Hanging My Head in Shame

Today I said what I think is the worst thing a teacher could say to a student. I said:

"I don't care what you think."

J. was talking back to me for the 8,000,000th time after I reprimanded him and it just came out. Hearing the words come out of my mouth as I said them, I regretted them immediately. I didn't mean it. I swear. And I told him so. I made sure everybody heard me tell him I didn't mean it and that I was sorry I said it. Then I went on to tell him what I really did mean.

I guess I'm being hard on myself. I've heard teachers say a LOT worse. A LOT. And they didn't take it back.

Countdown: 41 days

Hello Drrrrrrama!

School starts at 8:50 every morning. By 9:00 I had already dealt with two major problems between my kids. The first was between two boys, the second between two girls. The incidents really highlight the difference between how boys and girls "fight" with each other and which one I prefer handling.

By 8:52, two of my boys "got into it" (scuffling, arguing, pulling something between them so it was about to rip in two) in front of their lockers. I went over to see what was going on. It turned out that one boy knocked over the other's book bag, so the other one tried to take his jacket away. THIS IS WHAT 4TH GRADE BOYS FIGHT ABOUT. Ugh. They were SO mad with one another. When I "broke it up," they each tried to tell me what the other did (of course they themselves were not at fault), but I hushed them up right quick and told them I didn't want to hear it. I told them to close their mouths, get their stuff put away, and go pull their cards. What're the next words I hear?

"BUT..."

"But nothing," I said. And if I hear another word about it, you can go pull your card again" (which puts them on red before the day even starts! Oooooooh...). One of them couldn't help it. He kept trying to defend himself. Poor kid got on red before he even entered the classroom. He was NOT happy. Oh well. This is the kid who, according to him, is wrongfully accused for everything. He never does anything wrong. Mmm-hmm.

Not even 2 minutes later, one of my girls comes pouting to me that she wants to change seats because another girl who sits at her table is rolling her eyes at her, talking about her, and turning all the other girls against her. This all stemmed from a problem yesterday at lunch. And I had already told the eye-roller yesterday after the lunch incident that there is NO DRAMA ALLOWED IN MY CLASSROOM. There will be no eye-rolling, no rumor-starting, no tongue-sticking outing (?), NONE OF THAT.

I (stupidly) let the eye-roller give me some background info about why she was acting the way she was acting, because I knew it could not have been about the stupid lunch incident yesterday. It turns out that the other girl told her that "she couldn't get no man." (hee-hee). I (stupidly) asked the one who supposedly said this to her about it and it turns out that she had written it in her diary and the eye-roller read the diary without her permission. Oooooooh...

Then I realized that I was (stupidly) getting caught up in the drama that I had expressly forbid in my classroom and told them I didn't want to hear any monre "buts....". Then I expressly forbid diaries in my classroom. At this point, I felt exhausted. It was 9:09. This is how my day started.

Oh, and by lunch the girls were best friends again.

Just Call Me Fraulein

School starts tomorrow. I have been dreading this day since June 15th. To everyone's envy, I did nothing this summer. Nothing. Well, I did finish grad school, but it was only 1 class and 1 exiting exam. For the most part, I was lazy and it was great. Under my facade of idleness, however, my mind was ceaselessly working to prepare myself for this upcoming school year. Okay, okay, so maybe "ceaselessly" is a bit of a stretch, but since August started, my mind's been "gearing up" for this school year.

I'll be honest. I'm not the world's best disciplinarian. As any teacher will tell you, a good disciplinarian is consistant. Well, I am not. What is tolerable to me one day totally pisses me off the next. I can't help it. And trust me, I've tried. I've tried all kinds of rewards and consequences systems; I've used points, colors, prizes, checkmarks, demerits, pluses, minuses, positive reinforcements. I've even gone so far as to try NOT having a system. Yeah, THAT was a fun year.

So this year I've decided to go with a simple color card system. For you "civilians" (a.k.a not teachers), I will quickly explain. All students have 3 cards: green, yellow, red (hopefully you're picking up on the symbolism of the colors). Everyone starts everyday out on green. If you break a rule, you "turn your card" to yellow. Break another rule, you go to red. Okay, colors mean NOTHING to students unless they get something, like candy. However, I stopped rewarding kids with food a long time ago (Have you ever given candy to an extremely overweight child? It's not a good feeling). I've also done away with giving away crappy plastic toys. My reward is time. Free time. The two sweetest words a fourth grader can hear. That, and "no homework."

Long story short, if you end up with X number of greens on Friday, you get Y minutes of free time. It's simple, yes?

However, I still have the problem of being consistent. If I've just told the class not to leave their seats, how do I refrain myself (especially during certain times of the month) from standing up, pointing at a child, and shouting "YELLOW!" when all she's done is leave her seat to get the pencil that's rolled out of her reach? Do I really want to be that kind of Nazi teacher? I mean, I did just tell her not to leave her seat, but where does one draw the line? Depending on my mood, I sometimes feel justified in my reaction (okay, perhaps the shouting and pointing is a bit much), whereas other times I'm like, "Who am I and did that really just come out of my mouth?"

So I will do my best to be fair and watch for pencils purposefully rolled out of reach. Because you know once you've gone soft with one of them, you're pretty much screwed. Wish me luck!