"Going full hog"

I'm not sure I can fully support this metaphor.

Testing Violation: Choked to Death

So today during the short break between sessions I got a cough drop. The room was hot and dry, and I didn't want to keep distracting the students with my coughing (because at that point I felt like breathing too loudly would have been anathema). However I forgot to take into account my general stupidity and halfway through finishing my coughdrop forgot about it and swllowed it.

Now I am writing this so it means I lived, but during that half a second where I was unsure if my epiglottis was going to close in time to save my life the only thing that ran through my mind was, "if I die this is totally going to be a testing violation." I guess my mind figured there'd be plenty of time for the flashbacks and the lights and all that other "dying" nonsense after we addressed our immediate concerns.

Even as the coughdrop slid down my trachea, though, and I could feel the burning hot wintery freshness enveloping every sinus cavity from the back of my throat to my ears, I could not help but imagine the stir this would have cause at every school around the country during MSA orientation meetings.

Administrator: "And remember, no staff member is allowed to have any mints or cough drops or anything of the like during testing."

Teacher A: "Why?"

Administrator: "Actually this has been a problem in the past at some schools and it's easier just to bring a water bottle instead of worrying about cough drops. If the students see it or if-"

Teacher B: "I heard somebody died during a test from choking on a cough drop."

Teacher A: "No way."

Administrator: "I'm going to ask that we just follow the rules..."

Teacher B: "Okay, but I'm pretty sure that's what it is."

Teacher A (grumbling): "That's stupid."

Well teacher A, you are right. It was stupid, but to any administrators out there reading this thinking, "maybe we should ban cough drops from the testing room" know this: had I cut off my air supply and was struggling to take the last few breaths of air I would ever breathe, I would have immediately thrown the "Assistance Needed" sign under the door, asked for an administrator, waited for one to arrive, and then died in the hallway where I would not disturb any testing. Had I been provided a sword I would have gladly fallen upon it to save the need for emergency crews to rush into the school with their noise and flashing vehicles in the hopes of saving my life.

Semper Excelsior, Viventes Damnantes

I made connections!

Today we had the students in my reading class draw pictures of two vocabulary words. One is "prestigious" and one student asked if he could draw a picture of the "Prestige" award from "his video game." The teacher said "WHAT?!" but I asked what the reward was from.

"Modern Warfare: 2" he said.

"What's the Prestige award?" I asked.

"It's what you get for *insert middle school babbling about how awesome he was and how ____ still needed 8 points to get Prestige."

"So what does the reward do?"

"People gotta respect you!"

"How does that relate to the vocabulary word we have?"

"It doesn't, I just thought they sounded the same."

"What's the definition of prestigious"

*he pulls out vocab worksheet*

"Prestigious means... deserving of respect. HEY! Wait..."

"So the 'Prestige' reward just means you are..."

"Prestigious! People gotta respect me!"

"Right!"

"I gotta tell my friends on xbox live! *continue inane chatter*

That's when the teacher and I high-fived.

Achievement unlocked: "PEDAGOGTACULAR!"

MSA Preparation

This message was displayed on every TV Monday to prepare students for the MSA.

The first thing was get a good night's sleep blah blah blah, but then came the real treat: "Solve all family/friend problems before coming into school tomorrow."

Now the part of me that still has faith in humanity believes, 99%, that what they meant to say was "Don't come in tomorrow worried about and/or distracted by family/friend problems," since we did have a lot of nutty behavior/fights/etc. last week, but apparently that was too circumspect. Maybe it didn't have the finality that just solving the problems would have, the assurance that these problems wouldn't mysteriously resurface over the 2.5 hr testing block, or maybe even that our school is that committed to improving the lives of our students (through edict if need be). Whatever the reason, all I know is that no matter how we do on the MSAs, at least our student body is free of the interpersonal problems that once plagued their lives.

MSA Testing

"Stop. Wait. Close your eyes. Hold this moment in your mind and never let go. When you are a few years older and you're voting, check to see if the candidates support standardized testing. Then when you walk into the voting both, close your eyes again and remember this moment."

Bureaucracy and Physics

"Bureaucracy is like a pulley. If you have a box that's too heavy for you to lift, you hook it up to a pulley. This makes it possible for you to lift, but it doesn't give you 'free energy.' If you want to make it half as easy, you're going to pull twice as far. You sacrifice distance for force, so you get the same amount of energy to raise the box the same distance. This is generally a great idea, but there is a lot of cost involved. You need to buy the ropes, the pulley, find some way to attach the rope to the box, not to mention setting it up and making sure everything is working because if one part gives out the whole effort is wasted. It takes way more care and maintenance than just lifting a box yourself, so you wouldn't set up a pulley for every single system, but these costs are proportionally less if you have a ton of boxes to lift or have to lift a box you can't on your own. A pulley also provides a lot of middle class jobs so people will be happy. But I think I've left the analogy at that point."

I was very proud of this.