Venting

Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook will probably start reading this and think, "Brooke, drop it....." but I am very passionate about what I do and you all know that when I do something, I tackle it with everything....I'm a perfectionist and accept nothing less than the best. But here lately, my teaching job has truly been a challenge.

I just don't understand how so many kids just flat out DON'T CARE. For example, not last Wednesday but the Wednesday before I gave all my geometry classes a test review and they worked on it in class. Every once in a while I will just change the title to Test instead of Test Review, but I informed my students this wouldn't be the case this time, but that it would be VERY similar, so if they didn't understand a problem to be sure and ask. Well needless to say...some asked questions, most did not. I took up their test reviews and took a grade on them. Now mind you on Wednesday when they finished their test reviews I offered to check their answers...so this should have been an easy easy 100. Well at least 10 didn't even turn in their reviews, so that's their first 0. Whatever, waste your time, I'm giving you the opportunity to raise your average and you won't even TURN IT IN (frustration #1). I have threatened to quit giving reviews, but then I think, I punish those who actually DO their review, STUDY their review, and NEED that review to pass my class; so I continue to make test reviews and spend a class period working on them. Thursday rolls around and it's test day. I begin grading their tests and OH MY...they either made a 85 and above or a 15 and below. We just spent 2 WEEKS on this topic, yes 2 weeks....how could you possibly not get more than 3 out of 20 questions right. I wrote the test and test review. When writing the test, I took the test review and put in the exact same questions, only changing the numbers (i.e. 5 to 6, 12 to 32), nonetheless it doesn't change how you do the problem, only the answer and then I also changed the order in which the questions appeared. They all should have easily made at least a 50, good grief, half of them all you had to do was draw a picture. As the day progressed I became more and more frustrated. I ended up with 9 zeros on the test. I had 4 students tell me they didn't know how to do it, write a 0 on top of their test and turn it in. How do you not even try and exactly what have you been doing the past two weeks. After grading their tests, I began grading their test reviews. I couldn't believe how horribly half of my students had done on their test. I became even more angry while grading their test reviews. How in the world do you make a 100 on your test review but a 0 on your test.....oh wait, you copied someone else. Friday's class began with a griping session. I was NOT HAPPY to say the least. Yes, it was a difficult topic, that's why I spent two weeks on it. I could go blue in the face saying, if you don't understand ASK....but those who really don't understand never ask. How in the world can my special ed kids make 90+ on their test and those of you who are perfectly capable of doing everything make a 0....oh wait you don't try. I JUST DON'T GET IT.....I even asked for suggestions of how I can be a better teacher or help them learn. One suggestion was, "Well we have done this for so long, maybe we have gotten bored with the topic." I nearly lost it on this comment....mainly because the student who suggested this had only turned in 1-2 of the worksheets out of about the 7 we had done. I replied "Well I'm sorry, do you want me to just teach it one day, do a worksheet then move on? Because that's not happening. It has taken over half of my students this two weeks to actually understand what we are doing.....and I don't understand how you tell me you have gotten 'bored' with the topic when you haven't even DONE it." Yes I was a little blunt, but I was beyond frustrated by this class period. This is a student who I have daily struggles with and he always thinks I am wrong and he is right. I exchange e-mails with his mother at least every other week, if not every week and I told her what I said. I told her I was blunt and she was not upset at all. She was actually thankful.

We have moved onto another topic and it is much easier so hopefully the test grades will be better. We are doing a test review on Monday and taking a test on Tuesday....SURELY the grades will be better this time. Otherwise I may be looking for a career change....ugh....I JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND!!!

So...that's my venting for the night.