Grading Concern

Wednesday. Fourth period. 

Tyson strode in the room, upset. "You told me not to worry. You told me I wouldn't get an F." 

Tyson is new to the class. He only started it a couple weeks ago. He transferred from another school. (I presume he just moved.) 

When he arrived, we were in the middle of a unit. Since this is a special ed math class, our unit consists of graphing one kind of problem. As we were going to be doing more days on this, I figured that Tyson would catch on and catch up. I wasn't going to make him responsible for the worksheets he missed before he joined the class, but he could start where we were at. 

The worksheets that Tyson had done had many errors. Ms. S (the instructional aide who's been doing all the grading) informed me that the kiddos were missing many problems on their assignments. So, on this day, as luck would have it, the plan was to give the students a day to redo the problems they missed to improve their scores. 

I attempted to calm Tyson down. He was in a panic about having an F in the class. I explained that once he made the corrections on his assignments, his grade would rise. Tyson was stuck on the F and how that would effect his ability to play football. 

He had lots of questions. Ms. S sat with him a while to help him. By the end of the period, he seemed way more confident. 

And, as he finished his corrections, Ms. S graded and input his new scores. His grade went from an F to a C-. And it's only going to go up from there. 

It's hard to come in mid semester. But I knew that Tyson's grade wasn't going to be an issue. 

And, we kind of want him on the football team. That kiddo is huge. 

Football Season

It's Sunday. I write all my blog posts over the weekend, and I have for many years. It's simpler that way. 

Before getting to the blog writing, I did a quick perusal of my emails. When I got to my "student" account, I found another email from Khalil. 

Khalil is an eleventh grader in my fourth period class. He's on the football team. And his grade is not where it should be to make him eligible to play football. 

Yes, I know it's spring. But CIF shut down school sports in the fall. As COVID cases have fallen, they've allowed a modified spring schedule, including the sports we lost in the fall. The first high school football games were played last weekend. 

He's been saying that he needs to get his grade up. I told him he needs to complete his missing work (of which there is a lot). Yesterday (Saturday), I graded the two things he submitted, so his grade did rise... to about 33%. 

But today, he said that I had not graded his essay assignments. 

I took over this English class the last week of February. Before that, Mr. P had been the sub. The essay assignments had been assigned under him. In January. 

This is a case of "a lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part". But while Khalil has been persistent, he hasn't been rude about it. So, I'll grade the assignments (for partial credit due to them being so late). 

I doubt they'll be much help. His grade is so low at this point. But at least he's trying. 

A Mystery

It was day 2 of my 4-day assignment in opportunity. Before I left the previous day, I made sure to shut down the computer and turn out all the lights. (This is normal procedure for me.) So, I was shocked to arrive to a room with lights on and the computer not only on but logged in under the teacher's password.

(Every teacher and student on campus has a personal log on for the computer network. We subs even have one, albeit one that we all share.)

Had the teacher returned?

But I knew he was out of town. 135 miles away. Family emergency. The kind of family emergency where I would not expect him to drive back to town just to check his classroom.

Did I forget to shut things down?

Was the teacher back? Had things changed and no one told me? (Wouldn't be the first time I got to a room only to find the teacher present and be sent back to the office.)

No one arrived. The bell rang. I let the boys in. I started class...

An hour later the instructional aide arrived. (His usual time.) I pulled him aside and asked him about it. Had the teacher come by?

The teacher I was subbing for was also the football coach. He has assistant coaches. Who use his room and his computer. (Assistant coaches I was most grateful for. Otherwise, I would have also been covering football. Did that once...)

Of course. I should have realized.

So, I was not shocked to discover the room in the same state when I arrived the rest of the week. (Which was a good thing. Computers take a long time to boot up.)

The Weight Room

There were about 30 teenage boys all dressed in baggy PE shorts and T-shirts.  And "Umbrella" was on full-blast in the background.

One group was doing bench presses.  At four or five stations, boys were lifting weights while their friends were spotting them.  They'd do several repeats, and then the boys would switch positions.

A second group held the barbell behind their heads, squatting and then lifting.  They did this in a metal framework.

Then there were other various boys lifting dumbbells and walking around the room.  I saw them dropping weights on the rubberized floor.  Then they'd pick up others and place them on the barbells. But nothing stayed on the floor for long, as they were picking up after themselves.  All were busy, and they appeared to be working hard.

Today I was covering for the football coach.  It's the off-season, so the boys are doing off-season training.  I got to "supervise" the weight training (I use the quotes because the various team captains were doing the actual managing of the workout).

It was pretty easy for me.  From past experience, I know that the football coach doesn't take too kindly to his players antagonizing the sub (the words he used were "bear crawls" and "month").  So, I stood and watched.  And listened to music with a driving beat.