Welcome Back!

Welcome back

So we've put in a week already, and the shit is already hitting the fan. For one, I had no idea that 6th graders could be so spastic. A room of thirty students leads to perpetual motion, perpetual chatting, and a tendency to give one the feeling that one is in a room full of parrots. Once one says something, it is echoed by three, five or more in the classroom. They are confused and frightened about being shoved into middle school, and they show it through passive aggressive moves (like not reaching up for a paper when it is being handed to them), constant giggling, and the occasional back-talk. I've been informed that they start to function better as a group by January. I can't wait.

In the meantime, I've found that 7th and 8th graders, by comparison, seem quite mature. I never thought I'd be saying that! Now, with that said, I've already had to call security on a charming lad who believed it would be a good idea to wander from my classroom, disrupt another class and then refuse to return to class when instructed by two teachers (including myself) on two separate occasions. To top it off, this lovely youth decided that yelling "this is bullshit!" outside the door, and then jamming the door closed, with me and my class locked inside, was a great start to the year.

The question remains, what will our new administration do to manage discipline this year? As the demographic has changed drastically in this particular school over the past 5 years, administration has had a difficult time keeping up with the problems this changing demographic (ie: lower ses) is presenting. Plenty of hand-holding has been done in the past, to no avail, as we've watched the problem students be given the chance, time and time again, to disrupt the classroom. This year, our entire administrative team has been replaced, and we're all very interested to find out how our new team will deal with discipline. Now is the time to deal more swiftly and directly with those children whose main goal in life is to upset the learning of other students. As I was told on Friday, "watch out for that kid," referring to the charming lad who locked us in the classroom, "He's in a gang. He's real trouble."

Saddle up Rough Riders! It's gonna be a wild ride....