Cupcakes = Classroom Management

A lot can happen in two weeks. And a lot can not happen in two weeks. A significant amount of lesson planning or updating my blog, for example. I don’t know where time went, but I do know I could use a little bit more. In fact, I could use a lot more. It’s officially the end of the six weeks, so my “To Grade” pile has grown significantly. Not to mention the stack of standardized writing tests I have to grade for my homeroom. Oh, and the kids have been begging for new seats for over a week, now that we have had a few weeks of “Row Races”, and they are finding out exactly who the slackers are that are holding back their rows from winning muffins and juice. And speaking of muffins, I baked cupcakes and hauled them to school three days in a row as a class reward, only to have kids complain about the flavor or ask me why I didn’t bring them juice, too. Not all of my kids, though. Many were grateful and complemented my cupcake baking abilities, and were seemingly unaware that anyone can do it with a little help from Duncan Hines. One girl was even so bold as to suggest that I bring cupcakes every Friday on her end-of-six-weeks survey.

There are so many great stories I wish I could tell, even just in two weeks. We had a rain delay last Thursday, after three days of non-stop rain. Theoretically, a two-hour delay is a precious gift. In reality, it turned the whole day into quite a disaster. I arrived at Enfield at 9:30 and reported to the gym for gym duty. Gym duty makes me not want to get out of bed in the morning. There are supposed to be three teachers in there patrolling the kids who don’t go to breakfast. However, the past week I had been the only one reporting on time, so it was me against half of Enfield Middle. But today, not only was I the only teacher, but I soon realized as the gym filled up more quickly than usual that they were sending the entire school to the gym before breakfast—it was me and four hundred 11, 12, 13, and 14 year olds, many of whom are signifcantly larger than me. Inwardly I started to panic. It’s stuffy, hot, cramped, and the kids are wet—there is bound to be a fight. And what in the world could I do to stop it, with 400 students who would most likely cheer it on? Luckily, our drop-out prevention officer came in to help, followed shortly after by the rest of the staff. We collected our kids and did our best to navigate the mess of the day. Needless to say, I was incredibly thankful that the next day was Friday.

That Monday, I tried to give my kids a bit of a break by doing a lesson on debit cards/personal checks to tie integers into every day life. We learned why debit cards are different from credit cards, the difference between withdrawals/debits and deposits/credits, and how to record transactions in a checkbook register. I even showed them my online bank account, with the numbers whited out of course. But I had another “reality check” (no pun intended) moment when I asked the class to name the four most common types of payment in the United States, and one of my kids (in each class) answered “EBT”. I didn’t even know what that was, but to my kids, it is one of the most common types of payment (EBT is like electronic food stamps). Eye-opening.

Everyday has its ups and downs. For example, my homeroom drove me up the wall today, and I gave three kids silent lunch. Two of them did pretty much nothing the whole class period. But in the same period, I saw two other boys who hardly ever participate excitedly raise their hands to point out the fractions, decimals, and percents in pictures of a gas station, an advertisement, Walmart.com, a cupcake box label, and my Target receipt (I strategically used the receipt from purchasing my electric pencil sharpener that someone broke this week so that they would see how much I spent on it). Then, at the end, round Antoine and lethargic Roger got into it, over who knows what. But it was enough to send Antoine running after Roger, and send me running out of the classroom to tell Roger to flee. Goodness knows there was no way I could stop Antoine once he got going, so I did all I could.

Two periods later, as I struggled with my hole puncher, I had one of my more talkative boys offer his assistance: “Do you need a man?” I laughed as I surrendered the 3-hole puncher, and laughed even harder watching him struggle and another student say, “You need a real man, he’s just a boy!” When the first student finally fixed it, I puffed up his ego a bit, letting him know how glad I was I had a man helping me. Hysterical.

I could go on with the stories. But what’s really important is, are these kids learning? Several of them say it’s their favorite class, but I think it has more to do with the cupcakes and my less-than-threatening demeanor (I’m working on that). And a lot of what we’ve done so far should be a review, but according to their diagnostics, they need some extra practice. Well, the results are in: almost every student in my 8^th period failed their Unit 2 Test, with a curve. And the highest grade in 2^nd period was an 85. I’ve yet to grade my 3^rd and 4^th period, both of which are on an honors level, and I’m less worried about them. But those are the kids that are more intrinsically motivated and would do well anyways. So am I effective? Am I a good teacher? Am I really reaching these kids?

Only time will tell. I find it hard to believe that 6 weeks in to my first year of teaching, I really am any good. But I plan to spend the weekend revamping my systems and finding ways to invest these kids so that by the end of the next 6 weeks, I’ll at least see growth.

P.S. I've finally done something for myself: I signed up for the gym!