Day 74-" I thought you didn't believe men and women could be friends." When Harry Met Sally

Today beings our last 3 day cycle before Thanksgiving break. With my seniors last paper due on Tuesday, which is our last day before break (for some reason we don't go on Wednesday, but no one is complaining), I thought we could some different types of writing for the next couple of days. Today, we had a creative writing day with our marathon writing activity. My third period class stole the day for with a lively, riveting discussion on can guys and girls really be friends. The class was a modern day "When Harry Met Sally" argument with the solution being that the debate still continues to rage on.

I have a new Thanksgiving related writing lesson I'm going to try out next week, so hopefully my students haven't already checked out when Monday rolls around.

Day 73- “I asked him if it were a mirage, and he said yes." Smoke and Mirrors

Oh black day, you are the oasis of my week. New unit with my Read 180 group, peer review with my seniors, iPass, prep, then character development and setting development for the Read 180 lab groups' short stories. My seniors did a much better job with their peer feedback this time, and I'm sure this will translate into better papers for their final papers of the semester.

Day 72- "What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?" Groundhog Day

For a white Wednesday, this was an non-stressful day. My English 12 classes peer reviewed their rough drafts of their persuasive papers, and my Read 180 lab class explored what makes a good fiction story. After exploring those elements, I put the class in groups so they could brainstorm what problem they would like to write about in a fiction story. They are going to write a group story in the next few weeks, so I wanted them to start from scratch and work together to develop a background from a story.

Cluster was, as always, an experience. I still feel when I ask direct questions I don't received direct answers in return, but I am fairly adept at sifting through the double-speak. Still feels like Groundhog Day. At least next week we only have to meet for a bagel.

Day 71- "My boy is wicked smart." Good Will Hunting

Today was the last writing day of the semester of my red/white classes. They are having a hard time with the process of writing. By this I mean they just want to turn in a final copy. I completed grading their pro/con essays, and while the content was what I was looking for, their grammar took a turn for the worse. Almost all of them admitted to not proofreading their paper (when we peer review, we don't make grammar changes due to research showing that peers tend to make the grammar errors worse). We have used Google Docs all semester to write and submit papers, and Docs does not perform some of the automatic grammar corrections that Microsoft Word performs, and in the amazingly proficient laziness, they do not check their papers for errors. I have informed them I will be the toughest I have been all semester on grammar, so they better make sure they revise their papers. Ok, I'm off my box now. Anyway, I made them make more of an effort to have a paper to revise and edit (meaning I made it worth more against them if they didn't have a draft). They seem to think they can just write and turn something in, and they can't. Heck, no one can. They at least produced some competent drafts, which I'm hoping will turn in to effective revision and well written final draft.

I had my post-eval for my observation from Friday today. My observer tried to get me to admit that modeling is essential at all times, but he couldn't get me to do it. I admitted that I model new skills, but at this point I have expectations for my classes and I want to see what they can do. I told him I didn't do my modeling he saw for all my classes due to the student in my other classes, and that is how it should be at this point in the semester. I'm not sure he agreed, but that doesn't surprise me since modeling everything we do, and yes, I mean EVERYTHING, is our new cluster obsession. I received a solid score, and with my wicked genius IQ I was able to quickly calculate that I need an average of a 1.4 on my next two evals to have my job next year. Since all my scores have been double that, I can virtually sleep in my next two evals and be "effective". Oh the points I want to prove with that theory.

Day 70- "Are you threatening me?/ I'm just giving you some free advice, doctor. I suggest you take it." Hard Rain

Today was a very typical black day. I had a nice repeat of the analysis lesson I did on Friday, and this class did very well. As goofy as this class is, they are my highest performing class. They drive me crazy at times! iPass was a productive as I had students come in and begin working on their last papers, and I was able to get some of the papers graded that were turned in late. I hope they take my 3:00 p.m. deadline next Tuesday seriously, because I am sticking to it. I didn't threaten them will failure, I just promised them I wouldn't accept late work.

Day 69- "You want me to get up on the table and dance for you? Shine your shoes? Smile atchu?" Ocean's Eleven

