that one out).
3. Just in case I didn't complain enough about the homework assignment, I'm going to do it again just so Miss Bass can figure out that I really hate it.
4. I'm in high school, and I still can't seem to capitalize "I" or the first letters of sentences, or use punctuation for that matter.
Phew...now that I've introduced you to the pearls, the purpose has already been served. It really doesn't seem that bad, right? So, blog, we're going to dialogue about the tests and trials that add spice to the least boring job in the world - teaching. Hopefully, through taking out my sarcastic angst on keys that will be pulsating with my furious thoughts, I will realize that no matter how much I may whine like my pubescent students, that this teaching gig is right - especially for me.
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