Being the mean one...

So this week, with it's crazy schedule (school only M, W, F), has caused my kids to act like they have never had to sit in a chair before.  They are out of control.  And I finally used what I learned last year with my alternative school kids and got MEAN.

I seem to be put with the most neediest, behavior issue, nerve-racking kids.  Don't get me wrong, I love my job and the kids are really awesome... but the past week has really tested my patience.  I have a total of twelve kids on my caseload.  Of those twelve, maybe.. maybe 5 or 6 I can depend on to do their work, listen, pay attention, etc.  The rest of them are day-to-day wonders.  One day I'll go home feeling like a superstar cause my one lesson I get to teach all day goes extremely well, and then the next I have kids in the corner screaming and climbing the walls.  It's part of the job.

Back to me being mean, I finally broke down and sent two of my kids to ISS (in school suspension).  Now understand, I follow my special kids around to their four core classes and try with all my might to be patient...and then I get them for a period of tutorial (playing catch up, reteaching, previewing..) so when they get to me and act like they don't know how to behave, it's time to man up.

One kid, as I mentioned earlier, was in the corner screaming and making noises and literally climbing the walls.  He was definitely on my last nerve.  If he would have taken his medicine, maybe came in to school with more than just the clothes on his body, and was listening at all to what people said to him he might have been given a second chance... He begged me to not send him to ISS, as his "life would be over", but I stood my ground.  Felt very proud of myself then. 

My second darling decided he didn't want to do anything.  Absolutely nothing.  This one, let me tell ya.  I met with his parent and had to discuss his behavior (about 5 referrals thus far).  He's a very special, unique kid that is so hard to understand, but enough is enough.  Anyway, he refused to walk to ISS (though he chose to go there of his free will today instead of going outside to a PEP RALLY?!) so he had to be escorted.  Oh the joy of life.

My kids are needy.  I understand this, and I really love to help them... but they often refuse, end up failing, and the other teachers look at me with the look of "they're yours, make them pass..." as if anything I say or do with them will change their attitude.

So today is another Friday this week (off tomorrow for Return Day - a huge thing in lower slower Sussex County, DE) and I am taking my wonderful, sexy fiance to dinner for his birthday.  He's such a lucky man...

<3