TEACHING - Getting a Raise

Wow, looks like we’re getting a raise!

Eventually…

Well, immediately we can afford a happy hour. For next school year we’ll be earning 101% of what we used to! Just make sure the happy hour is at a fast food place where extra ketchup is free.

And then in the middle of next school year, we’ll actually get a raise.

Sorry, sorry, that is not exactly accurate. We will receive a contractual pay increase that in some way reflects the number of years we’ve (without a raise) worked. Not a raise.

Maryland keeps getting ranked as #1 in public education, but there’s no need to pay teachers more for that. When I used to work at a restaurant, there we had an expression for when customers said how great the service was and then left a lousy tip. Actually, there were a lot of expressions, but the one you may not have heard before is verbal tipping.

verbal tipping - it's not just for waiters anymore

But hey, getting those rare, infinitesimal pay increases is better than in other school systems where all the teachers get fired, right? Right? I mean, what we’re doing now is better than just leaving, right? We shouldn’t just give up and stop working in a broken system where no one appreciates us, right? … right?...

-(clears throat amid deafening silence)-

Oh, wait – it's summer.

Okay, so I can't be too bitter with weeks of vacation at hand. But please understand that the teacher appreciation image above is intentionally missing parts.

Enjoy the summer, everyone!

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TEACHING - the Gardener

So now I am a gardener. I went from using my strapping biceps sawing logs to planting daffodils. Really.

 

last year

this year

trying to flex muscles but looking like I hurt my back

Some people even asked me: “Do you garden?”

Haha. No. “garden”? You should see our little patch of dirt and weeds in front of the house. Haha, no, I don’t garden.

But I helped put down a mean bed of daffodils. And there are some other well-known, beloved gardeners: Samwise from the Lord of the Rings, God from the Book of Genesis, and Betty Gailes from school. That's pretty good company.

TEACHING - the new alcohol

In college, people would ask me:

“Do you like vodka?” “Sure.”

“Wine?” “Oh, yeah.”

“Whiskey?” “Definitely!”

“Do you like-“ “Just give it to me, and I’ll drink it.”

Eventually I coined the phrase: “I love all of God’s alcohols.”

I’ve had a lot of changes over the past few years: kid, house… okay, not a lot of changes, but big ones. Maybe there haven’t been so many because I’m not a big “change” guy. I like consistency. I eat the same exact lunch every day, drives my wife crazy.

Yet going back a few years ago, there is something new, something I never would've expected: Coffee. It was never interesting to me until recently. For all my life I was horrified at the idea of people spending tons of money for a fancy Starbucks every morning. And one of my friends in high school was so caffeine-addicted that he got headaches if he went for 12 hours without a Mountain Dew. For those and whatever reasons, I didn't see the point.

Maybe it’s that our grocery store gives free samples. Maybe it’s having a child. And then there’s my school. There are always two pots ready to serve.

everyone who drinks from that should be contributing, too, whoever you moochers are!

There’s one last big reason. Coffee gives you that extra comfort you’re looking for, but you’re actually allowed to drink it at school. It’s normal. It’s everywhere. Half of the teachers have a drink in hand when kids enter in the morning. That wouldn’t float with beer.

Coffee.

Coffee is the new alcohol.

But DON’T worry – I’m still very traditional and am not looking for a replacement for non-school life. Some things never change. 

 choose, but choose wisely

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WRITING - this blog

Dear Everyone,

Look, it's been a while.

Fortunately not tooooooo long. And I shared the epic story of the the carrot in the nose, which I hope you enjoyed. So I wanted to say thank you for reading and let you know a little about what is going on.

First of all, to address the name of the blog. Originally the name of the blog was Between Wednesdays. I went to a writers group on Wednesdays, and so the blog name indicated my passion for writing, implying that everything else was simply whatever happened outside of this extraordinarily important event. Then I stopped going. That is, now I only go on special occasions, having decided to stick to a different group that I joined and have been an active member of since 2008. So the Wednesday group is essentially out, and now the blog is named The Days of the Week to carry more of a day-to-day, "teacher" feel.

Second item of business: I've had some writing projects going on. In fact, I recently finished a revised draft of my young adult novel! I'll still be working on it for a while but hope to have it in presentable condition by the end of the summer.

Third, no more hiatus. Why the lull? It's been a rough year. And then the novel has taken a lot of my writing time. And I always have a top secret project or two going on, link not provided. But from now on, I'll make a new post in the middle of every month. Promise.

I hope you enjoy. I like sharing with you.

Sincerely,
+Grant

PS: the YA novel thing is not a joke. I really wrote one.

FAMILY - video - the Carrot in the Nose

           

Narration of the Carrot in the Nose. It helps understand the poem's rhythm. You'll want the other post's pic to clearly see the words. Enjoy!


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FAMILY - The Carrot in the Nose

The poem says it all, I think. It seemed to hurt only when we tried to get it out - artistic license.

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TEACHING - ESL and ESOL

I’m a soft-spoken person.

I have even been called a low speaker, to the effect that people don’t hear me. In fact, several times a day, I will be behind someone who suddenly turns around, throws her hand to her chest, and says: “Oh my God! You scared me!” Sometimes I'm just walking into the room. It could be a teacher or a student. I’m really not trying to sneak up on anyone, so maybe I’m scary, too.

Perhaps that’s why I like to write. No one hears what I say, but they should be able to read what I write, right? Or so I thought. Here's what happened:

Our county automatically adds a line below our signature. So if you work in my school system, you have the following under every email:

After the first week of school we had an ESOL Team meeting, during which we learned that English to Speakers of Other Languages would now be called ELA, English Language Acquisition. And ELL’s (English Language Learners) were now called EL’s (English Learners). Never mind that all of our official, government-mandated documents still say ESOL and ELL.

I recalled my time in grad school when I had to learn all of these different acronyms. And then the past six years when I’ve told someone I’m an ESOL teacher and he/she’s replied: “Oh! You mean ESL?”

So I changed my signature to include this message.

by the way, these are all official ESOL acronyms

The thing is that I changed my signature at the beginning of September! Nobody noticed. I've been really sad about it, but I decided I wouldn't tell everyone – that’s part of what makes it funny! It’s just there, slyly underneath every communication I send out.

Finally, FINALLY, someone did notice. The prize goes to Sonja Norwood, our new ELA specialist! (though if you met her in July, she had the very different title of ESOL specialist)

Thank you for the recognition, Sonja!

For everyone else, sorry if that snuck up on you.