Of Waterbombs and Detentions

Thursday afternoon was the Yr 9 'Year Level Outing', organised by their young and enthusiastic Year Level Co-ordinator. When he announced it at Assembly I felt he was being generous and perhaps a little foolish. They are a particularly unpleasant group, being Yr 9 and all, and they need very little excuse to run riot. When, however, he announced that there would be water bombs involved, I felt he had lost his tiny little mind. When I discovered that I was rostered to ATTEND this act of complete lunacy I considered some self inflicted wounds.

The plan was to walk the 100+ pupils down to the nearest park where a series of games would be laid out. At each 'station', a large wheelie bin, containing water bombs stood next to a variety of cone markers, upended tables, flags in bins and long benches. There were 6 different activities ranging through 'Capture The Flag' and 'Saving Private Ryan' to 'Barricades' and 'Obstacles'. The premise for all of them was simple. Complete the task without getting wet.

With military precision the enthusiastic Year Level Co-ordinator had calculated the exact number of waterbombs required for each game, two per team member, and bagged them up in black garbage bags inside the large wheelie bins. Each teacher had a detailed plan explaining the nature/rules of the games, the order of rotation round the stations and lists of the 10 kids on their team etc. There was no reason for it not to go like clockwork.

Except that there was Year 9 involved.

I cannot do justice in diary form to the level of chaos that followed. To be fair, 70% of the pupils entered into the spirit of the event with a sense of fair play and an intuitive knowledge of the boundaries, the other 30% however took testosterone, teenage egocentricity and the fact that they have no boundaries, right to the edge of health, safety and vandalism.

Thing is, I knew it was going to happen! I mean I know I am now officially one of the 'oldies' in the staffroom (funny...I was one of the 'young ones' for such a long time) and we as a group had discussed the foolishness and inappropriateness of the venture for some days beforehand. I know I am no longer as physically able to engage in the 'hijinks' of end of term, much as I might like to, for one thing the kids would think I was ridiculous! It is one thing for a young (in his twenties), fit, athletic sports teacher to belt around all over the shop pelting water bombs at people, it is quite another matter when the middle-aged wrinkly lady with glasses tries it. BUT surely the younger staff members could SEE where this was going??

Apparently not. I was assured that it was all 'good fun'. I announced myself 'party pooper' and 'old fogey' before anyone else could do it and acknowledged that this type of student/teacher bonding was probably out of my skill set now. I gritted my teeth and made a joke out of the fact that this was going to be a torturous afternoon for me. The young staff went smiling, off over the horizon.

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To be continued...

image credit: waterbombs: wikipedia

And the Answer is.....oh I dunno....Maybe Ten?

Yesterday I 'supervised' Year 8 Science and Year 9 Maths. The latter was heartbreaking. In the exam set for the most challenged of the 14 year olds, there was a question which read

x-2=11

A young man called me over. "I don't know how to do this one."
Now what you have to understand is that as a supervisor for kids with Learning Difficulties you have a fine line to walk. Sometimes you are there to ensure that kids show us exactly what they know. They may have lots of skills and knowledge locked up inside their heads and simply be unable to demonstrate that knowledge because they cannot access the questions. In this case, I reread the question, explain words which have slipped out of their often challenged memories, or sometimes simply read the question to them to take the reading load away so they can think about the actual question they are being asked.

Other times you are left to salvage a kid's self respect as they sit an exam which is blatantly out of their skill range. In this instance you mark the paper with 'assistance given' and they receive a modified mark which reflects their skill as marked against a different set of criteria.

This case was the latter.

I rephrased the question. "Think about it like this, what can you take two from and still be left with nine." I drew the familiar primary level empty box that the kids write the 'missing number' in. He remained blank and sputtered out a few unrelated numbers.

"OK," I tried again,"Let's draw the 9." I drew nine 'counters'."Now let's put back the two that we took away." I drew two more....different shapes so as to differentiate them from the nine. "So, if I ended up with 9 (I covered the two), what did I start with(uncovering the two)?"

