The Cursed Class

Last year's seventh graders got a raw deal towards the end of last school year.

For those keeping track, last May was The Flood.  Something like 13" of rain fell in one weekend and most of middle Tennessee looked like a lake.  We ended up missing a week of school due to flooding, and we still have businesses that are just now reopening after last year's disaster.

As a result of The Flood, we ended up canceling a lot of events.  We canceled the school play.  We canceled a band concert.  We even canceled our weekend camping trip to the local recreation area.  (Now that, I might add, wasn't solely because of The Flood.  A lot of it had to do with the fact that The Flood caused every snake in the entire region to hike on up to dry land to places they've never been before.  The camping area was overrun with them.  The thought of seventh graders + camping + snakes = chaos didn't appeal to any of us.)

And of course, this was the group of kids who never got in field day due to tornadoes.

So can you guess what's happening to them this year?  Anyone?

Yup, you got it.

Friday was supposed to be field day for the 8th grade.  It rained.  It was cancelled.

It has rained all weekend.

Tomorrow it's going to be in the 50's (cold for this time of year) and raining.

We may run out of school before we run out of bad weather.

Field Day? Without a Hitch? Really?

All the seventh grade teachers had been dreading Field Day this year.  After all, our kids have been absolutely wild since we finished The Very Big Deal Government Mandated Testing.  We had a really nice day during testing week, took them outside to blow off steam, and ended up breaking up fights left and right.  (The upside to that was some of our biggest pains in the rear ended up getting suspended for about ten days which was a nice break for everyone.)

So, to say that we were NOT looking forward to Field Day was an understatement.

And now that it's all said and done (on a lovely day in the low 70's with NO TORNADOES), it turned out to be one of the Best. Field. Days. Ever.

Strange.

These kids, who prior to field day were doing everything in their power to cause drama and stir up fights were actually well behaved.  We had Mrs. Reading's substitute (Mrs. Reading had a baby a few weeks ago) stay inside in a "holding room" where trouble-makers got sent and they could spend the rest of the day reading or doing piles of worksheets.  She had only four customers and these were kids who got sent to her by The Enforcer after doing something stupid at breakfast.

Seriously.  We didn't have to send a single kid in for getting into trouble.  Not.  One.  The Enforcer told me he kept checking the holding room to see how many kids were stacked in there and he was astounded to see that the only kids in there were the ones he'd put in.

What's kind of funny is that after we practically had to threaten kids to sign up for events, we ended up having kids begging to participate (once they saw how fun it was).  We had some new events this year and they were a lot of fun, for both the kids participating and those watching (and some of them were a lot harder than we expected).

So it went off without a hitch.  Which is almost scary considering this group.  We kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and it never did.

But never fear...we may have had a wonderful field day on Friday, but on Monday they were back to their old tricks and they celebrated by having a knock down drag out fight between a couple of our boys in between 2nd and 3rd period.

Counting the days...just counting the days.

Field Day Fiasco

Field Day for the Seventh grade is this Friday.

As long as it doesn't flood, hail, storm, snow, whatever.  Heavens, last year we spent most of field day in a hallway while tornado warning after tornado warning was issued.  Such fun.  So we shall see if the weather holds and we do indeed have field day. (We have a frost warning tonight, of all things.  In May.)

In any case, many of the Seventh Grade teachers have said all along this year that this bunch of kids really, really don't like each other and really, really don't have any team or school spirit.  They are a cantankerous group.  I've often said that individually, most of the kids are pretty good kids, but put them in groups (or classrooms) and you fell like you're on mile 1,999 of a 2,000 mile car trip with six kids who can't stand each other and who've fought the whole way.

It's been that kind of year.

So on Monday I had The Team talk to their homerooms and get kids signed up for Field Day events.  The idea was that I'd take all the names, do a spread sheet in Excel and then make sure that each kid got to do at least one of the events they wanted to do.  (It actually works out pretty well this way.)  Our kids responded pretty well and we ended up fielding pretty full teams for all the events, including some of the new ones the kids were unfamiliar with.  (For the record, everyone wants volleyball, kickball and tug-of-war).  

