My body is discovering some wonderful benefits to the slimmer me, including sleeping again. Yesterday morning, I was so comfy in my little nest that I wanted to brew a cup of hot coffee and climb back under the covers with a good book. Forget going to work: just hang on to the wonderful feeling of being surrounded by my bedding.
There have been no recent nightmares, no waking up screaming, no tossing and turning. I don't know if I'm still talking and making weird noises, but there's no one here to disturb, so it's okay if that's still going on. Yeah, I still find myself wide awake at 3:30 am, a hang-over from the master's degree frenzy, but fewer and fewer nights exist that I don't sleep soundly and through the night.
As a child, I seldom dreamed--unless it was a nightmare. I don't remember dreaming during the night, but I know my mind drifted off often during the day. Nighttime was a scary time for me, but I'm not sure why. I still feel the tightness of my closed eyes, the covers shrouding my head, and the stiffness of my clenched body as I tried to sleep. Often, I would stay awake, rather than even trying to sleep, because sleeping wasn't a release or a restorative.
I know how much I dreaded the battles of the day, which began with waking up still stressed from the night, and compounded with my mother's daily ranting and raving about whatever triggered her any particular morning. I often left early for the bus stop, really early, and walked sometimes a mile to a distant bus stop, just so I could be somewhere else! I found refuge in fleeing, and sometimes I still do that.
There was so much conflict, conflict that may be normal in a large family, five children birthed during the same six years, and then another child born six years later. My parents didn't have good coping skills and were marginal parents, but they gave whatever they had to keep us together and functional. We were as successful as any other family during the time of our youth. When my father died, we imploded because none of us knew how to mourn, how to grieve, how to cope. Family members scattered, finding personal refuge wherever they could, even fighting in the jungles of Vietnam (2 brothers) and marrying men we scarcely knew, which is what both I and my sister did. Three brothers shared the darkness of drugs and alcohol.
It seems I wasn't the only sibling who traded one darkness for another.
Seldom do I venture out at night because it's not a comforting time, nor do I feel safe when I can't see what's there and has to be dealt with. I often don't answer my phone at night, and I refuse to answer the door unless the person calls me and tells me they are at the door. I want to control my environment, and that's the only way I know how to do that, all the while knowing that there is no control.
I want to be easily awake, to hear the unusual sounds and identify them, to check why my dog is barking ferociously, to know that if I feel threatened, I can take action to defend myself.
Somewhere, there is a hidden memory that knows why the night is difficult for me, but like so much of my youth, it remains locked away. I do not know if I would unlock it if I could because sometimes not knowing is the better pathway through life.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
The First Last
Yesterday was the first day of my last semester, a good day because the students have come to class expectant, fresh with the feeling of starting over.
Sitting in the seats are 3 students I've had before who failed and are now repeating the semester. Two of the three are seniors; well, that's a misnomer because in my book, a student who has not passed the core classes cannot be classified to a higher grade. One of the seniors is taking 3 English classes concurrently, his chances for graduation a dim hope, at best.
This is the last time I'll teach Julius Caesar, a great play with messages appropriate to today's society. On a whim, I conducted a short reading level test to see which of the 3 available versions of the play may have a chance of success. Reading scores range from 2.2 (yes, that's second grade/second month) to 12.4 (grade 12, 4th month), so there is no appropriate text when it comes to reading, period, much less Shakespeare. Sure, we'll watch the film because maybe, just maybe, some of them will get something from seeing the play acted by professional actors, even when they cannot understand much of what is being said between the players on the screen.
The problem with No Child Left Behind is that its provisions became mandate in 2001, when these students were in middle school--too late to undo the failure to educate during the elementary school years.
The problem is that No Child Left Behind mandates all students reading at grade level by the 2013-2014 school year--after these children have "graduated."
Between these extremes is the vast wasteland, often captured by talking about students who "fall through the gap," a gap that is the size of the Grand Canyon!
In the meanwhile, all the wonderful programs that were in place prior to NCLB implementation have vanished. Students who used to have levels of core classes to address their strengths and weaknesses now are lumped together in what are euphemistically titled "college prep" classes, including reading levels from grade 2.2 through grade 12. The kids at the upper end seem to be doing well, while the students whose reading level never made it out of elementary school are failing, and failing, and failing.