There was 10-15 seconds of confusion. "Maybe ten?" was his reply.

He is 14 going on 15. In 6 short, summer laden weeks he will commence Year 10 and will be in Maths Applications with a syllabus of buying stocks and shares and doing your own tax. He can't add 9 and 2....with dots to count.

And guess who will be teaching him?

Another student, my nemesis, found herself in floods of hysterical tears. She started flippantly, ignoring all rules and cracking jokes with her next door neighbour, demanding help and whining that the teacher had not listened to her when she didn't understand during the year. (in truth, she was probably in the Focus Room when the lessons were taught). After struggling along for the first 45 minutes, she suddenly dissolved and exposed all the underlying fear and insecurity. She was terrified that if she failed her parents would make her quit her job at 'Hungry Jacks' (Burger King). Would I phone them? Would I tell them that she needed to go down a class? Would I tell them that she had really tried?

As I sat patting her back and feeling her pain (I had huge mental blocks with maths as a kid) I marvelled that this was the same child who had been so openly defiant, rude, indeed personally abusive (you really need a nose job Mrs A...you have a very big nose) and yet had it been appropriate to open my arms I am sure she would have crawled onto my lap. Also aged 14.

I calmed her and she tried a few more questions before the end of the 'road accident' that was this exam. She left saying she wanted to be in my class next year and would I please call her parents and explain?

As I said. This was a heart breaking exam.

Science wasn't quite so bad because when they don't know, they just write any old rubbish and lets face it, they're mostly no wiser! But Maths is the one where you sometimes don't even know where to start. Your inadequacies are laid bare for all to see. You can't cover with lost homework or distraction and attention seeking behaviour.

Better go finish the exam for my babies with this is mind.l

Under the Pump

This is my husband's expression and means you are under significant pressure. Science exam today...finished playing with it at 2am. Still think I could have done a completely different exam for one of the boys but just ran out of time. Mostly I go through checking that the questions are not phrased in ambiguous language or that diagrams are labelled clearly. Often they're not. As teachers we assume so much about how kids will approach a task. The ones with learning disabilities, especially Specific Learning Disabilities such as dyslexia and dyspraxia find sequencing and spatial awareness a challenge, so if an arrow is not pointing at exactly the right place....

They are also very literal, so when graphing three sets of results on the same axes the other day, after the teacher had demonstrated using a dotted line for one and a dashed line for another, to discriminate between the samples, many of my babies only plotted two graphs, cos that's all he'd drawn on the board.

Anyway, there is light at the end of the tunnel. I drafted most of the English exam for tomorrow last night so all that's left is maths. Now there's a whole other story. :-(

I also have a post on the waterbomb afternoon half done but it is too easy for me to get distracted (like now) so I am trying to leave that til the weekend. BRING IT ON!!!!!!!!!!!!

Best Shot Monday: Corn Boy

Lord, I should be chastised for my complete lack of ability with the camera. I have the best model in the world and I can still not get a clear picture of him.

This is my 'Corn Boy'!!! I asked him to rake the lawn (I don't think he'd ever been asked to do anything like that in his life before!!!) and cajoled him with one of my hats. On seeing the hat he announced he was like a scarecrow and needed 'one of those corn things' to put in his mouth. Blow me down if he didn't find one!!!

He then insisted I take photos and posed beautifully but I suspect I have changed a focus thing on my camera (borrowed off Himself) and nothing is clear. :-(

Regardless. He worked his butt off.
Look at the state of the lawn behind him! He told me that I would get a picture of the lawn behind him and that I needed an 'after' picture. When he had finished he called me down to take the after picture.He told me where to stand on the road so that I would get the whole background in. Look at that lawn!!!! It's still there under all the bark and leaves! Of course dad helped by getting rid of all the things SB raked up....but that's OK!! He was sooooo proud of himself.

There's not a lot of quality in these photos but the relationship building that goes on is priceless. Whilst I am despairing over No2 son at the moment, I am encouraged by my Small Boy. He may not be 'mine' but he kind of is.