Mrs. Eagle's team, however, had a different response.  They pulled all the kids together during seventh period on Tuesday and they couldn't get kids to sign up for anything, even the three most popular events.  They were rude, the didn't want to participate, they wouldn't listen, they didn't care.  According to Mrs. Eagle, all they want to do on field day is run around and talk with their friends.  Participating in the actual events wasn't on their agenda.

So, she went and talked with Coach Cool, who pretty much organizes the whole thing, and told him that we might have a problem.  (The fact that we only have two seventh grade teams this year is making it even more difficult, especially since so many of our kids are cross-teamed.  There's not a lot of team identity or spirit like their used to be.)  Mrs. Eagle pretty much said that unless something dramatic happened, they'd probably end up forfeiting all the events because she couldn't get kids to sign up.

So, The Principal, who we also talked to, suggested that on Field Day, Mrs. Eagle's team dismisses the few kids that did sign up to go to the gym and begin the volleyball tournament, whole the teachers keep the rest of the kids back in class and put them to work on something.  She figured that after about an hour of seat work they may actually want to sign up for kickball.

Coach Cool decided to announce that little gem to the PE classes and lo and behold, we had kids crawling out of the woodwork wanting to sign up for events.  I needed only a few kids to fill a few empty spots, and managed to get those filled without any effort.  Mrs. Eagle said kids were practically running to her room to volunteer to sign up.

So I guess, when the alternative is sitting in a classroom doing worksheets all day, or getting out in the sun and maybe actually participating in a little game of tug-of-war, being outside wins.

 

The Curse of the Seventh Grade

I am beginning to think that this class of seventh graders has a curse hanging over their heads. Or, if not a curse, one big black miserable cloud.

First, their camping trip was canceled due to The Flood we had at the beginning of the month. Some of these kids had been looking forward to this since December and were besides themselves with excitement. I am still amazed at how well they took it when I gathered them up and explained that we just couldn't guarantee their safety and since the camping area was under water, there wasn't much we could do. They didn't whine, fuss, or complain. They just sucked it up.

Then, the kids in drama, most of whom are seventh graders, received the news that their play (a musical, no less) was going to be postponed until we return to school in the fall. They had lost precious rehearsal time, many of the kids still didn't know their lines, and The Flood just complicated things. Another major disappointment.

And then there was Field Day.

Field Day is a big deal for these kids. I mean who couldn't love a day of running around, screaming, eating snow cones and just having a grand old time with your friends and not being stuck in a classroom all day? (I'm not including the teachers in this statement. Most of us tolerate it. Barely.)

So, due to The Flood, instead of having field day on three successive Fridays, they had Field Day on three successive days. Sixth grade was on Wednesday (warm and clear), eighth grade was on Thursday (hot and clear) and ours was today.

Any guess on the weather?

They had been predicting thunderstorms and rain (NO! WE'RE TIRED OF RAIN!) all week. It wasn't raining this morning and so we went ahead and tried to give it a go. We got the volleyball tournament started in the gym and while that was going on, the skies opened up. Great. It was raining like mad.

But then it stopped.

And they decided instead of 15 point games, they'd do 21 point games to take up time in the hopes that it dry up outside. And it sort of did so we were able to take the kids out for the kickball portion of the day. The PTA had hot dogs and Gatorade for the kids (free with a ticket from their teacher), they had other snacks to buy, and although it was a tad muddy on the field, the pavement was dry, the sun was shining and it was hot and muggy.

Awesome.

And then we could hear thunder in the distance. And it got cloudier. And we just finished up the last game of the kickball tournament and had taken the kids inside for lunch when it began to rain again.

Wonderful.

But it gets better.

The kids are in the cafeteria eating lunch, we're down the hall in the teacher lunchroom eating pizza (delayed Teacher Appreciation Lunch which was supposed to happen during the week of The Flood), and Mrs. Sparrow, the assistant principal is there with the radio. All of a sudden were hear The Principal come on the radio and announce that she's going to have to pull the tornado drill alarm as we were under a tornado warning. She then mentioned that all the teachers who had kids in the cafeteria had to go get them out of there and into the hallway where it's safer.

