My job was posted on-line!

Yes! As of Saturday, my school's very own web site says they are looking for elementary AND MIDDLE SCHOOL special education teachers! Theoretically, this could mean they just want to add a third special ed teacher to the middle school, in addition to me and the other current special ed teacher. But coupled with my rather negative summative evaluation, I think it's a good sign they'll lay me off and I can get unemployment! *fingers crossed*

Accentuate the negative

My boss e-mailed me my "evaluative summary" of my teaching today. It was fairly negative. My favorite part was where she wrote, "Ms. Artichoke has been observed yelling at students, invading their personal space, and persistently confronting students." Yes, I have yelled. That was wrong. I admit that. But I don't see how if I, say, block the doorway with my body so a student can't leave without permission in the middle of class, and that student gets angry and gets as close as they can to me without mowing me down, that *I* am invading *their* personal space -- aren't they invading mine? And I don't like the way she wrote that I "persistently confront students." That makes it sound like I keep harassing students over and over again about some issue, which I never do. Once it's over, it's over, and I still say hello to them and help them with assignments as if they never sexually harassed me or threatened to punch me in the face. If I'm guilty of anything, it's the opposite. There are a couple of students now I just don't even bother going over to in class to see if they need help with their work, because doing so only leads to trouble (for me, not for them).

The principal is setting up meetings with each of us teachers this week to tell us whether or not we are being offered teaching contracts for next school year. I hope I'm not asked back and I can qualify for unemployment. I wouldn't hire a teacher back who got an evaluation like mine, so this could happen. We'll see.

Blogging again

It's been a long time since I blogged. My dad died on March 9th, about six weeks to the day from when he received the diagnosis of lung cancer. I miss him a lot. My job was nice about it, at least -- they even sent me a beautiful bouquet of flowers "from your school family," as the card said. But even with the generous bereavement time (5 days), I've had to take a day off here and there since then, especially when my sister and I were going through/cleaning out Dad's apartment, so in my last paycheck I got docked three days' pay. I can't believe there are still 39 long schooldays until the last day of school. It feels like it should've ended months ago.
I'll try to write more later this week.

New assistant principal

Five school days down, 20 to go until spring break! Actually, last week ended up being a four-day week since Friday was a snow day. We got almost two feet of snow here in NYC -- highly unusual -- and we've had TWO snow days in the past two weeks, also highly unusual because NYC schools never close. I remember growing up in northern NJ listening to school closing announcements on the radio in the morning, and no matter how many schools in NJ were closed for snow, it seemed like the DJ always ended with, "But New York City public schools ARE open" -- so Friday was a real gift.

Since playwriting enrichment ended in January (thank you, God), I've been teaching "Arts & Crafts: Collage" to four sixth grade boys and one seventh grade boy. It's been going well, except they got kind of bored with collage, so I decided to order them latch hook kits. They had never done latch hook before, and they LOVE it! It took me about half an hour to re-learn how to do it (embarrassingly enough), and then another boy who picked it up quickly helped me teach the others. Three of them are doing skull & crossbones, and two are doing wolves. They're enjoying it so much! They thanked me profusely for ordering the kits and kept talking about how cool they're going to look when they're done. One of the boys said happily, "I like latch hook. It's relaxing!" :) So that's been a lot of fun.

In other good news, we finally hired a new assistant principal. I haven't actually formally met the man, I've just seen him around, so all I knew about him was that he was a white 30-something guy named -- well, I'll call him Patrick. It was funny because when I was telling the reading specialist about two kids who got into a scuffle during advisory and how I had nowhere to send them, she said, "You could've sent them to Patrick."

"Um, does he WORK here?" I asked. "I thought he was still just being interviewed and observing."

"Well, I guess technically he is," she admitted. "But I heard he officially starts tomorrow."

And sure enough, we got an e-mail from the principal on Wednesday that it was Patrick's first official day as vice principal. Hopefully having him around will be helpful. I checked my e-mail just now and the principal had sent us all an e-mail with a behavior contract we're supposed to discuss with the kids in our advisory group tomorrow and have them all sign. Oh, if only we had done this on the first day of school instead of the 106th day of school! This could have been a very different school year....

I didn't get fired

Well, I still have a job.

The special ed director had already scheduled my mid-year review for Thursday during the second-to-last period of the day, so all day I worried about whether she and the principal were going to use that time to fire me. But then the time came, and the special ed director came to get me, all perky, and led me not into the principal's office, but into the conference room, where a couple of other teachers were grading papers. She did my whole mid-year review like normal, and then at the last minute she asked, "Oh, and did you give any thought to our conversation on Tuesday?"