Today rounded out a very frustrating week of teaching. Let me clarify that last statement. Teaching was great this week, but dealing with the conflicting ideologies of our department, well most the school, and those of our "master teachers". I taught a lesson today in English 12 where we analyzed a non-fiction opinion article from the Indianapolis Star where the students were pull out the pieces where the author is showing support for his argument and providing relevance to the reader. We have done activities such as this all semester long, and we just analyzed another piece of persuasive writing last week. I read through a couple paragraphs with my class and pulled out the pieces where I found the author doing the above techniques. After that I had them finish reading the article and pull out the pieces on their own, then they discussed their findings with a partner, and finally we shared out as a class. During one of my lessons, a "master teacher" stopped by to see how my modeling was going. With this being day 46 of a 60 day instructional day semester, I found it was time to pull back a little from my students, to take off the training wheels, and to see if they could ride for themselves. Apparently, my lesson wasn't very effective because I didn't hold their hands and show them on the SMART Board what I would underline or highlight. My question was at what point in the year, and keep in mind these are seniors, do we pull back the hand-holding and expect them to have a certain knolwedge of skills? Do we show them every single task every single time until the day we hand them a diploma? At what point do we have high expectations and academic rigor for our classes? How is constant hand-holding this late in the semester preparing these kids for college? By this point in the semester, and with this being their senior year, I have expectations of my students and they should be able to do these tasks. I asked today, and also two days ago, where the line is between modeling and expectations for our students, and I did not receive an answer. I believe my students need to be expected to be able to do some tasks, especially a task I have modeled and they have done throughout the semester, without me modeling how to highlight or underline. My department agrees with me, actually every teacher I have talked to in the building agrees with me, except for the four who are in charge of our professional development. It feels like Groundhog Day here sometimes.

To end the day, on the last period of a no prep white day, one of the four horsemen came in to do my unannounced observation. I had a response that probably shouldn't be reproduced on here when I saw him enter my room. Anyway, I did the song and dance that they want because my job depends on it, but it was just not the way I wanted my day to end.

Day 68- "I'm invisible. Can you see me?" Mystery Men

Today was a fairly good day from a teaching standpoint, but from the standpoint of a teacher, it was highly frustrating. My Read 180 class had an assessment, so that was easy. My English 12 classes where tasked with starting their persuasive papers, and I was able to have some good conversations with many of my students on their writing and where this last paper was going. I did give them a "do or die" due date, so hopefully they will take that seriously and not fail their last paper due to complete and other slothfulness.

I want to go on a rant about the lack of voice I feel my colleagues and I have, but I am using a rare moment of good judgement and refraining. I will just say that its very irritating when we are told we are the best around, our opinions are asked about issues, and then the complete opposite is done. It's not quite as big a grievance as it was last year, but it's constant. We are being beaten not down, but into apathy. I'm tired of feeling like a ghost in the fog.

Day 67- "There's no place like home." The Wizard of Oz

I don't when the last time was that I missed consecutive days of school. It's an odd feeling being gone from school for what feels like a very long time, but in reality, was only about 12 school hours. Feels like being on vacation for a month and coming home. Also, coming back to a black day is a fantastic way to ease back into getting all caught up. Thankfully, I didn't get tapped on my first day back, but I kept looking down the hallway waiting for one of the four horseman to come my way. This will actually probably be a common practice for me until they ride in on one of their horses for my unannounced observation.

Read 180 was a review day, and my lone English 12 class had a research day. iPass, prep, and my lab class rounded out my day. Nothing much to report. Oh! I wasn't put in the front of the room in cluster this time! I'm sure that will be remedied next week though.

Day 66- Sick Day

Home again today to help take care of my wife and kids as she is recovering. My classes were tasked with research today, so I hope they were mature enough to spend that time wisely.

Day 65- Sick Day

I missed today to take care of my wife who was very ill. My students were left with an assignment we did with our previous paper to help them narrow down their topic and come up with a thesis for our next paper. This is mostly facilitation from a teaching standpoint. Thank you Joe Akers from HWP for this wonderful activity.

Day 64- "Sane is boring." R.A. Salvatore

Black Fridays need to be more prevalent than just once every three weeks. I love them, and they are almost like an extra 1/2 day weekend for me. Well, they aren't that easy, but its a fantastic way to end a week. This week felt as if it would never end. It's hard to believe it's only the second week back from fall break because that feels like fall break was months ago. Maybe I should check my totem.

My Read 180 class starting formulating their rough drafts, my second period class went through persuasive language, and I had a student try to persuade me to take him to McDonald's for lunch. He failed miserably. I did have a fantastic slippage of a euphemism that virtually ended all effectiveness of my class, which always makes for great teacher talk. I was instructing my students on an effective method to write a persuasive paper, and I may have said "You need to build to a climax and really ram it home..." Yep, that happened. Thankfully iPass and prep consumed my next 3 hours, so I was able to recover before my Read 180 writing lab. I was able to get some grading done during iPass, but my three senior school-adopted daughters came in, so it wasn't as productive as it could have been. I love those kids though. My day ended with my Read 180 lab where the students read for 20 minutes then typed up their final draft of their memoir. A day full of writing, my favorite students, and euphemisms is not a bad way to end a long week.