Most of us were sprinting out of the lunch room and into the cafeteria before the alarm went off and we hustled the kids out and into the hallway. I got in there so fast that my kids looked like they didn't know what was going on. They figured it out pretty fast, and hustled toward the door. We got all 300 kids out of there in record time, into the hallway, and down into the tornado position. Getting them quiet was the tough part, but they finally quieted down and we stayed in there for nearly 45 minutes.

Let me tell you, being in a long hallway with a bunch of kids, and insisting they be quiet so we can hear directions on the one radio we had, is tough.

Finally it was over, we let them go back and finish their lunch, and then we went back to our classes. It was still raining. We finally gave up on finishing field day and got the word that they are going to try it again later next week when the weather is supposed to be better. The remainder of today we basically let them relax and watched some videos. Of course, being the science geek I am, I had them watch one on tornadoes.

Appropriate, eh?

I hope next week everything works as planned. I really, really do.

Finally a Field Day

It has rained, and rained, and rained, and we had, within the first six days of the month, managed to have the same amount of rain as we usually get in the entire month of May.

So our first Field Day was canceled due to rain.

And it kept raining.

And then they finally said it would be today, rain or shine, because we were running out of days.

If it rained, we'd be stuck in the gym all day with 350 wild seventh graders. This is enough to make me want to put a needle in my eye and start drinking heavily. I can handle 350 kids outside where the noise can be carried off on the wind, but inside a gym is hell on earth. For the entire day.

We prayed for two dry days - one to dry out the playing fields, and another for us to have Field Day.

God listened. We had field day today. It was cloudy, but dry.

Of course our team came in dead last. It was weird, but even Coach Math noticed the difference between our kids when the kids piled into the gym for the first event which was volleyball. Mrs. Eagle's team and Mrs. Bunny's team were sitting rather nicely on the bleachers, they nearly all had on their team colors (red and blue) and they listened better. Our kids on the other hand...were lounging all over the bleachers, most of them didn't wear the tie-dyed t-shirts we made for them, and they wouldn't follow directions.

"You can tell which team has the thugs, can't you?" said Coach Math. "It's apparent just looking at them."

It's even more apparent when you look to see who's in ISS and who's suspended. We spent most of the day filling gaps on our teams because - of course - so many of our kids, both boys and girls, weren't able to participate due to behavior.

Counting the days, man, just counting the days.

Seventy-one Seventh Graders and a Weekend in the Woods

The Great Camping Field Trip was this past weekend.

I haven't written earlier because, well, I was exhausted. Not to mention backed up on finalizing grades, grading homework assignments, and getting my ducks in a row for our retention and promotion meetings with The Principal this week.

Did I mention I was exhausted?

This was the third year that we took a number of our students to a local National Forest educational center and spent the weekend doing things like canoeing, hiking, going through low ropes challenge courses, studying pond creatures and basically having a grand ol' time with a bunch of seventh graders. It's something we started a few years ago because we realized that so many of our kids weren't experiencing nature and had never had a s'more, been on a lake, or even been out in the woods.

I might add that many of our fellow teachers look at us as if we're freaking insane to do this every year. However, we do have a number of eighth grade teachers who got drafted to help last year (because they happen to be male and we're always short on male chaperones to ride herd on our boys) and they insisted on coming back because it's so much fun. I guess it depends on your personality on whether or not you're willing to give up a weekend of your own time to do something like this for our kids.

I just wish that Mother Nature would cooperate a bit better. The first year was in April and the weather couldn't have been more perfect. The last two years we've gone in May and a tornado or a severe thunderstorm has hit our town on both Fridays of our trip. This year it was so bad that the kids back at school were hunkered down in the halls for a tornado warning that went on past dismissal and they ended up holding the kids for over an hour. Meanwhile, we're off on our field trip where it's raining like heck but, thankfully, no tornado warnings for us even though we were only 45 minutes away.

However. It rained like mad on Friday afternoon, so we had to eat our sack lunch from school in the dining hall about two hours before we were supposed to be there. It stopped, fortunately, and we were able to get started on our afternoon activities without too much problem. Yeah, it was wet, and muddy, and slippery, and a bit drizzly, but considering that it wasn't pouring, we were happy. We did have to cut the night hike a bit short due to rumbles of thunder and some lightning, and by the time the kids were in their dorms it was raining pretty hard. Around three in the morning the storm was raging and I opened the door to the counselor's room where I was residing with Miss Reading and it was something else out there over the lake - lightning flashing, loud rumbles of thunder, and rain, rain, rain. I went back to sleep and didn't wake up for a few hours.