"Yes," I said. "I want to become a better teacher. I want to stay."

"Okay, that's great! That shows your dedication and commitment," she said enthusiastically.

And that was that. It was rather anticlimactic, actually. The principal wasn't even there! Which is fine with me -- if they want to pretend like it never happened, I'll just play along.

Now I'm on my one-week February vacation. It is so, so, SO nice to have this week off. I really needed it. As my dad said the day he was released from the hospital, "If I'd had to stay here one more day, I would've had a nervous breakdown!"

;O

I might get fired tomorrow

Bit of a setback yesterday.

I was doing well, didn't even raise my voice last Friday despite a near-riot in my homeroom at the end of the school day when I came quite close to being trampled by a group of eighth graders. But during my advisory class the last period of the day yesterday, they were being so obnoxious -- throwing pillows at each other, talking over each other and me, not listening...one of them was even throwing milk (don't ask)...so I raised my voice to show them I was serious and meant business. But the special education director and the principal made me meet with them after school and told me that an adult who was also in the library at the time thought I lost my temper. Both the elementary school music teacher and the librarian were in there, so it could've been either of them. I really felt I just raised my voice and was firm. I didn't think I lost my temper like I did on the two occasions last week -- I didn't feel out-of-control enraged or anything. But I guess that was the librarian's or the music teacher's perception. And who knows, maybe all the stress of working in that place is making it impossible for me to distinguish between raising my voice and yelling. I have no idea anymore. :(

Anyway, it was such a frustrating meeting because every concern I tried to voice, the principal twisted my words around to make it my fault, and that that's why I shouldn't be working there anymore. When I said we haven't gotten lesson plans for advisory in weeks, she said as a professional educator I should've been proactive and realized I had to start creating my own. I said, "I would've been happy to do that -- I *have* been doing it, on the fly -- but it was never communicated to us." She said there are so many creative lessons I could create with advisory, and if I can't, maybe this school isn't the best fit for me. When I said the behavior in the hallways is scary-- the pregnant math specialist was knocked to the ground in the stairwell last month by kids running wild, pushing and shoving -- the principal said, "Oh, those were just students being careless. The math specialist knows that. She's not afraid of the students. If you are afraid of them, you can't work with them effectively, so maybe this school isn't the best fit for you."

Then it dawned on me what she was trying to do. I let her talk for a while and just yessed her to death. When she asked me what I was thinking and how I was feeling, I wanted to say, "You shithead! You're trying to force me to quit three days before February break so you don't have to pay me over vacation week! THAT's what I think!" But I behaved myself and just repeated back what she'd said to me, that we have to be positive with the students, respect them, be role models, etc. Then she insinuated that I would be happier teaching in a school for juvenile offenders. "In schools for juvenile offenders, you walk the halls and can hear a pin drop, it's so quiet, because they're so boxed in they can barely move. Here at CrazySchool, we want to give our kids more freedom than that," she said with her enigmatic smile. "But this isn't for everyone, so maybe this school just isn't a good fit for you."

Anytime she asked me what I was thinking, I said I completely agreed with what she was saying and that I was committed to staying. It was actually pretty comical to watch her try to hide the disappointment on her face every time I reiterated my commitment and refused to quit. In the end, we finally left it that I would take today (which ended up being a snow day, thank God) and "reflect on whether this school is a good fit for you." Such B.S. I mean, is losing your temper a couple of times -- not swearing, not using berating language, not hitting a kid or anything -- really a fire-able offense?

So now my decision is made for me. I was doing my best to stick it out, but I can't work at a school where I feel like the principal is going to be gunning for me, just waiting to catch me doing something wrong. That is, if she doesn't just fire me tomorrow. She'll either have to terminate me so I can collect unemployment, or wait for me to quit after I've found another job.

I'm very curious what will happen tomorrow.

Quiet

I didn't scream uncontrollably at any kids today! :-D
Also I helped one student with a science test, and another with math.
All in all it was not a bad day.
We even get out early tomorrow. On Fridays our school day for the kids ends at 3 PM instead of 4:30, and usually we teachers have professional development from 3:15 - 4:30. But tomorrow, professional development is cancelled! Only because we have to go in for an all-day professional development session on Saturday, though. Sigh! I just hope it's useful.