I. In first period, a student came to me and she said “Ms. Wright, do you have any paper towels?” and I unfortunately had to respond with “No, someone stole them” because that is the reality of my situation. She said, “Well [other student] just spilled water all over your floor.” I sighed and said, “Hold on. I’ll get some napkins.” I ran to the bathroom right across the hall just as the bell rang to end class. I was back in thirty seconds. Do you think they were there waiting for napkins to clean up their water? Of course not. A minute later a student walked in and asked me why there was water all over the floor.
II. Between first and second period a fight started down the hall but it was down the hall so I just stayed at my door while they broke it up. But then a minute later two girls started swinging right in front of me so then I had to help the assistant principal break up a girl fight. I’ve avoided this moment for so long. Honestly, the most annoying part is that I almost spilled my coffee and had to let some random kid hold it and then I tossed it out because I was afraid to drink it.
III. At the beginning of second period there was a seating chart up on the screen and my class of HONORS students wasn’t smart enough to figure out where their seats were even though there’s clearly certain rows that have more desks than others, and the back is CLEARLY the back. One student crashed out trying to get people into the right seats and I just watched while everyone argued with her until she finally said “Ms. Wright I don’t know how you can be a teacher because I’m about to smack half these kids” and then sat down. I gave her some candy.
IV. In second period a (different) student was crashing out (there’s a trend in this class) because he couldn’t find his journal and they had two minutes to turn in their sub work from the day before [see X]. He loudly stated, “I’m not doing my fucking assignment from yesterday again!” and then sat down. After watching him pout for 20 minutes, I went and organized all my journals and what do you know I found his behind the entire shelf. So I said, “Here [student]” and he came over, snatched his journal from my hand and walked away. Naturally I had to passive aggressively say, “You’re welcome” and then he passive aggressively said “Thanks.” Did he even do his assignment from yesterday? No. No he did not. Did he drop his journal behind the shelf to try and get away with it? Hmmmm…
V. In fifth period a kid swore up and down that the sub gave him the wrong paper: it was his sub work paper from when I was out the week before. God, take me back to Colorado. I told him I threw all of the extra copies of those away so there was no way that’s what she gave him. He never relented. I hope he wasn’t lying but it doesn’t make sense. I still didn’t give him a new copy though. As an add-on, a student in seventh period told me the sub didn’t give her entire group the paper. I asked her why she waited 24 hours to request one and she just stared at me so I smiled and walked away.
VI. Even when I assign work on paper I still get some AI generated garbage where student use hyphens and worlds like “falsehood” which they’ve never used a day in their life. Then they watch me read/grade it with this look of fear in their eyes because they know, and they gotta know I know, and now we’re making this weird eye contact and I just blink a few times, sigh, and slap a grade on it because at least they had to write it on paper?
VII. Seventh period today a student told me, “I couldn’t do the work for the sub yesterday because I couldn’t read the story.” I asked him what he meant and he said, “I mean, I couldn’t read the story.” So again I asked him what he meant and – I’m not kidding – he said, “I couldn’t read the story.” I said, “The font was too small? It’s too dark in here? You had temporary blindness? You can’t read in English? Like why couldn’t you read the story???” and then he said – seriously – “I couldn’t read it.” I stared at him for eleven seconds and told him to get away from my desk. According to his mom, he lost his paper.
VIII. There’s a student in my eighth period that every single day walks past me before a different period and asks, “Chromebooks today?” and when I say no he grumbles and gets mad. But then half the time he just grabs one anyway, so why does he even ask. I have 35 kids in that period. I don’t even bother. So today after school when I forced him to leave so he doesn’t miss his bus, I asked him when he plans on doing the actual work I assigned from that day and yesterday. He has the audacity to ask me if he can come to tutoring. I said, “Why would I let you come to come to tutoring when you don’t even do your work in class because you wanna write your AI generated dragon story instead of doing your work? Why do I have to put in extra time?” but I said it in my head because I’m only mean to like 2 students and now he’s staying after school Thursday. Listen, I also liked to write my own stories in high school instead of doing my classwork, but I sure never asked my teachers if I could come to tutoring to do my missing work (my mom would email them asking if I could turn it in late).
IX. In seventh period a kid started to crash out (why do they crash out so much) on ME because I wouldn’t put up the questions from yesterday on the screen. I had a sub yesterday. I said, “It’s not my fault you didn’t do your work. Do today’s work and I’ll post yesterday’s in Google Classroom for when you’re done.” I thought that was it but then he demanded I give him another copy of the story because he lost his and I said, “Wow I guess you’re learning about personal responsibility in two different ways today.” /Understand, I threw away 60 papers off my floor on Monday afternoon after having the sub. We’ve been in school for 13 weeks. They know we always keep copies of stories for the week. I lost count of how many kids were mad at me for not giving them another copy of the story. It was fun for me to watch how many of them would figure something out so they could do their work today, and how many just sat and pouted the entire period and now owe me Monday’s work AND today’s. [As a nov. 4 addition, I let them have a new copy but only if they beat me at a single game of Rock Paper Scissors.]
X. At the end of the day, I tallied up how many students actually turned in their work when I had a sub yesterday. My number does not account for how many students were absent or sick/at the nurse, etc., but only 21% of my students turned in some work from yesterday. Today I also learned that I’m now up to 199 freshmen that I see on a daily basis. I just remembered I haven’t graded their interim essays yet either. 199 essays should only take me like 20 minutes, right?
