Oops!

Oops!

Background check needed before certification can go through…

Guess what I forgot to do during winter break?

Yup.

So my K-6 general education certification is pending until the background check I had done last week is cleared.

This, sadly, has cost me a couple of job opportunities…

But hey, as long as parents continue to act worse than their children in my state, I should be in a position in no time!  Seriously.  ‘I can’t stand to see my kid in my mask’ is just code for ‘I’m tired of hearing my kid whine about masks and I don’t want to wear one myself so here I am protesting my family’s right to get terminally ill.

The fact that America ever made it to become a first-world country much less a world power is still a mystery to me…

I love my country but I hate the spineless, cowardly, selfish, greedy people who run it.

Certification Pending...

This is such a depressing thing to see when you have studied for what essentially amounts to three months straight.

Sadly, I only have myself to blame considering I let my background check slip. Now I have to get in touch with people to have my work email unlocked.

It has been a long and winding road already…

No one at grad school said anything about additional certification…

The program was geared towards preparing student to teach adults, not kids.

Then again, when I asked the ‘teaching career’ guru if I should get certified in general education or special education…she said ‘no’.

Do yourself a favor, if you are going to specialize in ESL, special education, or any other area…go for additional certification in general education. There are more special education jobs than there are ESL (in my State, anyway) and there is WAY more general education jobs than there are both ESL and special education combined.

Get it while you are still in college!

It will open up three times as many doors for you!

Start in general education, get that experience, then work towards the subject or kinds of students you actually want to teach.

Get your foot in the door!

Depression...

It’s hard to keep your head above the water when you’re drowning in your own tears...  Take that, former me who wrote horrible Goth poetry! 

Talk to Them...

“I hate it here.  School is too hard.  The playground is different from the one in Pennsylvania.  I don’t like Delaware.  I don’t like living with my grandpa.  I want to live with my mom and dad but they have to fix the house so we can go back.  My brother and sister and I moved down here.  My baby-baby sister is with mom and dad.  I want to go home.”

This ramble is brought to you by a displaced boy in first grade.

Sometimes you just have to listen and not just shove a lesson down their throat.

Not long after this, I sat with him again.  We worked on his reading, which is something he hates.  He still hated Delaware.  He still missed his mom and dad.  But he was more willing to participate and work with me.  He didn’t act up or whine.

Sometimes a chat can make a world of difference.

Even if the effects only lasts two weeks before he goes back to Pennsylvania…

Okay, I am Mad…

As a teacher, my discipline is lacking…

So long as the students respect each other and do their work I’m fine with some of their shenanigans.

But

I

Do

Not

Tolerate

Bullying

Unfortunately, I failed one of my students…figuratively, not literally…

She has an IEP…

She struggles in math…

Theory says that I should pair her with a more capable student…

Theory neglects to say that I should make sure that the ‘capable’ student will HELP her instead of insulting her intelligence to her face.

She has been a no-show at summer school for a full week…

Gee, I wonder why…

The only time this was brought to my attention was when my ‘capable’ student insulted her intelligence in front of the whole class…

She hasn’t been back since, and no, she’s not on vacation.

Now, I am a new teacher so if there’s a ‘sixth sense’ that one develops after years of practice I have yet to develop it.

I am also VERY hard on myself.

I feel as though I have neglected to protect and empower her…

I can only hope that things improve for her as she repeats 3rd grade next year…

I’m so sorry sweetheart…

Weird Kid...

Strange kid, why like me

I’m a weird, childless spinster

Nobody likes me.