I Am poems

Next week students are preparing for standardized tests, so to ease their minds I am planning a poetry unit. I realized that if I am going to make them write this poetry, I need to write it, too. (Obviously, Laurissa, obviously). Here is the first one. It turns out a little fragmented, but I like the concept. I think the point is for students to take ownership of what they write.

I Am Laurissa

I am a friend junkie, a person infatuated with smiling
I wonder why we have memories--connective, story-driven memories
I hear whistling winds pushing through the windows
I see Mom's crinkly wrinkly eyes, bright and sparkling stars in the night sky
I want to read two books at once
I am a friend junkie, a person infatuated with smiling

I pretend to like Grandma's sweet potatoes
I feel God's resuscitating pump of my heart when it fails
I touch the glossy cover of new books
I worry about my choices
I cry over injustice
I am a friend junkie, a person infatuated with smiling

I understand A Saving Grace
I say, "Mountain peaks are the best places in the world"
I dream I'm shrinking while everyone else is growing
I try to like politics and to keep an open mind simultaneously
I hope that traveling, teaching, and loving is for me
I am a friend junkie, a person infatuated with smiling


When I was in eighth grade, my English teacher had us write a poem much like this one. She gave them back at graduation. Special.

"They just keep going until they hit something"

"Oh you'll have fun with seventh grade students. They just keep going until they hit something," said Tim Pikaart, the resource teacher at Rehoboth High School. And from my first two days' observation in my new school, I have found it to be true.
I sit at a little makeshift desk in the back of the 7th grade English classroom at Patrick Henry Middle School. Students walk by me all the time, mostly to throw away little things that can't wait until after class or to sharpen their pencils. They keep their eyes down until they think I'm not looking and glance up through loose strands of hair, and then, almost expecting it, they kick a leg of my desk or fling their arm into the wall. I think I'd like to see P.E.
They wiggle and smile crooked smiles and and have adult size feet. And they can sit in rows and act all "high school" but then I ask their favorite color, and instead of looking at me like I'm uncool, they eagerly say "Blue!"
Thus far, I have been given a smoothie, a sucker, a mint, a note that says "WELCOME," and half a pie for Pi day.
So, I know I'll miss those juniors and seniors, but bring on the seventh graders.

Highschool+Culture=Twilight

Student: Miss Boman, have you ever been to a concert?
Me: Well....yes.
Student: Which ones?
Me: Um, there's this thing called Lifelight in South Dakota. It's actually pretty good.
Student: Well who was there?
Me: Don't say Chris Tomlin...not Barlow Girl, either. And you better not say Superchick. Probably shouldn't say Leeland. Um...Family Force 5?
Student: [Severely unimpressed and continues working for a while]

Student: Miss Boman, have you ever partied? [Other students begin to pay attention]
Me: Uh...
Student: You know, gotten it down, 2001 style?
Me: Student, I was thirteen in 2001.
Student: Oh
Mr. Weidenaar: [Bent over laughing]

Yeah, I have no idea. But I also get this all the time:

Student: Miss Boman, have you turned on your swag today?

Or this:

Student: Miss Boman is a balla'!!

Or this:

Student: Say it! Say it!
Me: No.
Student: Come on, say it. "Tree-fitty." Say it!
Me: No.

And these are my first experiences with high school students, people who understand every possible passing fad and every popular expression under the sun. And all the while I have to make them believe I have no idea about modern trends, otherwise we'll have an hour-long discussion on how the Jews for Jesus chapel sound guy looked exactly like Alan from The Hangover.

So do I not respond? Do I redirect these pop culture literate people toward something else? I think the best I've done was relate romanticism to Lady Gaga....Taylor Swift to Emily Dickinson...Forrest Gump to Huck Finn.

I'll leave you with one more:

Me: Put that phone away.
Student: It's not a phone.
Me: Put that i-pod away.
Student: It's not an i-pod.
Me: Put it away!
Student: Ahh! That's what she said.

I give my biggest thanks to The Office for making "that's what she said"s popluar. (Beth, if you're reading this, you understand, right?)

High school.

Sunny days, taking the...clouds away.

I think the presence of sun has a lot to do with perspective. Call it natural force or whatever, when the sun comes, so do the smiles. Let me put this in perspective for you. I am sitting at my after school job, monitoring Rehoboth's new weightroom, and about half the walls are windows. Right now the sun is at its brightest. It's at a height in the sky where it shines full force into every western facing window, and all I can think about is an everpresent reality: you're leaving in a week. I am leaving in a week.

Suddenly I feel like my time here at Rehoboth has been cut short, like I need another half a semester. Who knows, maybe it's the sun that's doing it to me, but I want to do more hiking, I want to continue to develop those relationships I have begun, I want to go to the flea market another time, and I want to drink coffee at Camille's. I want to see the Grand Canyon, I want to hike in the Hogsback hills, I want to climb Pyramid Rock, I want to be here when track season starts, I want to keep playing volleyball on Thursday nights, I want to keep teaching that awesome 6th hour class, I want to see Janelle's brilliant essay that will be published soon, I want to see the talent show, I want to see the boys' and girls' basketball teams go to state. I want to have just a few more weeks.

So why has my perspective changed so much from the first week? When I first got here, all I could think about was going back to Iowa and South Dakota, going back to live with Kearsen and Josh. I didn't know anyone.

