Entering a Difficult Week

I'm on week 8 now! Last week went well, though was a transition from London weekend to class again. I was impressed, for the most part, with the students' debates and had fun with them. I made chocolate covered pretzels for the winning teams. Yum!

Thursday and Friday I was more than a little hesitant about beginning to teach poetry. It's hard for students to find meaning through a web of literary devices and disguised intentions. I was unsure of my ability to teach the students to uncover meaning and analyze the poem. However, it went much better than I thought. I felt I had a solid grasp of the content (Shakespeare Sonnets 29, 73, 116, and 130) and was glad to be able to make lots of personal connections between the poems and contemporary, young adult life. They are all love poems, so this made it easy.

The weekend was busy. I volunteered to do hair for the upcoming school play. We had the dress rehearsal this Saturday; it was a blast! The play is set during the 70s, so I was doing lots of puffs, flips, and sassy curls. I liked the drama atmosphere and was glad to see what drama is like behind the scenes. Hair, makeup, and costumes were all done in the same room,with sheets set up to separate the girl's changing area from the boy's. Most of the girls had to add extra padding to make themselves look older, bigger, and fatter since they were playing older parts. It was hilarious because all of a sudden we heard things like, "Oh, your butt's too low, move it higher" and "do they look even?" and "you're sagging." We all started cracking up; the guys handled it good-naturedly. Ah...the honesty of drama!

Sunday night I went to the guy's dorm, Maugenhart, for dinner to help one of the student on his paper. It was interesting to see guy dorm life (I had been to a girl's dorm the week before). It was fun to observe, but I was surprised to find that most of my seniors there had not even started the paper due the following day (today), but which had been assigned 3.5 weeks earlier.

My fears were confirmed when I arrived to school Monday morning and had a discussion with Jill. She had also been to the dorms that day to offer assistance on papers and was saddened, frustrated, and angered to find that no one had started their papers yet. This is very frustrating to me. This Hamlet paper is the second and last major paper they've been assigned for the semester. It's worth a SIGNIFICANT part of their grade. The first paper, similar in direction, was awful, most students getting D's and F's. One would think they'd learn (after the serious talk Jill had with them) and change their procrastination habits for this paper. But, they didn't. Though I haven't read the papers yet, Jill and I both agree that they can't be of any better quality. For the intensity of the paper I assigned and for the place the students are at, there is no way they can have written an A or B paper in one night. Because a pretty nasty flu is rapidly spreading through the dorms and b/c of drama and SAT's that weekend, I told the students this morning (the morning it was due) that they could have an extension to Wednesday. Most of the students had stayed up way late into the night to finish the paper. I can only hope they'll use this extra time to work on it more.

My frustration has carried over into the way they are performing in class. Friday I gave them a simple lit device identification and analysis quiz on Sonnet 116. The average grade was 7/13. Failing. The skill required was something they'd done multiple times with Jill and something they should have been doing since 9th grade. I'm left wondering, "Do I babysit them and re-teach things they should already know, sacrificing the content I could cover in order to work on more basic skills?" Is this how they can best grow and learn from their lack of diligence? I need to understand that they are only in h.s. and I can't treat them fully like adults. But still, some of the things they are doing and choices they are making are really immature. Please pray for my wisdom as I continue to teach and evaluate them. I already have some ideas for steps to take. I need to find the balance between helping them out, realizing they are still young adults and learning, and between letting them receive the consequences of their poor choices.

This week is also difficult for me because it's the most intense in terms of content I have yet to teach myself before teaching them. We're covering a lot of poetry; I need to be secure enough in my understanding of it be able to teach them clearly, especially with their recently-revealed struggles. I also will be receiving 55 papers to grade on Wednesday, which will increase my work load tremendously. This Friday and Saturday is the play with a six-hour party on Sunday; so, the weekend will not give me much time. Please pray that I use my time wisely, stay healthy (the spreading flu is a stomach flu, something I don't handle well), and remain positive. I gave the students a pretty sharp lecture today regarding their papers and procrastinating, so the mood has been pretty heavy. I don't like to be mean; but it's necessary sometimes, though painful to me. I never want to be a parent. :)