And when I did, I discovered water on our floor.

This was not good. I shook Miss Reading awake and we took our flashlights and discovered that our room was flooded with about a quarter of inch of water. It went out of our room, into the lobby of the dorm, and then into the area where the girls were. Fortunately, it didn't get into their sleeping area, but stopped right before the bathroom. Great.

I took my shower, tossed on my clothes, doused myself in bug spray (gotta keep those ticks away) and then headed out in the rain up to the dining hall where I knew I'd find Mrs. Bunny and her coffee cup.

"Our room is flooded," I said as I sucked down my first of many cups of coffee.

"Oh good gracious," she said. "How bad?"

It wasn't bad at all, truth be told. I only lost about a dozen decks of cards, and aside from the inconvenience, it wasn't much to get excited about. We told the cooks who had showed up and were getting breakfast ready and they made calls and the maintenance guy showed up later that morning and shop-vac'ed the whole place, along with the unoccupied dorm next to us that also flooded. We found out later that in 20 years, they've never seen that happen. Considering that anywhere from three to five inches of rain fell that night, and that some roads washed out, we were lucky.

However, by the time breakfast was over, the skies had cleared, the sun was out and we had a gorgeous day. We kept them busy (and muddy) all day - we did challenge courses, canoeing, a pond study, orienteering. I might add, that one of the highlights of this trip is the food. They do it up right, and the amount of food they feed our kids is astounding. The kids are amazed - bacon and eggs and pancakes and biscuits and all sorts of good stuff for breakfast, hamburgers and fries and brownies for lunch, and chicken and green beans and salad, and cake for supper, and a snack of cookies for later in the evening. The food is filling, and tasty and for many of our kids (those who are on free and reduced lunch for example) it's more food than they've eaten in a long time. They loved it! They talk about it for days afterward, and I've even had kids from our first year come back and mention how cool that trip was and "wasn't the food awesome?"

Some observations about this year's group of campers...

They couldn't handle the challenge courses as well as the kids in previous years. The group of fifteen that I spent the weekend with was considered by many to be one of the better groups (we simply numbered the kids off and mixed them all up). Even so, they didn't get very far on the challenge courses because they argued, wouldn't take the time to make a plan, wouldn't listen to each other, had too many kids who wanted to be leader, and generally acted like the pains in the butt they've been in the classroom all year. They'd get halfway through a challenge and would find out that it was hard, and then want to start over. As the counselor said, unfortunately in life, unlike video games, there is no reset button. It drove them crazy that they had to solve their way out of their dilemma and that they couldn't just restart.

This group was not the most coordinated group around. Mrs. Eagle, who has years of Scouting under her belt, helped do the canoeing along with Mr. Algebra, and they said that, once again, my group was the best at canoeing. We didn't tip anyone, we didn't have any splashing fights, and they, somewhat, followed directions. That being said, we still had four kids that refused to go with a fellow student (lack of trust there) and insisted on going with one of the teachers, and about three canoes ended up nearly getting stuck in the trees near the bank (the lake was HIGH), and couldn't seem to get the idea of how to steer the things - perhaps because they didn't listen and pay attention when they were being taught how to do this. However, the other groups all had at least one (and one group had four) tips, so at least my kids stayed dry. I was pretty proud of them at this point.

This group of kids are the most physically unfit, whiny, lazy bunch of kids I've ever seen. They need to get off their butts and away from their cell phones and video games. Case in point...we had to hike a mile (down a paved road) to the pond to do the pond study, and then walk back. I'll be 47 next month, and I'm a tad overweight, and I have a bad knee. I kicked their butt when it came to walking or hiking anywhere. Granted, I go to the gym and walk a lot plus I lift weights (so the canoeing was no big deal) but jeepers, a mile walk down a road and you would have thought we'd made them hike up Mt. Everest. The only ones who didn't complain were kids that were already involved in scouting. However, the bulk of them were going on about tired they were and how sore their feet were. We heard this all weekend. I was tired (due to lack of sleep) but my feet, back, shoulders, and everything else was fine. I was also smart and brought lots and lots of socks to keep my feet dry.

