Long Time, No Update

I've been pretty busy. Good busy.

School is going well. Friday was a non-student day. We had Performance Review Meetings. Basically meaning that I had a few hours of uninterrupted time in my classroom and one 45-minute meeting with my faculty head. Nice!

I'm really starting to find my feet at St. Peter's. I have my good days and bad days, but the good are starting to outnumber the bad. I'm reacting to different situations better now. Even being abused over the vending machines...again.

Yep. Those vending machines have got to go.

At the beginning of 3rd period on Thursday, I had 27 year 7s waiting for me. We'd just had our 20-minute morning break and the pupils know they are expected to go to class. Well, along come two year 9s (both of whom have me for music) to the machines outside my room.

I told them they were too late to use the machines and to get to class. They continued to approach the machines. One is on a timer, the other is not. I held down the coin return button on the one so that Nathan's 50p piece kept going straight through the machine. Still, he and Adam refused to give up, apparently thinking that they are more stubborn than Miss Cooper.

How wrong they are... : P

I finally got a bright idea and grabbed for the 50p piece as it came out in the coin return slot.

Nathan: "Give me my money!!"

Me: "You can come by at lunch and have it back then."

I'm not sure which kid yelled the "F" word at me as I turned around to walk away. But that stopped me in my tracks.

Me: "Excuse me?"

Nathan: "Give me my money back!!"

Me: "I told you, you can have it back at lunchtime."

Nathan: "Shut up!!!" He was getting really mad at this point. And shooting himself in the foot.

I, of course, was inwardly outraged that I was being subjected to this abuse. So I said, "Right, let's just go see what Mrs. Reed says." Mrs. Reed is my next-door neighbor, an art teacher. She is wonderful when I need help.

At this point, Adam was pissed off on his friend's behalf and getting himself in more trouble than he would have been in if he had just minded his own business. But try telling that to a 13-year-old.

Mrs. Reed agreed with me (as I knew she would) and they got borderline verbally abusive with her. So she called for a Senior Member of Staff (SMT). While we were waiting, Mrs. Hardy (another SMT, on her way to teach a class) happened by and got involved. They were abusive to her, as well. She had to get to her class (and my poor year 7s were still waiting for me). So along comes Miss Owens, an assistant headteacher, and she tries to sort it out. What a mess!!

She took the two boy to the Inclusion Room--kind of like an in-school suspension. They spent the rest of the day there.

A few minutes later, the SMT on call came by my room to ask for my side of things and to tell me to fill out a couple of referral forms. I gave him the 50p piece to give back to Nathan.

All told, I was 10 minutes late for my lesson.

But hopefully what those two year 9s will take away from this is that they shouldn't go against Miss Cooper's instructions. I'm sure they'll be kinda pissed off at me for a while, though.

But they've never been good in my class, so oh well. I can just send them out.

Eventful week!

Other than that incident, things are going well. I am, as I said, finding my feet. I'm feeling more confident in my abilities and I'm doing some good lessons. The kids seem to enjoy them anyway. I have a few who gripe and complain but I chalk it up to puberty. : P

In the Fan-tab-u-lous News category: Summer is coming!! Yessiree, she is due to arrive on Thursday. I am really looking forward to seeing her and showing her around Burnham and later, London. She's never been to Europe and I know she is going to love it. What's not to love?

She'll spend two nights in Burnham, here at Kathy and Derek's place. They have kindly offered a spare bedroom to her. Saturday, she'll catch a plane to Barcelona. She'll come back to London on Thursday. On Friday, I'll join her there for two nights to show her my favorite parts of London that are off the beaten path. She'll fly back to the States on Sunday, December 5th, and I'll train it back to Burnham-on-Crouch. At that point, I'll only have a couple of weeks left before I fly back to the States myself. Yesterday it was one month! I'm getting excited to see everyone.

In other great news, I had some help from a bunch of Sixth Formers on Monday and my classroom looks fantastic! We got rid of a lot of junk--out-of-date books, papers from previous school years, etc. We moved my tables around so the kids sit in groups now, not rows. It looks great. It's not done yet, but it is so much closer. On Friday, I put up posters in the messy back corner and started getting it ready to be the Composing Centre. I will take pictures soon.

Well, I'll wind this post up, then. I will be better about updating this week (or so I'll try!) and about emailing, too.

Cheers,

Meg