Yesterday

When is the last time you took a risk? How did it work out?

Across the threshold

into the light

of overhead fluorescence,

white ceiling tiles

and a vacuumed floor

there are 35 desks

and a white board.

An hour later

they enter:

apprehension, fear, anxiety,

happiness, joy,

apathy,

the hard walnut

of adolescence

spread across high school juniors.

We all regard

the text

and the packet

of goldenrod paper

and decide

the value

of the education

we will be gathering

and what we are going

to do about it.

I recommend

we plow

and glean

and harvest

the cornucopia

before us,

but I am one

in the pool

of constituents

within that clean,

bright room.

Subbing PE and the Hospital

Yesterday, I woke up coughing. I hadn’t coughed much or felt sick since Sunday. I thought I had my cold licked.

Nope.

I had an assignment to sub at Vista Heights Middle School. I’ve subbed there several times this year. It’s a nice school. It’s just twenty miles away. I coughed intermittently in-transit to school. I was worried because there was patchy black ice on the roads; and I didn’t want to cough and cause a pile-up or something.

Once there I had time to prepare: baseball. “But there’s eighteen inches of snow outside,” you say. The game is played in-doors with light plastic balls, bats and rubber bases. The ball can’t be thrown or hit hard and never goes straight. With middles school boys running every which way, we had a lot of fun; but I started noticing problems: I felt dizzy, all my muscles ached, it hurt when I urinated and I was having a hard time keeping score.

After the last class, I wrote a tiny note (I usually write long, thorough notes on behavior, participation and successes) and drove to where I thought the Veteran’s Outpatient Clinic in Orem, UT is. The Clinic had moved six blocks straight west. Delirious and confused, it took me forty-five minutes to find it. Once there, the clinic staff told me none were permitted to “see” me. I told them my situation and they agreed I shouldn’t drive the forty-five miles to the Salt Lake VA.

They gave me a number to get permission for 911 to come and pick me up.

Huh?

I called and stayed on the line for thirty minutes before a guy got on to help. I did not understand what he was saying, but under the impression he would call 911 for me after I hung up, I did. He didn’t.

I called again an hour later, feeling much worse. The long wait went faster this time. I was really out of it. The phone told me this time to have the desk clerk here call 911. Okay, but to place the call the desk clerk needed permission from the head nurse to make the call. So after two phone calls, I was finally able to “see” someone at the clinic to be sure the expense of a 911 call and ambulance trip could be authorized. I guess heavy lung congestion, high blood pressure and a temp of 103.9 was enough for the nurse who “saw” me saying I shouldn’t have been driving in the first place.

What was I thinking.

The ER docs were quick and efficient. My problem there was I could not remember any of my family’s phone numbers (no cell phone). I know my own of course and so through my roommate, I called a close friend, Kevin, who gave me a ride home from the hospital after they stabilized me.

I feel much better today. My son helped me get around filling prescriptions up at the Salt Lake VA where the cost is zero when the prescriptions at a regular pharmacy would be well over a hundred dollars for only a few days worth of goodies.

Anyway, I’m about to take my pills which will knock me out, but will hopefully help me recover.

High School: Special-Ed and Peer-Tutors.

Today I subbed special-ed again. I get loads of opportunities to do this, so I am used to doing it. All of the kids today were cognitively challenged and love going to school. One of the benefits these kids get is the chance to work with a peer-tutor. Peer-tutors are kids who are normal, main-line high-school kids. Most peer-tutors are obviously the best kids in the school. Not necessarily the kids with the best grades or the popular kids. Peer-tutors are, for the most part, the most together kids in a school. Kids with plans and goals for the future.

Today, I went to lunch with the special-ed kids to make sure they ate all their food and didn’t get lost. I’ve done this before. Usually I do this in middle-schools and I am busy the entire time. High school kids are bit more chill and this goes for the cognitively disabled as well. It was very pleasant to see that many of the peer-tutors spent time with the special-ed kids even when they didn’t have to.

I mean, peer-tutoring happens during class time and these peer-tutors often would go out of their way to pull some of the disabled kids over to their tables and involve them with their clique of friends who are not disabled. Like I said, these kids were not the cool kids, the jocks or the nerds. They were just the regular kids who are the heart and soul of every school talking about whatever and doing whatever, but involving special needs kids who after high school will either live with their parents 24/7 until they or their parents die or will live in institutional centers and work at small jobs like Assembly (a day program attached to the Provo School District I sub at quite often) building boxes or extracting foam from packaging molds.

While these peer-tutors are just the regular kids, they are obviously the best kids, will to risk social standing and popularity to befriend those who normally exist within a tiny, little bubble who after high-school will never exit the bubble again.

Math, Middle-School Boys and Cookies

I subbed math today at Dixon Middle School where my brothers, sisters and kids all went to middle school (I went to Tomlinson Junior High in Lawton, Oklahoma). I got to sub Math which is my second favorite subject to teach after English.

