The return of the blog.

I'm going to skip my usual opening line of "it's been a long time," mostly because it's been too long to even legitimately make that comment. It's been like a month and a half. It's been a rough month and a half. I've laughed a little, cried a lot, but me and fiancee have endured and there's light at the end of the tunnel. He has been painfully patient with my weekly breakdowns, providing the support and encouragement and realistic practicality that I've needed to turn my focus back towards my Lord who is dying to help me through it all. My time with Him has transformed from pride and ignorance to humility and earnest desire for His guidance, and I am eternally thankful. It's finally become a bittersweet time, as I stare down the end of an era with a brief 12 days left.

My kids are making me laugh again, but it's mostly because I'm seeing their humor again when for so long I only saw their rebellion.

My kids are making me smile again, but it's mostly because I'm seeing their humor and good intentions again when for so long I only saw their disrespect.

SOLs are over and we're officially in movie watching time now. Yeah...I'm that teacher. But I have a legitimate and Language Arts related writing assignment planned to begin the moment the movies end, so have no fear. Funny things that have happened in the last week:

A boy from my 5th block came into class and wandered around my room for about four minutes whining about how he's in the mood for an apple. "I really want an apple...I"m really in the mood for an apple...do you have an apple for me, Miss Melchione? Please give me an apple, Miss Melchione." I didn't have an apple for him. He picked a piece of trash up off the floor though and walked it over to the trashcan, and then looked inside the can and screamed "THERE'S AN APPLE IN HERE! SOMEONE THREW OUT A PERFECTLY GOOD APPLE!" I nearly died of laughter.

Yesterday my [favorite] student got caught by his homeroom teacher wearing a hoodie and was told to put it in his locker. He came into my room freaking because he was wearing his track uniform underneath the hoodie with no shirt underneath. Hoodie = not school uniform. Track uniform with no shirt underneath = not school uniform. Quite the quandry he was in. So he went around asking all my kids if they had a sweater he could borrow, and none of them did. I said, as a complete joke, that he could wear my little gray cardigan...and he said okay. As he was putting it on, looking a little bit like a moron, my mentor (his homeroom teacher) walked in looking for him, and laughed. This is a man who doesn't laugh. We told the kid that he better wear the sweater all day long....which he probably would have done if the French teacher hadn't told him he needed a pass from the office to wear a women's sweater that's two sizes too small for him. I have to say that when I heard that, I nearly died. Kid went back to the hoodie and wore my sweater around his neck until lunch when I walked into the cafeteria, frozen in my sleeveless dress, walked over to where he was sitting with all his friends, and took my sweater back without saying a word. I feel like he might be getting crap for that whole exchange until he graduates from high school.

A male student who I don't have said last week in my presence that I'm too beautiful for anyone. And then yesterday he told me that my cheekbones are perfect. I told him I'm starting to get creeped out.

In other news, I was treated to my very first manicure/pedicure last week (have I mentioned that I have a fantastic fiancee?) and I am kind of in love with my French tips that are now sadly chipping. I've literally never liked French tips on anyone and never had a desire to have them. The sweet manicure lady pretty much told me I was getting them and didn't give me the choice, though, so I rolled with it. And now I want them to always be French tipped. And less chipped than they are right now. I need to come up with a way to legitimize regular trips to the nail place...

Engagements and Middle Schoolers.

Well...today was eventful.

I was given a beautiful engagement ring last night from the love of my life, and after all the conversations and pre-planning that has taken place about us getting engaged, I am so excited to be wearing his ring and officially able to tell the world that it's happening. I was so excited to be able to come into work today and have all my nosy little children see it and freak out and get excited for me...but no one noticed. Aside from the extremely rewarding scream and tears that came from my close friend and coworker when I crashed through her first class of the day to show her the bling, I got nothin' from anyone. If they noticed, they didn't say anything. It seemed a little anticlimactic...I'm not the kind of girl to announce it with no lead in, so I was lost. Do I just go through the rest of the school year without them knowing I'm getting married? After they've stalked the heck out of our relationship for months trying to get as much info as they can? Should have known that wouldn't be the case. This is how it went down:

4th block was ending and one student sleepily said "...is that an engagement ring?" and another girl said "I saw it but didn't say anything." Three nearby girls freaked and came to look at it, and then the bell rang. One of them went out into the hallway screaming "MISS MELCHIONE IS GETTING MARRIED!" and then every. single. kid. from my 5th block that was standing right outside my door ran in screaming "MISS MELCHIONE'S GETTING MARRIED?! MISS MELCHIONE, YOU'RE GETTING MARRIED!" and then Miss Famous 5th Block Girl ran up and down the hallways screaming that I'm engaged. My homeroom kids showed up in awe because they never saw it. One boy from homeroom came barreling in screaming "YOU'VE GOT A RING?!?!" and then the bell rang and Miss Famous 5th Block Girl wouldn't shut up until I told them the story. So I told them how he did it.

