PrePrac: Days 2-3

I'm writing this later than I intended so this post may be a bit shorter than I wanted it to be because I've forgotten some things. I need to get in the habit of writing this every Friday.

So, days two and three were somewhat eventful.

First, I had to interact with students for the first time. They were writing essays to practice writing for standardized tests. They had to write a response to evidence of foreshadowing in a short story. A student asked me how to start the essay and I froze. I haven't written an eighth grade style essay since I was in eighth grade. How do they start? I answered the question to the best of my availability (I quickly found out that my answer was wrong). And then I just walked around reading their essays, looking for their evidence, telling them if what they gave was actually evidence. By third period, I was getting a lot better at talking to them and by day three, I wasn't really nervous at all to talk to them, which I am taking as a good sign.

I also got to sit in on a meeting with the eighth grade teachers. They were having a meeting to discuss many things but ended up really only talking about one thing. One student, actually. There was an incident where a student brought a box cutter and a shank (I believe made out of a nail) to school and the student was never suspended. The dean of discipline came into this meeting ready to fight with the other teachers. She was literally yelling at the math teacher about an email that she had sent (an email that none of the other teachers remembered seeing). Anyway, apparently the father of the student came in and appealed the discipline and said that this student had never been in trouble before so she shouldn't be given some leniency and that "it wasn't technically a knife." This blew my mind. Not technically a knife?! Aren't we quibbling a little bit over the definition of a knife? The student still brought a blade into school and a shank. And regardless of whether or not the student had ever been in trouble before, this was a major first offense. If I had never committed a crime and them I decided to assault someone, the penal system would still punish me, would they not? This child needed to be disciplined. They did end up suspending the student, but it had been almost two weeks since the weapons were first brought into school, so at that point, what has this student learned from the situation?

I also sat in on an ELA meeting where all of the ELA teachers in the school met to talk about testing and scheduling. I also got to meet the other teachers which was nice.

I also had to scold a student, which was new for me. They were using Chromebooks and were not supposed to use any other websites and one student kept going on youtube. I had to talk to him three times about it but he did stop going on youtube so maybe the kids will respect me the same way they respect her.

I guess we'll see.