The first half of the day were the kids in main-line classes and the the second half was for resource and special-ed. The special-ed kids try super hard, but disabilities make learning hard. The resource-student, junior gang-bangers were trying to push buttons while I was trying to help those with disabilities, so I was getting frustrated. During forth period, twenty minutes before the lunch bell rung, I decided to mess with the rotten kids. I had already sent one to the office for threats, disruptions and profanity and I wanted to lower the stress level just a little.

I pulled out the pack of cookies I had set aside for lunch and started looking at them. These kids, especially the boys, were starving. I opened the package slowly. Smelled the cookies loudly. Picked one out and sniffed it as if it were a fine cigar. I acted like I was going to eat it, put it back, then quickly snatched it back and gobbled it down greedily. I then sighed loudly and drank from my bottle of Coke.

I then ate the entire pack except one. I held it up and addressing the one boy who looked like he was about to cry from lunch anticipation, I told him I was going to put it in my pocket and save it until I went home. This kid also happened to be the loudest and most abrasive, but he is a middle-school boy after all and his stomach is still more important than his homies, the girls or mathematics in particular.

Every once in a while before the bell rang I would pull it out and smell it again.

He was in agony.

Between classes during hall monitoring, I would pull the cookie out and show it to him whenever I saw him. He was funny about it, but his friends teased him a lot.

Finally at the end of the day as I was exiting the building, I passed him as he was waiting at the main entrance for his mom and ate the cookie right in front of him. I told him how it tasted, but he said he already knew what Triple Double Oreos tasted like with a grumble and a huff. He told me I was a punk, but I responded that every time I ate an Oreo from then on I would think of him.

Man, I love middle-school boys.

Subbing English: Creative Writing.

I had a fun day subbing, today. I can sub and have a cold at the same time. Man, I hate my cough. I have been having such a hard time with it. Fortunately, most of the kids I sub are sick as well.

English was fun. It always is. We focused on writing strategies for the first third of the class. Many kids have a hard time writing. Many just don’t know what to write. Or so they say.

Step one: I had them simply sit still and think about the subject. The subject was “pets.” Easy enough. After sitting there, they started asking questions: “What if I don’t have pets?” “What if I don’t have a pet now, but I had one before? “What if I want a dragon/unicorn/dinosaur?” These were all great questions, so I suggested to them that they could write about any of those questions.

Step two: I had them make a short list, then write. Three or four simple ideas that have to do with pets. The kids had tons of ‘what if’ questions then. My answer was always “what if? Write about that or what ever you want.” They thought about this for a couple of seconds and then just started writing. Every kid in the class wrote for the full fifteen minutes. Most had more than one page of text. Some had up to three.

Step three: I had them talk about it. We then spent five minutes talking about what they wrote in small groups. The class exploded. Everyone was excited. Some pet stories were quite normal stories, but a few were about fanged toe-nails, barking tacos, seven legged snakes and other fantasy creatures. The fanged toe-nail pooped pepperonis. It was so much fun. Everyone broke into giggles through out the discussion.

Emotion is such an important part of learning and I am glad they reacted in such a positive way.

ps. I apologize to everyone wanting a comic. While I can teach with a headache and a cough, I can not draw that way. I hope to have something up tomorrow.

a.

Map: Sandy Hook Elementary

The Outsiders – Explaining Ponyboy

Assembly: Change Change Change

A long time ago I learned the truthyism: nothing is constant except change itself. This is not a bad way to understand the world, but for some reason some people just don’t get it.

We have a situation in Assembly that requires some people to be moved from one seat to another. Particularly one person, Person 1, but the last person we moved, Person 4, was very unhappy about it. Person 4 was convinced I thought she had done something wrong. She didn’t of course. She didn’t believe me. She actually broke down into tears. Sobbing, fifty-year old women from Boston are pitiful, but because the change was important and necessary, I didn’t budge (I can’t tell you why Person 1 had to move unfortunately).

This set the mood for the day.

A client/trainee, Person 2, who was a tiny part of the primary reason for the change is someone who taxes the patience of the faculty and other clients/trainees. Person 2’s disability makes her cranky. Constantly. She is a very nice person, but if something sets her off she complains non-stop (Hey is for horses! I can’t drink caffeine. Current events is only supposed to be on rainy days! I hate Bingo! Tell the other faculty they can’t boss me. So-and-so is bossing me! etc.). We moved her to her new location, because she has been doing very well and we had been looking for a way to integrate her better into the group.

Today, the first day of the move and person 2 is happy with the change, but one of her new neighbors was not too thrilled and started picking at Person 2. Person 2 complained. Eventually, Person 2 had to be taken outside until her “behavior” subsided. I have been working with Person 2 for as long as I have been substitute teaching with Assembly (since early February) and so I know how to weather her worst storms and to also help her understand we hear what she says, listen carefully and value her. It did not take long for me to get Person 2 to agree to ignore her neighbor at her new table. Now Person 2 and her neighbor have a long history of strife. Both are hard working, competitive women with very different disabilities. To say the least, the needling continued. The neighbor dislikes Person 2 (“She’s annoying”). We had two more blow-ups, both went outside for “talks” and both lost their end-of-day rewards for good behavior, but Person 2 is still happy with the change. Eventually, the neighbor will come around to Person 2 and everything will be fine. The stress of change eventually goes away.