Class: Are we invited?
Me: Of course.
Miss Famous 5th Block Girl: I'm going to be up on the stage singing and rapping.
Me: Of course.
Male Student: Can I be the best man? And the guy that makes a speech and cries?
Me: Of course.

I was immediately asked what my name is going to be [it had never really hit me how much my last name is my identity as a teacher...] and when I told them it would be Mrs. Moore, half of my students said that they'd still call me Miss Melchione, half of my students asked if they could start calling me Mrs. Moore now, and one student said he's just going to call me Ms. M, and then paused and smiled and said "...get it? Get it? Because they both start with M."

One of my [favorite...shhh] students came in late, and Miss Famous 5th Block Girl says "Miss Melchione's engaged" and he stopped frozen and said "....really? REALLY?! Ah!" and then rushed me with a hug. It took everything within me to get them quiet enough to explain what we're doing today. Thankfully, what we're doing today is watching the movie Hoodwinked to review direct and indirect characterization. A couple of them are having a hard time grasping the concept of a fairy tale cartoon, though:

Miss Famous 5th Block Girl: She is a little girl...and she's singing to the animals! Singing to the animals, Miss Melchione! This is why little kids love fantasy trash now!

Miss Famous 5th Block Girl: A taxi in the middle of the woods?
Me: Move on.

On an unrelated note, one of my boys has told me that he would like to be called "Batman" from now on. Not sure where that came from...honestly don't want to know. Also, I took one of my boy's phones about a month ago, and his mom never came to the school to pick it up because his grades sucked. He kept coming to me and whining "my mom won't come get my phone until my grades don't suck!" and I would say "well sweetie...your grades still suck." He walked in today with a HUGE smile on his face and a swagger to his step, announcing the my engagement is not the biggest news of the day: his mom gave him his phone back. And then he interrupted me several times to tell me, with a huge smile on his face, that he got his phone back. Ten minutes into the movie I look over and he's staring at his lap. I called him out and said "you wanna lose it the day you get it back?" He's been dutifully watching the movie since then.

Cake Boss and such.

Last week was Spring Break, and this week has been sketchy at best. Not one teacher wanted to be there Monday for the Teacher Work Day, and not one student wanted to be back yesterday. Yesterday was rough. Lots of attitude all around. I literally had a student say "It feels like the year is over." Yeah. There's only NINE weeks of school left, but they've all checked out. Every single one of them. I thought I could expect this after the SOL, not this soon. Today was more fun, though. I worked them fairly hard today - with Dr. Seuss, sure, but I made them work - and then let them run wild for about 20 minutes. Turns out that was a good call...but it also created some funny conversations.

While my 4th block had free time, they all ended up talking about the Hunger Games. They've all read through the series at different places, and they were all discussing the end of Mockingjay even though they haven't all gotten there yet. One boy who's in the middle of Catching Fire kept freaking out when someone would spill something important. He had just gotten over freaking out about something really minor...there was a pause of silence in the room as everyone who had finished the series weighed the pros and cons...and then one brave soul said: "Prim dies." I thought that kid was going to have a heart attack and die right there on my floor.

Student 1: Algebra will never be used in the real world.
Student 2: Dude, all I need to know in life I learn from Cake Boss. I'm totally serious.

Student: My ears are great! [pretending to adjust his ears] I'm listening to the NFL right now!
Me: How's that off-season working out for you?
Whole class: OOOOOOOOHH!

[after reading Yertle the Turtle earlier in class]
Me: Stop trying to climb onto my filing cabinet!
Student: I'M TRYING TO BE YERTLE!

Stooping to their level.

I had the following conversation with a student today after I handed her back her rough draft with my comments:

Student: What's H?
Me: It's not an H.
Student: Then what is it?
Me: The paragraph symbol.
Student: Paragraph...paragraph...paragraph...whatchu tryin' to say?
Me: I'm tryin' to say that your whole paper is one long paragraph.
Entire class: Oooooooh...
Student: That's just because I didn't break it up into paragraphs.
Me: And I was just showin' you WHERE to break it up into paragraphs.

Another student came to me with the "Research Paper MLA Cheat Sheet" I had handed out. He put the sheet on the desk and pointed to the top, which showed them how to put in in-text citations step by step. This is literally what I put on their sheet:

First: put quotation marks around the words you're using that are from somewhere else.
Second: at the end of the sentence, put a parenthesis --> (
Third: put the last name of the textbook/article's author inside the parenthesis
Fourth: put the page number of the book/article you got that quote from
Fifth: put the other parenthesis --> )
Sixth: put a period.

It seems this student was offended that I had felt the need to break it down quite so simply. This was our conversation:

Student: Miss Melchione, we're not in second grade.
Me: I just wanted to make sure you got it.
Student: I think I know where to put my quotation marks. I can't believe you think we're that stupid.

And then I reached over and just circled the "put a period" on his paper. We had a good chuckle.