There are no remediation programs; on the contrary, at our site there are targeted programs to teach the skills necessary to pass the exit exam, a test aimed at 8th grade proficiency. With enough repetition, even a well-trained chimpanzee could probably earn a passing score! But there are only 2 levels of English: college prep and honors/advanced, which has turned "cp" into a grade-level, slow-paced class not at all appropriate for training students to compete at the college level, and a watered-down version of an honors' program for which I had to offer extra credit to get the grade curve high enough to have a few A's.
We'll struggle through Julius Caesar and most students will get something from the effort. None of them will probably apply the knowledge of the play to their lives, but many of them will remember enough bits and pieces of the learning process to have benefited from the exposure.
And another class of poorly-performing students will graduate from high school ill-equipped to perform the most basic functions demanded by society in the business world, much less go on to college and meet the expectations of that educational environment. There is no stopping the train because decisions are political, not educational, and my career train is coming into the station after a decades-long ride. There is someone coming behind me to take up where I leave off, someone who will do the job that the administration wants once all the "old timers" are sitting in the rockers on the front porches of the retirement homes.
Change isn't good or bad, it just is, from one first last to the last last in June.
Sitting in the seats are 3 students I've had before who failed and are now repeating the semester. Two of the three are seniors; well, that's a misnomer because in my book, a student who has not passed the core classes cannot be classified to a higher grade. One of the seniors is taking 3 English classes concurrently, his chances for graduation a dim hope, at best.
This is the last time I'll teach Julius Caesar, a great play with messages appropriate to today's society. On a whim, I conducted a short reading level test to see which of the 3 available versions of the play may have a chance of success. Reading scores range from 2.2 (yes, that's second grade/second month) to 12.4 (grade 12, 4th month), so there is no appropriate text when it comes to reading, period, much less Shakespeare. Sure, we'll watch the film because maybe, just maybe, some of them will get something from seeing the play acted by professional actors, even when they cannot understand much of what is being said between the players on the screen.
The problem with No Child Left Behind is that its provisions became mandate in 2001, when these students were in middle school--too late to undo the failure to educate during the elementary school years.
The problem is that No Child Left Behind mandates all students reading at grade level by the 2013-2014 school year--after these children have "graduated."
Between these extremes is the vast wasteland, often captured by talking about students who "fall through the gap," a gap that is the size of the Grand Canyon!
In the meanwhile, all the wonderful programs that were in place prior to NCLB implementation have vanished. Students who used to have levels of core classes to address their strengths and weaknesses now are lumped together in what are euphemistically titled "college prep" classes, including reading levels from grade 2.2 through grade 12. The kids at the upper end seem to be doing well, while the students whose reading level never made it out of elementary school are failing, and failing, and failing.
There are no remediation programs; on the contrary, at our site there are targeted programs to teach the skills necessary to pass the exit exam, a test aimed at 8th grade proficiency. With enough repetition, even a well-trained chimpanzee could probably earn a passing score! But there are only 2 levels of English: college prep and honors/advanced, which has turned "cp" into a grade-level, slow-paced class not at all appropriate for training students to compete at the college level, and a watered-down version of an honors' program for which I had to offer extra credit to get the grade curve high enough to have a few A's.
We'll struggle through Julius Caesar and most students will get something from the effort. None of them will probably apply the knowledge of the play to their lives, but many of them will remember enough bits and pieces of the learning process to have benefited from the exposure.
And another class of poorly-performing students will graduate from high school ill-equipped to perform the most basic functions demanded by society in the business world, much less go on to college and meet the expectations of that educational environment. There is no stopping the train because decisions are political, not educational, and my career train is coming into the station after a decades-long ride. There is someone coming behind me to take up where I leave off, someone who will do the job that the administration wants once all the "old timers" are sitting in the rockers on the front porches of the retirement homes.
Change isn't good or bad, it just is, from one first last to the last last in June.
Sunday, January 28, 2007
the continuing saga of the computer
Talked to son for well over an hour, trying to hook up remotely so he could see what the heck is going on with my machine. Repeated efforts failed, so I went into the new McAfee protection program and ran it, finding 8 viruses in the process. One of those is associated with my uninstall process, so that may be part of the ongoing problems I'm experiencing.
