Freaky Friday

 Well, Friday was an unusual day at school. I had decided to do a 'fun' Halloween themed lesson for my Year 9s period 5. I had a small amount of reading and discussion planned, then some Halloween puzzles and I planned to end with a collaborative* Spooky story writing activity. I didn't get far into the discussion before things went wrong.

The short reading mentioned the Celtic origins of Halloween, the festival of Samhain and then how it was incorporated into other festivals by first the Romans and then later by Pope Boniface IV. Too much time was spent on giggling about the name "Boniface", I'm sad to say.

The major hurdle, however, turned up at the discussion of Saints and Martyrs (there was a reference in the text to All Saints' Day). I valiantly tried to explain that a martyr was someone who was killed for the beliefs or who died for a cause.

"Like a witch?" one student asked.

"Not usually," I replied starting to feel that fear that one feels when students are about to use your definitions against you.

"But they were killed for their beliefs. They were burnt at the stake."

I reluctantly agreed that a witch could be considered a martyr but not a Saint.

"What about Joan of Arc?" piped up another student who had done her extension research on her. "She was a Saint and burnt as a witch."

The discussion became somewhat messy then with half the class being distracted by discussing the TV show 'Joan of Arcadia' and me trying to point out that the people who burnt Joan were different from the people who thought she was a Saint and that no one actually thought she was BOTH a witch and a saint.

Eventually the discussion mutated into one about the origins of Trick-or-Treating. Several students complained bitterly about not ever being allowed to go trick-or-treating because their parents "didn't believe in Halloween."

"Don't believe in Halloween or don't believe in trick-or-treating," I asked.

"Halloween," bemoaned the student. "They're stupid. They won't even let me get dressed up or have a party."

I felt a little worried. Were they staunch fundamentalist Christians who would be offended by my Halloween themed lessons? What about the fact I had lent this student Harry Potter book to read? I felt an angry phone call coming on Monday.

Fortunately some other students started questioning her. It seems her parents are fine with fantasy and horror fiction, they just don't think that you should celebrate halloween because it is a holiday about evil**.

It made me think about the nature of holidays. Personally I find that they are so commericalised that their origins or the spirit of the origin isn't really the relevant. I do not think that eating or giving out candy for Halloween means that you are celebrating demonic spiritis any more than eating an Easter egg makes a person believe in the resurrection of Christ. Really most holidays now are just about the purchasing and eating of chocolate.

* Essentially the plans was like the game "and the consequences were..." where each person writes a sentence and then folds the paper back and passes it on to the next person to write the next sentence but with each sentence starter being given so that the kids just insert the characters, dialogue and location etc.

** Evil is a little unfair I feel. The Celts just liked a fun festival where they could light fires, sacrise a few animals and get drunk. Much like the average Kiwi BBQ. They might have believed that the dead spirits walked the Earth for that night but it was not sinister. Buddism and Shintoism have similiar festivals and people don't think they are evil, do they?

Long Weekend of Goodness

 I feel an increasing sense of joy and excitement as the Long weekend approaches.

Long weekends are good, chiefly for two reasons:

1. They are 'Long'. 3 days. Woot.

2. They are 'weekends'. As in days where I don't have to go to work.

A long weekend is good. A sunny long weekend better. I am hoping for predominantly good weather. I'll cope with rain if I have to, as indoors not-working is pretty good too.

If I can just get my junior exams marked by the end of today the weekend should be mostly fine of wretched marking. Heh heh.

Marquee of Doom

 I will have to admit to being somewhat melodramatic in my title. The marquee was not so much an object of doom but it did prove to add some unnecessary pain, suffering and chaos in my day.

What is a marquee doing at school?

Well, school is having a reunion of seemingly monstrous proportions this long weekend. There is an open day at the school on Friday where former students may wander around and snoop in classrooms, to make matters more interesting this is coinciding with junior exams. I sense a stay-at-home-with-imaginary-flu Friday coming on.

Today was chaotic enough.

This afternoon a massive marquee was erected between C and D block. This meant that staff could not park in their usual carparks and worse still those of us (like me) who teach in a classroom that looks out of the area had diabolical afternoon lessons. It was pretty noisy but I figured the kids would get bored with staring out the window after a while. After all how interesting or exciting can it be to watch people hit pegs with hammers for an hour? What I didn't realise was that it only had to be more interesting than my English lesson and apparently, for the majority of students, it was captivating.

I have no idea as to why they have put it up so early. I could see the gleam in the students' eyes when they saw the purest white fabric of the marquee. They are simply gagging to get out there and jump on it/graffiti it/set fire to it.

My worst fears were confirmed when student X came into class and saw the marquee through the window. He frantically started rummaging through his bag. He then asked if he could leave class because he had lost his lighter. I said no and that he wasn't supposed have a lighter anyway. He replied that it was OK because he wasn't going to use it for smoking. Hmm.

I cannot imagine that the marquee shall survive the night without becoming besmirched or violated in some way, it certainly won't make it to the weekend without some significant damage.

However, surely people would realise what a target for vandalism it is? I wonder if there is some sort of alarm or security on it.

Ahoy there! Weekend Ho!

 It is finally, to my utmost relief, the weekend.

