Never Promised You A Rose Garden...

Well, it's been a while.  Mostly because I'm lazy, but partially due to the fact that I'm on my Christmas ["Holiday" to be politically correct] Vacation and school is just about the last thing that I want to think about.  But I'm sitting here in the airport so I figured I'd kill some time and throw a little update out there.

Obviously I survived week three, but it was no picnic. Here's some of the highlights:

• Two of my students were suspended for fighting.
• Five more are on the "list," ready to be suspended for general bad behavior.
• My administration is finally stepping up to take care of my biggest problems (see above). Meaning, they'll have to come in for a meeting with me, the principal, and their parents.  If that doesn't work; they're outta here.
• I was told by my "mentor" (who's supposed to be there to support me) that every single thing I'm doing is wrong and ineffective.  Well, she said it a little nicer than that, but that was the general idea.
• I was the "grinch" teacher who didn't give my class a party on Friday afternoon.  They took a Science test instead.  Did I feel bad? Nope. They spend enough time partying on their own.  When they earn a party, I will gladly give them one.

I'm hoping that at least a little bit of the craziness was attributed to the time in between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  When I arrived they were just coming off a short break and only had a few weeks before their long break.  Coming back in January, they'll really have nothing to look forward to or get excited over, so hopefully they'll settle down a little bit.  I'm hoping to go in more prepared as well.  Now that I know them and they know me, maybe we'll actually be able to get some work done.

It'll get better.

It has to.