Anyhoo, not only does the machine seem to be back and working like its old self, but I was able to log onto my blog for this post with no problem.
I'm going to shut down for the rest of the day, finish cleaning my house, and then read a book. I'm just not feeling totally tekkie today!
Anyhoo, not only does the machine seem to be back and working like its old self, but I was able to log onto my blog for this post with no problem.
I'm going to shut down for the rest of the day, finish cleaning my house, and then read a book. I'm just not feeling totally tekkie today!
Saturday, January 27, 2007
Ketchup
The last couple of weeks have been filled with snips of insight provoked by interaction with strangers and peers. I've felt like that bug on the wall, listening to what others say about themselves, about life, about me.
Life may be good for most of us in the weeks following the winter break. Some are refreshed, while others are depressed, but almost all are stressed: it's the end of one semester and the beginning of another, hampered by the district's decision to provide 2 meaningful days of mandated in-service training which held at least 1000 teachers and administrators captive in a large room for one of the most uninspiring, tedious presentations of my career.
Any public speaker who earns a fee should know when he's lost the audience, especially when the audience of his colleagues is guffawing throughout the motivating slide show that proves his approach to forming collaborative educational communities is the way to go. He was mildly interesting for about the first 90 minutes, and then he headed downhill in an uncontrolled tumble.
It was awful! I completely lost it when he recommended that we all wear the t-shirts proclaiming our intent to "Harass 'em 'til we pass 'em." I could not stop laughing, and then had to get up and leave when the woman sitting next to me proclaimed loudly, "I need a drink!" I'm sure she meant water or iced tea, but there were so many voices raised in agreement with her comment that I had to leave to regain control.
Where do we all need to be? At our sites, printing rosters and the materials we need for Monday. I believe in the philosophy of begin where I intend to end, so I'm ready minute one of day one, especially when my student population has changed. I don't know the new faces coming into class, so I will have to demonstrate my classroom process to them beginning when the bell rings. If I'm not prepared to do so, they will know that they don't have to be prepared either, and that's not the way I do my job.
Today's Saturday, and I'm going into work.
The college class is off to a great start, and several have accepted the extra credit option to blog. A person who needs to become a better writer needs to write, not read about writing, and one of the best ways I know to get the writing process engaged is to offer extra credit for a blog. I read and respond to each posting, which takes a bit of time, but pays off huge dividends in the classroom.
Word is around that I'm retiring, so interested replacements have approached me to ask me about working at my site. Great, I tell them: go for it. We all know that if this one isn't a fit, the next one in line may be, and life goes on. I'm on the college roster for both summer session and fall classes, so will continue working for a while. Far better to look forward to 3 classes and 2 days a week than 5 classes, 5 days a week--and close to 200 students, few of whom want to be there.
The landscaping is about to begin, and I pray that this landscaper will do the job right, do it well, and not "adjust" the agreed to price. Once it's in, the landscaping will be manageable without using a gardener, so that's the goal. I hope it will also add value to the house.
Next on my plan is to finish the dresser I began refinishing last summer, then add the cabinets to the wall above it and create a built-in buffet. I'm also going to empty the boxes in the garage, keeping some and discarding other contents, with the goal of parking 2 cars inside, rather than leaving one outside.
Then, I'm taking apart my office and redoing it with shelving I can use, cabinets, and only current materials. I have contents that need to be shredded and the boxes discarded. I've allowed it to pile up until I can't stand it, so I'll probably be as ruthless as it takes to dig out from under the decade of disinterest.
The biggest step is landscaping the smaller backyard, the one off my never-used patio. A fence was installed to create a dog run, but then I broke the arm twice and lost my momentum. It's time to get up and running again and make my house at least as run-down as the rest on the block, rather than looking like it's abandoned ... .
I've lost weight, brought my blood sugar down, and look and feel a whole lot better than I did a short 6 months ago. I have more energy and fewer headaches, so can't complain. Have even received a couple of compliments on the self improvements, which adds motivation to continue the process.
time for the shower and shoving off: I have work to do.
