Teetering on the edge....

This was the first full week since probably Thanksgiving, and was very full indeed with meetings and observations. Plus the growing feeling of tension and craziness (though nothing has quite broken yet...)

We had dinner with our PD, Jenn, on Monday. I thought there were going to be 20 or so people there, and instead it was just the 430 gang plus Pam and Kim. We talked about all of our fun times, and I started to appreciate even more how much I love Tom, Michelle, and Tony. I am lucky to teach with them where I do...they make my job much more fun, and they are reliable and devoted and I just adore them.

Now that the mushy stuff is over...the kids. On Friday they cracked me up. We were in class getting ready to take the quiz, and Marcus (who likes to pretend we're dating) said, "I tried to call you last night, and you didn't answer. Where do you live?" I didn't respond, so they asked if I lived in the city, and I said yes. They were surprised by that, so they asked if there were black people in my community. A few of them thought this was a stupid question, but someone said, "come on now, white people stick together!" I told them that yes, there ARE black people in my community (did not include that Matt and I are the only white people for blocks...), and they were surprised again. Someone said "Some white people are afraid of black people!" to which the class responded "dumbass, she teaches US! How could she be afraid of black people?" I just laughed. It's so strange to me how race is such a huge part of their world, but it's not exactly like they're racist. My kids, such strange people...

On the other half, this was a big week for drama. On Thursday at the end of the day I was sitting in my classroom when I heard Ms. Garrett yelling for Mr. Brown. Then she went running (well...sort of...she kind of scoots because she wears such crazy shoes...) down the hall. I finally got out of my seat to find out what was going on, and I found Kiari, Lamont, and Donyae guarding Ms. Garrett's door looking rather valiant while Garrett looked a little frazzled. I looked in the door to see the new girl, Amirah, sitting while James S. went on and on about something. Asked for the story, I found out that pretty much all of the girls in the 10th grade had come to Ms. Garrett's door at the end of 7th period to wait for Amirah to jump her. I guess she's been mouthing off to all the wrong people, and they have already reached this point. Anyway, Donyae, who is with Amirah, found out about it and warned Ms. Garrett, who could sort of stop it. Mrs. Stokes (the student support dean) took Amirah home and kept her and Tantania (the ring-leader of the others) out for Friday. Since Amirah has only been at our school for a week and has already caused this much trouble, it's likely she won't be coming back.

Along similar lines, Friday was a rather strange day. During 1st period, Kiari wandered into my room looking for James M., who wasn't there. He got Denzel's attention and asked "do you know what we gotta do?" Denzel nodded, and Kiari's parting words were "somebody goin' die today." Well...that didn't sit right, so I wrote it up and left during the next class period to inform the principal. Third period rolls around and Kiari, as usual, needs to borrow a pencil. I usually make the kids give me something for collateral, and Kiari usually gives me his keys, which he does this time too. Except that this time there's a brand new Leatherman Micra on it...strikingly similar to the one I'd misplaced earlier in the week. I took the keys, and decided to confiscate the knife, leaving Kiari a note that said "I confiscated the knife, but won't write it up because I don't want you to get expelled." Shortly thereafter he was called to the office and didn't ever come back for the keys...though he was around quite a bit later in the day. Supposedly the whole thing that was happening is that some kids jumped James after school the day before and beat him up pretty bad, and Kiari and some of the others were going to get revenge. Wonder how all that worked out.

That was pretty much my week. I'm tired and about to have my last kid-free days until Spring Break (March is going to be a looooooong month). The plus side is that after my meeting with Jenn I'm feeling energized to start making my kids do even better. Let's hope they cooperate with me! Always a struggle trying to control kids when they actually have all the power.....