I initiated something today called "silent day." What the kids don't know yet is that it's going to evolve into "silent week." I walked into school this week - this wonderful week before spring break when the kids are going on field trips and attending assemblies at the end of the week and they're on Week 6 of a research paper they hate - and decided I can't do it. I can't handle them running around and screaming and tearing my stuff up for another week. So when silent reading time ended I passed out their folders and told them in whispers that they can choose to either keep reading or work on their papers, but they may not talk. And by golly, it worked. So I did it with my other classes too. Didn't work quite as well for 5th block, but it worked better than letting them run wild. Silence, my friends, is glorious. It's my new favorite thing. Hence: the birth of "silent week."

Last Minute Productivity

Just one tiny story. Today the research papers' rough drafts were due, and they've had a week to write them. Many of my students didn't even think about starting until the end of class yesterday. Two of my classes didn't even really make an attempt today either, but my 4th block busted their butts to reach the deadline. And all but two were successful. One girl, sitting in the front row, who honestly sleeps through about half of her time in my room, asked me repeatedly to come up and help her through a rough spot in her draft. About three minutes before deadline when I went around to grade the drafts, she suddenly yells at the top of her lungs "I'M DONE!" and I yelled back from my desk "YAY!"

I really do love it when they get their butts in gear.

Grace and love.

Once again, time has passed since my last blog update. I don’t think I really have much of a reason this time, except to just say that life has been busy. No busier than normal or than anyone else’s life, just the normal kind of busy where suddenly you think “Huh. It’s been two weeks since
I’ve blogged.” I actually have no idea how long it’s been, but you get the point.

I haven’t tried to hide in the last couple of weeks that things have been rough here in Room 43. Kids have been crazy, I’ve been frustrated, and questions of whether I’m going to stay or not have resurfaced. To make that long and needless story short, the answer came in the form of a still small voice that whispered to me last weekend that I’m fine, I’m where I’m supposed to be, and I’m staying. Just having that knowledge that I am in fact where God wants me – for now, anyway – has given me such a peace about the situation at school. The kids haven’t really calmed down much, they haven’t really started caring more, and the over-all atmosphere of the 7th grade hasn’t changed, but my attitude has. Have there still been bad days when I struggle with holding on to things too much or let myself get bothered by them? Yup. But I’ve also been laughing and teasing with them again, and I’ve seen some of them actually learning and working hard. It’s been easier to keep it all in perspective, which I’ve been so thankful for. And then we watched a video at church Sunday night that rocked me to the core.

http://www.worshiphousemedia.com/mini-movies/12872/Deidox--Lindsayhttp://www.worshiphousemedia.com/mini-movies/12872/Deidox--Lindsay

I do not work in the Bronx. I understand that. I do however work in a school that is 77% free and reduced lunch, 50% ESOL, and 100% NOT the suburban middle school all my textbooks told me about. I teach reading and writing, like this woman. I teach middle school, like this woman. My kids physically look like this woman’s kids (although mine look much older), and my kids wear the exact same uniform as this woman’s kids. And as I watched this video and heard her talk about her kids and talk to her kids, and see her obvious love for them, I felt something that I really can’t describe. The phrase that wouldn’t stop running through my head over and over again was “I haven’t loved them like that…” And honestly…I don’t know if I have. There’s a very real possibility that I’ve only loved them conditionally, when they’ve done what I’ve asked and they’ve worked hard and they’ve stayed in their seats and they haven’t tried to hurt each other or me or my stuff. But after all the tears were wiped away and the hugs and encouraging words from the incredible man in my life had been processed, it occurred to me that even if I haven’t loved them like that up until now, I can start. I can walk into school with a different expectation and a different mindset. I can love them for who they are and for who God sees them as, instead of what they do for me or how well they behave or how hard they work. Please believe me when I say that that is much easier to do with some of my kids than others. But that’s the point, right? Grace isn’t grace if it only applies to who we want it to apply. Love isn’t love if it’s only given to the people we think have earned it. I will be the first to tell you that I don’t want my grace to apply to all of my kids, and I don’t think that all of my kids have earned my love. But…that’s the point.

...Still finding that happy place.

Well...it's been a week and I'm still looking for a change in behavior/work ethic/attitude from the children. At this point it probably goes without saying that I haven't seen it. I'll spare you the drama and details of my last week, or specifically of the day I had today which gave me a headache because of all the anger I held inside all day long, and I'll just tell you one story from homeroom. One of my girls brought an entire, unopened quart of butter pecan ice cream into my classroom to eat for breakfast. The truly surprising part of the story, I think, is that she was genuinely confused about why I asked her to take it to the head of the cafeteria to store for the day.

I also found out today that one of the kids I absolutely love from my 5th block is moving. Tomorrow is his last day. And just because all of us teachers spent the morning talking about how great he is and how upset we are that he's leaving, he acted like a jerk all afternoon in class. Because he's leaving and he doesn't care anymore. Because it would have been way too much to ask for him to just stay a great kid for two more days, I guess.