I love orienteering with the right bunch of kids. This time I got the right bunch. I had four boys, one little tiny girl, and we had a blast. They listened, helped each other, and we did great. This was our last activity and by then they'd finally learned to work together and help each other out. The terrain was rugged, but I'd managed to get a group of non-whiners for this one and we were all over the place, up and down ridges, through brush, across creeks, you name it. They did a great job of stopping every so often to check their bearings, adjust, and move on. I was so proud of them.

Bonfires rock. S'mores are awesome. And Mrs. Chicken can scare the bejeebers out of them with ghost stories about a old farmhouse that stood near our school playing field. Of course, it helps when the hoot owls and coyotes start howling nearby.

The best part of the weekend, however, isn't necessarily the kids. It's a chance to spend some time with your fellow teachers and just have fun. Most of us were up before sunrise and were drinking coffee and watching the sun rise down on the boat dock. It was the only quiet, kid-free time we had. The kids, fortunately, were so beat that they'd sleep until we'd wake them up so we had a few hours of grown up time before we had to get them ready for breakfast. It was wonderful. Drinking coffee, yabbering, laughing, and generally having fun with people that you work with but don't ever get time to just hang out with during the school day. I love those cups of coffee and companionship down on that lake. It's the best part of the weekend for the teachers.

So, we didn't lose a kid. We had some scrapes, and lots of mud, but overall it was a success. The kids loved it, we loved it, and we'll probably do it again.

If for no other reason than to have a chance to drink coffee at sunrise by the lake.

And to give our kids a chance at what Mother Nature has to offer.

Field Day?

According to the rain gauge in my back yard, we have had 4" of rain since Thursday. My yard looks like a jungle. Seriously. I have grass up to my knees.

(That being said, it's not like I have a decent lawn to start with - it looks like pasture. It's a mix of weeds, crabgrass, zoisya, bluegrass, fescue, clover and goodness knows what else. But some of it is growing up to my knees.)

Any bets on whether or not we'll have field day on Monday (when it's scheduled)?

Our makeup day is Wednesday.

Wanna guess what the forecast is for Wednesday?

Yup. More rain.

A Screamingly Good Time, Or How To Survive Field Day

As a rule, the teachers in the 7th grade look upon field day with dread. If it can go wrong, it most likely will.

Rain delays, for example, are torture. There is nothing quite like having 300 plus kids all ready for field day, hyped up and wound tight, only to have it postponed due to rain. No matter how fun and exciting your lessons are that day, they don't measure up to any potential field day, and the disappointment is palpable.

Field day is also a day where even the good kids can lose total control, start fights, or do something equally stupid. Last year's was one of the worst in recent memory, and any memories of good field days we had in previous years were nearly obliterated by this one. Nothing like freezing weather, injuries, flood and fights to make a miserable day.

So it was with apprehension that we approached this day.

And the volleyball tournament went off great. The kids screamed, yelled, but never got rowdy or out of control.

We went out to the kickball field and discovered that it was a picture perfect day. Blue sky, fluffy clouds, a nice breeze and temperatures, by the end of the day, in the low 80's. The kids ran around, bought snow cones, played kickball and had a ton of fun. Mr. Social Studies and I kept an eye on Angry Boy who has returned to us from a three month stint in a residential mental health facility and was a bit of a concern. He does not do well in unstructured environments (gym class was a nightmare with this kid), and we were waiting for his melt-down and subsequent visit to guidance. Amazingly enough, he survived the entire day without having a single melt-down or issue, truly something to be proud of.

Lunch went off without a hitch, and even going back to the homerooms to cool down and relax while one of the other 7th grade teams had their turn at lunch went well. We did have one issue with Angry Girl (is it me, or did we get every kid in the school diagnosed as bipolar this year?) when she went off on some girl from another team in the bathroom. Two of our girls came and got me, I had Mr. Social Studies watch my room, and caught Angry Girl as she was being escorted out of the bathroom by Mrs. Chicken. We had the kids do statements, I plopped her in guidance, and that was it.

By this time we're all looking at each other going, "This is weird but we've only had the one blow-up with Angry Girl and that's it? When is the other show going to drop?"

