Thursday, November 10
Code Red in HomeEcc
That's right, subbed for a 7th/8th grade HomeEcc class today. No cooking, or mixing, or budget planning though. Today they learned newspaper reading, as the lesson plan called for a newspaper scavenger hunt. Some red flags:
Flag 1: Every nook and cranny is teaming with old newspapers in this class.
Flag 2: One group tries to turn in a completed hunt after only a few minutes of work. Date erased and re-written in top left corner.
Flag 3: Class groans not again when I introduce scavenger hunt.
(Speaking of red, today was also a "Code Red" drill. That's like an earthquake drill, except for school shootings. As soon as the announcement blared over the loud speaker, the kids cheered wildly and gleefully began constructing a barricade in front of the door. Maybe for Growed-Ups things like "Code Reds" are a bleak reminder of our morbid times, but for the kids its an excuse to turn a table over.)
So, today was a classis example of the proverbial scavenger hunt that broke the class' attention span. So loud. So crazy. So many newspapers ripped up and thrown around.
The peak of Mt. Insanity was reached (and this is 100% fact) when a student--making eye contact with me the entire time--tore off a strip of newspaper, put it into his mouth and started chewing a spitwad. I shook my head in confused shock. The freak smiled, and thank God, he plucked it out of his mouth and threw it away. This is the future. Newspaper-chewers.
Flag 1: Every nook and cranny is teaming with old newspapers in this class.
Flag 2: One group tries to turn in a completed hunt after only a few minutes of work. Date erased and re-written in top left corner.
Flag 3: Class groans not again when I introduce scavenger hunt.
(Speaking of red, today was also a "Code Red" drill. That's like an earthquake drill, except for school shootings. As soon as the announcement blared over the loud speaker, the kids cheered wildly and gleefully began constructing a barricade in front of the door. Maybe for Growed-Ups things like "Code Reds" are a bleak reminder of our morbid times, but for the kids its an excuse to turn a table over.)
So, today was a classis example of the proverbial scavenger hunt that broke the class' attention span. So loud. So crazy. So many newspapers ripped up and thrown around.
The peak of Mt. Insanity was reached (and this is 100% fact) when a student--making eye contact with me the entire time--tore off a strip of newspaper, put it into his mouth and started chewing a spitwad. I shook my head in confused shock. The freak smiled, and thank God, he plucked it out of his mouth and threw it away. This is the future. Newspaper-chewers.
