$(*&($%&(W$*(%&@%$^$&$*

Welcome to Monday...I really tried to go in positive, but...I had emails in response to the analysis I had completed of the last benchmark test my students took. The principal wanted to know if I felt my kids were making adequate progress. Uh, no.....they don't want to do the work. So I invited him to come in and hear the discussion I was planning on having with the math class today - but he is so overwhelmed with work he can't make it. Guess it's not that important....

And then another email saying I no doubt would have to reteach some skills, based on the results. Uh, ya think? Forget the fact that the skills are being taught out of any consistent context, of course I need to reteach.

So by the end of the day I was pretty pissed, and so I emailed the principal and said if AIMS are so important, then I need to get some extra time away from the art classes to do more preparation. We'll see just how important this is.

Then when I was working with the kids in math class, I asked them what we needed to do to change their progress, and they took the opportunity to dump on me. We need more worksheets to practice" - uh, well, you don't work on the ones I give you, and so on. The thing I found most interesting is that they think the stuff I give them is too easy, and the AIMS stuff is harder. Well, I give them open-ended problems that they need to bring forward information and use it practically - not multiple choice. According to brain research, this is a more difficult task. But they want all multiple choice so they can guess.

Just can't win....

But the best part was in the computer with the 8th grade art class (what an obnoxious group of children) - computers are deadly slow, can load the sites, kids are messing around with YouTube, after they have been specifically told they can't go there - if the district is so concerned with making this failing school better, then at least we should be able to hhave more up-to-date computers, servers, and so on. It was an extremely LOOONNNNGGGGG 90 minutes.