Then the days just got cloudier and I got to experience life in a New Mexico blizzard. That should never happen. I got over my full-time section of student teaching, and now that I'm comfortable, I have to go.

And now that the sun is here, I have to leave it.

It's going to be a long Spring.

And you're going to have to bear with me...

Because the further and further I step out of Rehoboth, the greener and greener it looks to me.

I want. I want. I want.

Tomorrow students are supposed to come to school dressed in all maroon and gold...or red and gold and black. Actually, I'm not entirely sure what the colors are anyhow. Something of the sort. Apparently teachers around here dress up, too, so I'll have to see what I can find. That's right, if you haven't guessed yet. It's homecoming week. We had superhero day. Sarah dressed up as Darth Vader, and Jules dressed up as Marge Simpson (don't know if that counts). Then there was jersey day, and there was celebrity day. I was going to go as Katy Perry, but realized I own no Katy Perry clothes, I don't have dark, Betty Boop hair, and I can't walk in heels...or sing "I Kissed a Girl" with my conscience still in tact.
Today I had students working on a predictions worksheet, but a few of them were talking, so I said "shhhhh." And they did. Like good students. But one girl said, "BUT IT'S THURSDAY!" "Yes," I said, "and tomorrow is Friday." She'll be fine. Nobody panic.
And tomorrow is Friday. I will be ready for 30 minute class periods, because we have to include a pep rally and chapel, oh AND school, too. So we're reviewing some of their most creative hypothetical endings to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and laughing. Should be fun.
Today I observed the senior dance for Rehoboth's Got Talent. Colby is coreographing the dance, and they're dancing to Kickin'.
I was going to buy Valentine's candy for all my students...but then I saw chocolate covered cherries and bought those instead. I realized that I have over a hundred students, and that would be a lot of candy to pass out. So I might draw a big heart on the board that says something like , "You're sweet." Maybe.
Anyway, this is choppy writing, and I'm suddenly very tired. Good night, and if I don't talk to you before then, Happy Valentine's Day. (I will not be seeing the movie).

Oh, this might work. But then again...

The beginning of a full-time student teaching schedule has brought about a whole new dynamic to teaching. Suddenly, my greatest ideas are just good thoughts and my most prized lesson plans wouldn't cover the smallest of what goes into one class period of American Literature in one day.
Take a groupwork activity, for example. There are thirty students zoned into a time and a place called seventh hour on a Monday. This group activity should take no more than 25 mintues. Students will read a chapter out loud and answer the questions, no big deal. Nice idea. In college education courses I would write it down like this:
Groupwork. Students will read chapter out loud and answer questions. (took me 10 seconds to write)
But in a real classroom with real students and with real considerations, maybe I should have written this in college education classes:
Groupwork. Before students are assigned to groups, make sure they understand the assignment. Be prepared to explain it four different times in three different ways and to write directions on the board. Oh, and don't forget to explain that the group with four guys should keep reading together, and the group with two giggly girls can't possibly think Huck Finn is so hilarious, and the yardstick should NOT go down a student's shirt: "what are you doing anyway?" I ask. Be prepared to redirect ten different conversations and to be sociable without distracting the students. Be prepared for those students who haven't read the chapter and for those who haven't read but pretend like they have and for those who have read but won't talk and for those who have read and want to talk all the time. Be prepared for interruptions: "Miss Boman, can we...." "Miss Boman, I have to use the bathroom" "Miss Boman, what does this have to do with anything?" "Miss Boman, you going to the game tonight?" Be prepared for those who put the worksheet in their bag and say they'll do it that evening. Be prepared to have created a lesson, complete with all worksheets, projects, assignments, assessments, main questions, etc, that in no way matches the amount of time students use these artifacts.
So if that's one 25 minute lesson, what the heck am I teaching for?
Oh yeah. Did I mention my students are amazing and I can see potential rising up out of each one of them every time I see their faces in the halls or grade one of their essays or quickwrites or worksheets?
And it's a give and take situation, because in the midst of that one 25 minute lesson, I'm thinking a hundred different things a new teacher should think.
And don't forget about introductions, connective and integrative concepts, and conclusions. And don't forget about the fact that in two weeks, they might not remember this groupwork lesson.
So as I think again at those merciful college professors, who said my ideas were great and were sure to challenge students, I realize now that an engaging lesson does not come with a one-sentence "Have students do this..." plan. It requires so much more.
So much so that I probably shouldn't be writing this right now at 10 pm when I have a whole day to plan for tomorrow.
Ephesians 4: "I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love."
So is this life worthy?
I hope so.

Unlearning

"What makes you different from anyone else is that you are prepared," Gail said. "No one can do what you can do at that moment." Gail, my Rehoboth supervisor, said this because I was having major doubts. Because the moment I see thirty pairs of eyes looking me over, making sure I'm legit, I question my ability. The first day of school I was entirely too nervous--nervous smiles, nervous waves, nervous words, nervous hands. Nervous.
So now, two weeks into student teaching, I have been thinking about truly preparing myself. And here's where I say that I have to unlearn all my college ways. Procrastination is no longer an option.
Not in life.
So I am now going to quit procrastinating tomorrow's lesson plans and get going.