Work Surprises

The second week of work started with a half day (afternoon) for an intermediate instrumental music teacher (gr 7-8). I got to the school and the teacher was still there. There were a lot of great resources in the music, but today was not a music day.  He let me know they'd be doing "art", language and a social justice type group project. No music. Had I had recess duty. I did get a 30 minute prep though.

These kids were not into it. Some kids were so unengaged. They were to colour a picture with a sort of Celtic theme that was aligning with their language projects (you know those high detail/stress relieving colour sheets?).  It had some interesting aspects but most kids, despite being told to look carefully, plan ahead, and do their best, just coloured willy-nilly.

Recess involved a physical altercation with kids going to the office and another kid refusing to come back inside at the end.

The group projects included another class. There was a lot of noise, some kids worked and some kids didn't. There was a lot of conflict and competition and criticism between groups. When it was time to clean up there was a boy from the other class being rather noisy and defiant. He used the F-word towards me (not too my face, but in response to what I asked him to do). I mentioned this to the other teacher and she sort of brushed it off "He thinks he can talk that way...". I learned later that I could have filled out a report. Is it worth it for a couple of sentences? On the one hand, no. Not much changes, it stays in their file for only a year, there's unlikely to be an actual consequence. On the other hand, YES. There definitely is no consequence for actions that don't get reported and the kids tend to escalate their behaviour. And the union and board will get a better picture of what we deal with.

Later on, I got another call for this teacher. It didn't really work with my schedule, so I was happy to refuse it. I could have ended up with totally different classes and subjects, but you never know. I just brushed this day off as on the low end of normal, and looked forward to the next day. Which was much worse.