The week itself seemed quite long and Friday was a hellish day of exhausting nastiness from students. It seems the monkeys, er students, have learnt how to remove panes of glass from the windows. I don't know why they do this because the panes are too big to run off with or hide inside their bags. Actually what they would do with a pane of glass is a little beyond me. Perhaps they have entrepreneurial desires to sell large panes of glass behind the B block toilets at lunch. Still until they come up with a sneaky means of transporting the panes of glass they have to content themselves with hiding it inside or outside of the classroom. Seems a bit pointless really.
One student was 'snapped by the cops' yesterday. Not in my classroom but in the one next to mine. A friendly neighbourhood police officer brought in a sniffer dog and found some drugs. Such naughtiness. It seems it was not enough for dealing so the student shall probably not get into too much trouble despite being moronic enough to bring drugs to school*. It created quite a stir of gossip amongst the students. Apparently the police officer stayed behind to answer any students questions, the most popular one being, "what kind of drugs can't the dogs smell?". Oh dear.

During the afternoon I did hear some interesting misinformation being spread between students such as "dogs can't smell marijuana if you hide it in pate sandwiches".

Interesting. I would have thought that the idea of pate-flavoured dope would unappealing but perhaps it could take off and become the new space-brownie.

* Apparently the dog took quite a bit of time as many students bags smelt "interesting". Probably more than just vegemite sandwiches in their bags, methinks.

Tears and Rage at Dance Rehearsal

 Well, dance rehearsal last period did not go so well. My organisational skills could not defeat the allure of jumping on table tennis tables and randomly pulling the stage curtains open and shut.

After about 10 minutes of half the class doing their best 'lunatic monkey' impersonations, I was yelling at them and dragging them back to class to write notes. I have a small amount of tolerance for loud obnoxious behaviour especially when it may lead to the breaking of school equipment and my getting in trouble.

The students quickly settled down and were quiet when I offered that they could return to practice after they had copied down my one page guide on formal writing. They complied and were able to return.

However, annoying student X was really insulting to some of the other students when we started again. I told him to either participate and be supportive or sit down on a chair and shut up. He kept on being rude and obnoxious and had to be referred out of class. Rather than leave quietly and go where he was supposed to, annoying student X decided some histrionics were required. He threw a chair down on the ground enraged and screamed at me as he ran out the door, "I HATE YOU! YOU'RE NOT MY MUM!"

Either it is the most cutting insult he could think of or he was trying to demonstrate that whilst he struggles with English, he has grasped some of the basics of biology.

Year 9 Dance Contest

 I am once again surprised at the vigour and ferocity that a competition can create amongst students and not a few of the staff. The fight for the Year 9 trophy* is becoming more heated as we approach the end of the year. This Friday it is the Dance contest. Each form class must present a 5 minute dance performance. Points are awarded on creativity, interpretation and technical performance. There are double points awarded for a full class participation - this at least means that it isn't just the girls and the one boy who learns tap/ballroom dancing** in each class performing. I have been drafted into performing in my class's routine to Car Wash.

There is something of an arms race going on with the Year 9 teachers as to who is going to give the most practice time and have the best class performance. Rumours are flying around of classes who have to rehearse during each PE lesson, English lesson and form time until Friday. I have been sucked into this trend and I'm spending today and tomorrow's English classes in the hall doing the dance routine.

Another problem is the fight for 'creative control'. Several of the girls are keen to choreograph the routine, they just struggle to agree on anything. One with blarg hip-hop step, another wants some jazz type step, and they get very argumentative. It has been challenging keeping them all on speaking terms with one another.

I'm wishing I had seized entire creative control now. I was plotting to get them to do a "Murder on the dance floor" routine because I like dance routines with a story/narrative structure and the 'altogether now' part is such a cool dance! However, I was initially led to believe that the dance had to be student-directed so I let them arrange their own dance. Since then I have discovered that a certain class has had their teacher arrange their entire routine. Rumour has it that this teacher is an obsessive Grease fan and has got his class doing 'Grease lightning'. My spy in the senior school says that their routine is pretty awesome. Curses!

Currently my class has dropped down to fourth place (we were first place in trophy listings end of term 2) since our disappointing performance in the Volleyball tournament. We need to win the Dance!

I shall have to get these kiddies to get their groove on this afternoon.

* The whole school culture of a trophy for the best Year 9 form class and House contests etc still eludes me a little. When I was a high school student, the only form of school spirit came in a bottle and you probably would have been murdered if you were seen dancing in front of your peers.

** I don't know why but it seems that most of the girls have taken some sort of dance lessons at some stage and many have aspirations to run Stage Challenge when they are seniors. For some reason most of the classes seem to have one boy who learns either tap or ballroom dancing. The others males claim 'they can't dance'. Is this just a local thing or is it representative of all young teenage boys in NZ. 1 in 15 is classically trained and very good at dancing and the other 14 refuse completely?

Gauwarf and Waahogroam - exciting new onomatopoeia

 Long time, no post. This is what happens when I have to work at work. Blogging gets neglected. Plus I had a large amount of marking to do this weekend. Tis the season of reassessments and exam preparation essays to mark. 'Nuff excuses. Beginning to sound like a student.

My juniors are reviewing language techniques such as metaphor, simile and my personal favourite, onomatopoeia (as much fun to spell as they are to make). Hopefully the excessive amount of time we are spending on revision will hopefully mean they won't fail their exams next week or at least won't fail any more than the other classes. Today when I gave out their homework/revision a collective wail rose up from the students*. However, my ears must have been highly tuned today because out of this din were two discernible sounds. Gauwarf and Waahogroam. Listen out for them whenever you hear teenagers mumbling their ways through a groan. Quite distinctive.

I informed the students of the spelling (as best as could approximate) of the weird noises they had made and added the additional homework task of writing down any other whiny sounds they make today. They seemed reasonably enthusiastic but asked for a limit of five. Apparently some of them are such prolific groaners and whinge-makers that it would result in a hefty-sized document if they were to record all their complaints.

* This is usual and to be expected. If you give out homework and there isn't any whinging then chances are that students are either: a) not listening or b) dead.