We finished kickball, and got the kids out to the playing field for the other events, things like sack races, tug of war, three legged race, and so forth. This is usually the part of the day that drives us crazy because trying to get the kids organized into the events they signed up for earlier in the week is like herding cats. They wander around, go get free hot dogs from the PTO, buy more candy bars, and generally are as elusive as mist when you really need them. We worked out a system where we started herding the teams together an event ahead of time. If someone couldn't be found, we grabbed a kid and stuck him or her on the team.

It worked great. In fact, it was so great that the P. E. Department was looking at us with their jaws hanging open. We finished field day a good 45 minutes early, mainly because we got the kids where they needed to be when they needed to be. They kept gushing over how cool it was that they didn't have to waste time rounding up kids. We broke the record for the fastest field day ever. (Maybe the fact we didn't have to waste time with fights helped as well.)

However, we didn't want to take them into the building and have them sit 45 minutes in our classrooms. That would have been nightmarish.

So we got 100 kids up on their feet and Mrs. Language lead them all in a rousing game of Simon Says.

And we all had a very good, very nice day.

Oh, we didn't win this year again. But we did come in second with 15 points. That was nice.

Why Field Day Was the Pits.

I usually enjoy Field Day. I like getting outside. I like watching the kids play kickball and volleyball and do tug-of-war and all that. It's fun. It's somewhat relaxing. And the kids have a ball.

This year it was awful.

That morning as I drove to school I stopped to get some sunblock since I'd lost mine on the camping trip. It was a beautiful morning, with a few clouds in the sky, a lovely sun rising in the east - a perfect day for Field Day.

Except, of course, by the time we took the kids outside a brisk wind was blowing, dark clouds covered the sky and it looked like the heavens were going to open up on us. They didn't, thank goodness, but that was the only positive point of the whole day.

Due to the cold weather the kids, who are usually baking in the sun and whining about the heat and slowing down somewhat (due to the sun and heat), were wild. Absolutely wild. My mom once said that her horses played more and ran faster in cold weather, and the kids were no exception. Instead of spending field day enjoying the sports and the kids, we spent it on discipline issues and crises management.

We started off with about eight of our special ed kids who were passing around condoms, which had apparently been shoplifted earlier that week. Mrs. Language, Mr. Social Studies and I spent thirty minutes trying to sort that one out. Especially since we weren't really all that sure they even knew what the condoms were supposed to be used for. Let's just say these were the last kids we would have suspected in a condom-passing incident. Amusing moment was watching Mrs. Language interrogate the boy who finally admitted bringing them to school and asking him, "Do you know what these are used for?" and having him hem and haw and stammer and finally squeak out a "Yes, ma'am." Her response? "You certainly weren't planning to do that here at school were you?" I thought he was going to faint from embarrassment.

Then we had some of boys huffing and puffing and talking trash and trying to get involved in a fight.

Then Faraway Girl complained that a boy from Mrs. Eagle's team was touching her inappropriately. Mr. Social Studies got a hold of him and not only did he admit to the touching, but he admitted that he was touching two other girls as well. (He got seven days suspension.)

Then one of our kids got smacked by a kickball in the jaw so I had to walk her up to the nurse, and discovered three other kids trailing us so they could get in the building and get their coats.

Then the workers at the city pool, which sits next to the school, decided to work on the pool which caused the field between the kickball field and the school to FLOOD with up to 4" of quickly moving water. One minute there's a dry field...the next minute we're trying to figure how to move 450 kids through it without getting them soaked.

Then we realized that we had no way to get Scooter Girl through the field as the path she motored down on was flooded and her scooter can't get wet. Thank goodness two PTO moms were there (selling concessions) and were able to take her back to the building in a van, with her scooter (which is amazingly heavy) in a trailer behind another car. We got her in for lunch, but due to the flood and the cold, she decided (unhappily) that it would be better if she stayed in the building for the rest of the day. I felt awful for her, but she's a computer nut and was able to go play to her heart's content on a computer in the library.

And we lost, for the first time that I can remember, Field Day. Out of 30 possible points, we scored...are you ready....three.

That's three.

For coming in third place in Volleyball.

Out of three teams.

It was awful.