Edited to include: Just on looking.....Lord I love this kid.

Click for more Best Shots

Why Lord? WHY????

I am now officially going to SCREAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I am back at work (after 6pm) finishing the modified History exam for my two special ed boys. (Lots of pictures and not so many extended responses). I stopped briefly to make a phone call and find out how far from home Himself was as Mum and Dad have dropped the Baby Angel home. I don't like to leave her on her own for too long in the afternoon (it's still broad daylight here) and I was checking on her too to see if she was ok.
Aaaaaaaanyway, as I spoke on the phone the screen in front of me went blank. The computer had shut itself down automatically as it's on a network and senses if it has been 'left on'. I thought I had over ridden that at 4pm when the whole lot go down all at once. Apparently not. I have just lost over an hour's work including importing pictures, cutting and pasting and formatting. I feel sick. Whatever happened to the automatic 'save' facility on Word?????????

On that note I might as well go home and finish it there. It is going to be a VERY long night as I also have Devotions to prepare for the morning and the Year 9 English exam to do. I am also exhausted from a day of history revision with the most miserable lot of Year 9s you could imagine. No one would know from their demeanour that they have an exam tomorrow. They just do not seem to CARE!!
>:-( gggggrrrrrrrrr

Mum and Dad are Here and Its HOT HOT HOT

Look who we picked up from the airport this morning. That's Mum in the silly hat and Dad grinning in the foreground. They've certainly arrived to full-on first day of Summer December weather!!!

27C??????????? This weather widget is WAAAAAAAAY out!!!!!! It is stinking hot and I am going to have to go for a swim. (not a pretty sight) Himself and the kids are already in. I think he's paying them to pick leaves and hunks of bark off the bottom of the pool. One problem with living near the Gorge is that when there's a gully wind (most of the time), everything blows into our yard.

We're not talking about sailing today as the boys didn't perform very well. They adjusted the rake on their mast and as Himself put it, they sailed as if they were dragging buckets!! Well at least they'll know to adjust it the other way next time!

Gotta go; I'm supposed to be cleaning up the house for M&D coming for dinner tonight! They have a little house a few suburbs away which they stay in when they're here. They're here for four months actually so its great for them to have their own space.

I'm procrastinating! Vacuuming awaits.

Seven Random Facts

I have finally been tagged for the Seven Random Facts meme! Thanks Kim!! Here goes.

Here are the rules:

1. Link to the person that tagged you.
2. Post the rules.
3. Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself.
4. “Tag” 7 people at the end of the post and include links to their blogs.
5. Let each person know that you tagged them.

1. I used to drink chardonnay but now I drink sauvignon blanc.....with ice. Stops me from
getting too 'tired' or dehydrated.

2. I am the only person in my house who refills the toilet roll holders.

3. I have a strawberry birthmark on my back. When I was born it was the size of my mother's
thumb print. Now it's a doozy!! Still, I can't see it so it doesn't bother me. Actually, I quite like
it...not everyone has one!

4. I am a Thursday's child. Apparently I have far to go.

5. I saw 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show' when I was fifteen. I wanted to be Frankenfurter.

6.The only medal or prize I ever won for sport was 1991 Ladies Slalom Champion,
Cabramurra Ski Club. There were four people in the competition.

7. I can count the number of car accidents I've had on two hands and one foot. But hey!
I've driven a LOT of kilometres over the years. There's got to be a statistical probability
involved here, right??

Now the rules say I have to 'tag' seven people but so many have done this before..........still, it's quite nice to be tagged by name......and there are people I would like to hear more from..... so....I will tag

Headbang8 at Uber Elvis

Chris at CDV

Strange Scottish Girl at Blogging Me Blogging You

Chin Chin at Ouistiti

Melody A at The Hipmomma's Journal....have you done this one???

Susie at Susie J as I can't see a meme category on her sidebar so I'm hoping she hasn't done it!!!

and YOU! Let me know when you do it!!