long week

well, this week was certainly the longest one i've had in a while. i'm glad to be making more money and teaching again, but this job is very stressful. maybe it will get better, but there's a lot going on that i wasn't really prepped for. kids are way WAY behind, and i haven't been given some basic materials and/or information i feel like is necessary to succeed. for example, i got fussed at today by the attendance person for doing it "wrong"... because i used a ballpoint red pen instead of the felt-tipped black pen to mark students present or absent. why this was such a huge freaking deal, especially considering i have never had the felt-tip rule explained to me, and every other school i've worked for makes you do attendance on the computer anyway, i have no idea. we also have no books, no library, and no shelves. i managed to procure a semi-shelving unit from the office today, and i am going to bring in some of my personal books monday, but the lack of a library, book room with class-sets of books, or computer lab sure makes meeting the goals of the 6th grade curriculum a challenge.

i gave a vocabulary quiz today covering 8 vocabulary words. it was fill-in-the-blank. it had the words on it. most of the kids failed. many of the kids spelled one or more words wrong. believe it or not, some kids even used words that weren't even on the list because they didn't happen to notice that the words were on the bottom of the page. oh, and one person got a zero, but didn't leave any blank.

welcome new teacher.