Life may be good for most of us in the weeks following the winter break. Some are refreshed, while others are depressed, but almost all are stressed: it's the end of one semester and the beginning of another, hampered by the district's decision to provide 2 meaningful days of mandated in-service training which held at least 1000 teachers and administrators captive in a large room for one of the most uninspiring, tedious presentations of my career.
Any public speaker who earns a fee should know when he's lost the audience, especially when the audience of his colleagues is guffawing throughout the motivating slide show that proves his approach to forming collaborative educational communities is the way to go. He was mildly interesting for about the first 90 minutes, and then he headed downhill in an uncontrolled tumble.
It was awful! I completely lost it when he recommended that we all wear the t-shirts proclaiming our intent to "Harass 'em 'til we pass 'em." I could not stop laughing, and then had to get up and leave when the woman sitting next to me proclaimed loudly, "I need a drink!" I'm sure she meant water or iced tea, but there were so many voices raised in agreement with her comment that I had to leave to regain control.
Where do we all need to be? At our sites, printing rosters and the materials we need for Monday. I believe in the philosophy of begin where I intend to end, so I'm ready minute one of day one, especially when my student population has changed. I don't know the new faces coming into class, so I will have to demonstrate my classroom process to them beginning when the bell rings. If I'm not prepared to do so, they will know that they don't have to be prepared either, and that's not the way I do my job.
Today's Saturday, and I'm going into work.
The college class is off to a great start, and several have accepted the extra credit option to blog. A person who needs to become a better writer needs to write, not read about writing, and one of the best ways I know to get the writing process engaged is to offer extra credit for a blog. I read and respond to each posting, which takes a bit of time, but pays off huge dividends in the classroom.
Word is around that I'm retiring, so interested replacements have approached me to ask me about working at my site. Great, I tell them: go for it. We all know that if this one isn't a fit, the next one in line may be, and life goes on. I'm on the college roster for both summer session and fall classes, so will continue working for a while. Far better to look forward to 3 classes and 2 days a week than 5 classes, 5 days a week--and close to 200 students, few of whom want to be there.
The landscaping is about to begin, and I pray that this landscaper will do the job right, do it well, and not "adjust" the agreed to price. Once it's in, the landscaping will be manageable without using a gardener, so that's the goal. I hope it will also add value to the house.
Next on my plan is to finish the dresser I began refinishing last summer, then add the cabinets to the wall above it and create a built-in buffet. I'm also going to empty the boxes in the garage, keeping some and discarding other contents, with the goal of parking 2 cars inside, rather than leaving one outside.
Then, I'm taking apart my office and redoing it with shelving I can use, cabinets, and only current materials. I have contents that need to be shredded and the boxes discarded. I've allowed it to pile up until I can't stand it, so I'll probably be as ruthless as it takes to dig out from under the decade of disinterest.
The biggest step is landscaping the smaller backyard, the one off my never-used patio. A fence was installed to create a dog run, but then I broke the arm twice and lost my momentum. It's time to get up and running again and make my house at least as run-down as the rest on the block, rather than looking like it's abandoned ... .
I've lost weight, brought my blood sugar down, and look and feel a whole lot better than I did a short 6 months ago. I have more energy and fewer headaches, so can't complain. Have even received a couple of compliments on the self improvements, which adds motivation to continue the process.
time for the shower and shoving off: I have work to do.
Oops, I Did It Again
My, my, my: this is so weird! My access to my blog disappears, so I can read it but not post to it, and then--magically--it returns, teasing me with the prospect that the link is repaired.
I've freed up disk space on my computer (unnecessary, according to the computer's analysis); defragged (why is that such a long process?); uninstalled Norton, purchased and installed McAfee; talked to Verizon about the remote possibility it could be the DSL box (I do admire techs who listen and respond civilly to inane questions such as mine). Unplugged, plugged, and rebooted far too many times to count.
I've been to the help chatroom and learned that many, many bloggers are having huge issues since the beta test blog went gold: I thought gold didn't tarnish, but evidently calling something gold doesn't make it gold. Of course, everyone suggests that you follow all of the steps on the help page, which I did the first 3 times I tried to "fix" the problem. That's when I began layering on all the other suggestions, including replacing Norton with McAfee, which has been suggested as a better safe guard for unwanted computer access via the internet. I erased my history, deleted cookies, changed my security settings to the default--oh, the list goes on and on.