Day 63- "Words have power." Blackout

White days kick my arse, especially when first period is a little bit goofy and doesn't want to listen or be very engaged. They were engaged with the movie clips I showed, but there are just a couple goofy students who just make even a good lesson difficult at times. This is a bright class that does well, but a few students still act like freshmen. I have a feeling their papers they just turned in won't be as well written as their last ones, so maybe that fear of failure will help them shape up. Anyway, after that class I reviewed ethos, pathos, and logos, then showed examples of persuasive writing and language. We analyzed the first part of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have a Dream" speech and examined the emotive and persuasive language and techniques in the speech. They seemed to do a great job of pulling out the persuasive language and realizing how emotion and symbolism can be used to persuade. Hopefully their understanding will carry into their papers as well. I'm pretty happy that "Tommy Boy", "Rudy", "Braveheart", "The Lorax", and Meatloaf's "I Would Do Anything for Love" all made appearances in my lessons these last two days.

Day 62- "Helen, let me tell you why I suck at sales." Tommy Boy

Today was the beginning of instruction on persuasion. I really was hoping I would get observed today because I really loved my lesson, but alas, no dice. I showed them the three appeals or persuasive techniques of ethos, pathos, logos, then showed them commercials and movie clips where different persuasion techniques are used. The best one I used was a scene from Braveheart where Mel Gibson hits all three techniques in one two-minute speech. I was able to find and show a variety of clips that were engaging and showed a variety of different persuasion techniques in different circumstances. They were highly engaged and the lesson seemed to be very effective. At the end of class, I had them write an advertisement to try to sell a product to someone. They had to write two ads, and the products they had to choose from were jalapeno pretzels, a Scentbug air freshener, and a Batman thermal travel cup. They were fairly into the assignment after watching all the video clips, and I'm anxious to read their ads.

The day ended with cluster, which all I can really safely say about it is that it happened and no one got in trouble. I seem to routinely be right in the front of the room though. I don't believe this is coincidence either.

Day 61- "Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose." Bill Gates

I'm exhausted. My senior class that meets on black days tests me. They are a bright group, but extremely lazy. We peer reviewed our papers today, but many of them had very little written and weren't really into the activity like my other classes were. I will have to be much more structured with this group on how I make them do their peer revisions for our last paper and make them have some sort of rough draft due to evaluate. They don't take the writing process (I hate that phrase, but I'm not sure at this point what is a better description of it) seriously enough in my opinion. This class thinks they can slack off because they did better on their first papers than my other classes did, but if I had to wager, I would bet those scores aren't so high this time.

My Read 180 lab class started brainstorming and writing their rough drafts for their memoir papers. They are doing well with the writing workshop, but I want to really push them to make them better writers and readers.

Day 60- "We write to taste life twice, in the moment and retrospect." Anais Nin

Today was a fairly routine day in the world of writing. My first period English 12 class spent their last day in the lab writing their pro/con essays, while my other English 12 classes spent their class time doing peer revisions. I don't think many of them really take peer revision as a serious enough process. They do it, and they go through the motions, but I do not believe they see the value in it. I'm not sure I did at their age, and I probably didn't in college either. I need to figure out how to make them value this part of writing. There a couple mandates I could have for them that would make them actually take more time doing this, but getting them to value it is a completely different animal.

For my Read 180 lab class, we starting diving into doing writing workshop. I am using Nancie Atwell's Lessons that Change Writers as my curriculum and guide. I think this is a fantastic book, and I'm hoping it makes my struggling readers and writers become more accomplished. For this class, I introduced writing territories and we brainstormed as a class and as individuals what our own personal writing territories will be.

Day 59- "Bad improvisors block action, often with a high degree of skill. Good improvisors develop action." Malcolm Gladwell's Blink

Today I had planned to have my English 12 classes partake in peer review, but since my substitute on Wednesday didn't follow my plans, and my students are convinced she may be a customer of Los Pollos Hermanos' special dessert, I had to completely improvise. Since most of the work I had planned for Wednesday did not get completed, and this is the toughest paper my students will be writing this semester, I decided to give them a day to write and take specific time to conference with them, especially the ENL students and students who are struggling in class. It ended up being a productive day, and the students had rough drafts to review for Monday's class. In the end, I guess it all works out.

Day 58- "If you give orders and leave, the work won't get done"- Portuguese proverb

Coming back from being out is always interesting because I never know how much the sub covered. The only real class I had today was my English 12 class, and they were writing in the IMC, so it was fairly easy. I have a feeling based on the notes from my sub and talking to my students between classes, that my sub screwed me and peer review won't be happening tomorrow. I guess I'll be improvising.

I am going to have to change my seating chart for my Read 180 class. It can only help, but this class is just a struggle to exist. If they don't shape up in life, they won't even be able to serve my daily fry or coke intake from McDonald's.

Today is Halloween, but due to alleged horrific storms we will be having tonight, no trick-or-treating until tomorrow night. This will be a very uneventful Halloween, but at least I was able to wear jeans and a t-shirt to work today. I really do believe I am the most effective teacher I can be in this attire.