It is too early to see if Person 1 likes the change. He’s sneaky. Person 3 was just fine with the change. Person 3’s OCDs are extreme and I was expecting problems, but I got none.

At the end of the day, the last thing I heard from Person 4 is: “I didn’t do nuttin. I was good. Why did you make me change places.”

Oh my!

Assembly: Grey Foam

I substitute taught the highest production team in Assembly today since their boss had her last day yesterday. Assembly is a day-program/transition department for cognitively-disabled adults for the Provo School District. The people I work with are called clients or trainees. This group is higher functioning than many and most of them love to work, but their disabilities interfere with their chances to find work except for here. They work on it though.

Today, we had work. For the last two weeks, there wasn’t any work and so everyone was excited. Grey foam is packaging material for an air-bag manufacturer here in town. Today’s foam was two inches thick with quarter-inch holes punched through. Each foam piece is four by three inches and has fifty holes cut through. Assembly has to pull each little bit of foam out of the holes. The job is quite simple and because it is simple, “foam” is the perfect work for Assembly.

There are two teams of higher functioning workers. The team I was working with is very efficient, but also very emotional. Think of mixed middle school drama and put that into the minds and bodies of adults who are in their twenties, thirties, forties and fifties.

Here are some of the things I did:

• Reminded someone to stop tattling to me about what happened at home that I heard from her three other times today and repeated several times yesterday.
• Remind someone to not grumble under her breath.
• Ask the grumbler and the repeater not to argue.
• Tell the grumbler to ignore someone on another team who is bugging her.
• Remind someone to stay awake.
• Tell someone to not wash his hands every five minutes because the foam is itchy.
• Negotiate a deal as to when someone can get a snack from her lunch bag.
• Ask hand washer to pull up his pants, he’s flashing everyone (severe plumber’s crack syndrome).

There is of course more, but this is part of it. Not everyone has problems like this. There are other extreme problems, but none of those exhibit when the team is working because they love working. Everything I listed happened while we were working.

Each of the six teams in Assembly have different problems. The group I was with does not have any one who drools. There are no wheel chair bound people. There are no people who say “no” to any request and run and hide in the bathroom. On the other days of this week I worked with those groups and I loved it as much as I loved working with this group.

When there is no work, we do activities, chores and classes. The trainees would rather work. They get paid to work, not to do the other stuff, so when we are working there is a lot of fun and between some of them light competition to see who can do the most.

Departures

I love substitute teaching. I love the variety and daily change of pace. Even when I’ve done long term assignments each day is different. One of the other nice aspects is being able to look at the politics of a work environment and celebrate not being a part of it. I like getting to know students and trainees and seeing their bad sides (and subs always see the worst part of students) knowing they are essentially good people–for the most part, I hate seeing the mean in some kids and I’ve hated seeing bullying. I also love getting to know the faculty at the different schools I work at.

Today was the last day for one of the Faculty in Assembly. She left half-way through the day and got the chance to say good-bye to all the trainees she worked with. Some of them were brought to tears and some are not sure what happened. She left for the reasons most people leave: greener-pastures, better pay and benefits and a change of pace. She wanted to continue in Assembly and work at the new job as well, but conflicting training schedules ruled that out. Things like this happen.

The difference in this experience and when a teacher leaves mid-term at a main-line school is the student rumor-mill. Like Assembly, faculty do not tell students why someone leave. It rightfully isn’t their business. At school, the student rumor-mill goes into over drive. The students try to figure out why something they don’t understand happened. Particularly with popular people like the faculty-member who left today. Sometimes dark-hints from less than ethical faculty will cause student-body ire to fall on administration or other faculty. In Assembly, the trainees cry and admit how much they will miss someone, but only occasionally is there a bru-ha-ha.

When I first started subbing at Assembly, I was replacing a faculty member who left under dubious conditions. The rest of the faculty was glad to see her go, but not many trainees. When I took over, I was answering questions about the now gone faculty-member and when was she coming back for two weeks. A couple even told me it was my fault (usually after I told them to do something). Still, acceptance settles in faster in Assembly than at a main-line school.

To me, the reason is simple: constant turnover. At the institutional care most of the Assembly trainees live in, there is a lot of turn-over. The work is hard. I couldn’t do it. I can’t deal with adults who need bathrooming help and I gag at the smell of poop. There is not a lot of long term continuity and so the trainees get used to people going in and out of their lives. The trainees know I am a sub and that I work with every population group. They are used to the idea that I will be working with them one day, at a middle-school another day and then magically, I am back with them or with a different group in the facility like Laundry or Brick.

While I am very glad the particular faculty-member left today (she did give notice and was quite professional) and agree with why she went, I find the consistency of the trainees lives lacking. Even here, some of the faculty have been in Assembly for years. One for thirty-two years, but it just isn’t the same. Living on a bed of sand is not good for anyone.