When all is said and done, my students are blogging, and I'm able to read and respond to their postings, as well as other blogs to which I subscribe, but am locked out of my own blog.
Why can I access it today, but not last night? Is the link repaired, or will this be the last I see of yet another new blog? What happens if I find the other copy of Mental Gymnastics and delete it? Will I lose both copies, or just the one that has no content. Should I just go for it, or tread cautiously?
Stay tuned ...
I've freed up disk space on my computer (unnecessary, according to the computer's analysis); defragged (why is that such a long process?); uninstalled Norton, purchased and installed McAfee; talked to Verizon about the remote possibility it could be the DSL box (I do admire techs who listen and respond civilly to inane questions such as mine). Unplugged, plugged, and rebooted far too many times to count.
I've been to the help chatroom and learned that many, many bloggers are having huge issues since the beta test blog went gold: I thought gold didn't tarnish, but evidently calling something gold doesn't make it gold. Of course, everyone suggests that you follow all of the steps on the help page, which I did the first 3 times I tried to "fix" the problem. That's when I began layering on all the other suggestions, including replacing Norton with McAfee, which has been suggested as a better safe guard for unwanted computer access via the internet. I erased my history, deleted cookies, changed my security settings to the default--oh, the list goes on and on.
When all is said and done, my students are blogging, and I'm able to read and respond to their postings, as well as other blogs to which I subscribe, but am locked out of my own blog.
Why can I access it today, but not last night? Is the link repaired, or will this be the last I see of yet another new blog? What happens if I find the other copy of Mental Gymnastics and delete it? Will I lose both copies, or just the one that has no content. Should I just go for it, or tread cautiously?
Stay tuned ...
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
So This is Magic ...
My blog is cured: not only did I access it this morning, but ... I didn't have to go through a sign-in process and get kicked out. Availing myself of the "help" feature included creating a new blog, this one, only to find that I no longer existed to the dashboard in name or email or blog format.
What made the situation so irritating is that my son could access my blog just fine, so he had a challenging mental leap to accept that I could not, regardless of the steps I took to follow the help menu to the letter. I've heard that these unexplained events are called "hiccups," but it seemed to be more of a "belch" to me.
Now the only issue is --- 2 copies of my current blog and no former blog at all. It has passed into the great techno space in the sky with narry a blink of an eye. Please don't even ask how that happened as I fear there are gremlins in my computer messing with my mind.
If you ever want to feel REALLY stupid, instead of just dysfunctional, try explaining happenings that are impossible to explain, much less happen, to your computer-wise son who sees your natterings as the first stages of early-onset Alzheimers!
Okay, perhaps not so "early onset" as I'd like to think.
What made the situation so irritating is that my son could access my blog just fine, so he had a challenging mental leap to accept that I could not, regardless of the steps I took to follow the help menu to the letter. I've heard that these unexplained events are called "hiccups," but it seemed to be more of a "belch" to me.
Now the only issue is --- 2 copies of my current blog and no former blog at all. It has passed into the great techno space in the sky with narry a blink of an eye. Please don't even ask how that happened as I fear there are gremlins in my computer messing with my mind.
If you ever want to feel REALLY stupid, instead of just dysfunctional, try explaining happenings that are impossible to explain, much less happen, to your computer-wise son who sees your natterings as the first stages of early-onset Alzheimers!
Okay, perhaps not so "early onset" as I'd like to think.
Monday, January 15, 2007
Starting Over
If the third time is the charm, this time I shan't have to delete my blog and begin again.
I can make it through the first year, but then something always happens to the blog and I must start over.
This time, failure to access is the culprit. Repeatedly.
There is no rational explanation for the failure, but after following the steps suggested to alleviate the problem and then calling for help, the best solution available was--sorry--you'll have to recreate the blog.
So, here 'tis.
I can make it through the first year, but then something always happens to the blog and I must start over.
This time, failure to access is the culprit. Repeatedly.
There is no rational explanation for the failure, but after following the steps suggested to alleviate the problem and then calling for help, the best solution available was--sorry--you'll have to recreate the blog.
So, here 'tis.
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