Colours of Fall

After a long day spent in front of a monitor, trying to unravel the mysteries of our budgeting program I needed to get out – and fast!

I’m not about to try and explain the way in which said software works – simply because I can’t. Most of it defies logic – some entries demand that the post be saved twice in a row, otherwise it disappears somewhere into a great abyss. That’s for starters -I still haven’t figured out how I can get a printed version of the entries made thus far….

Did someone mention training??? You mean getting to take a course so I’ll actually know what I’m doing???

No money for that.

Guess why I was sitting there today, making 5% cuts to an already slimmed down budget for next year? We’re at the point where our principals are suggesting their positions be cut in half – because we can’t increase the size of our classes or lay off more teachers.

Good thing I have this place to blow off steam at – no one from around here knows about this blog, so I can be pretty open when there is a need for that

Slow News Day

Normally Loki does his business in the morning around the first bend of the path, but today…

…after 20 minutes I was looking out over the lake. I finally had to return home, mission not accomplished. That is, not until we were outside the apartment block… The rotter!

After that I spent the entire morning, waiting for the technician to figure out why I couldn’t access certain workfiles on the PC after he had done an upgrade of memory capacity. I’m still amazed I  managed to just sit there, watching him – without going ballistic because of all the work I wasn’t able to finish during the 3½ hours he was at it! Does that mean I’m mellowing?

Nah! Couldn’t be!

Situation Report

First day of a new school year. Our class is the same and still not the same. Almost everyone seems to have grown at least 5 cm since spring and some of the boys have much darker voices.  The girls appear more poised, more grown up than last year – looking at their school pictures from Grade 7 I can hardly recognize them!

I’m still hobbling around, so for now I’ll have to resort to posting “old” pictures. The trees are beginning to turn different hues of  yellow and red – and I fully intend to be out there taking pictures come the weekend!

Grumble

The title stays, but I think I’ll skip what I intended to write about… Some things are better left until they have gone from a roiling boil to a slow simmer. I will however say this much – there is no known cure for Stupid, but it does seem to be a prerequisite for getting elected to our Board of Education.

I will try and write about the situation a bit later – in the meantime; Enjoy!

Back To Reality

First day at work and I spent the first two hours waiting while the Tech department made it possible for me to check e-mail and access a printer from the computer in my new office. Nowadays we can’t just call them on the phone and get 25 seconds of  verbal help – now we need to mail a “Support Request” to them for every little piddly thing. Easy as pie to do when you can’t get into your ——– mail program! Why do I get a sneaky suspicion that this is part of a plan to record every single little thing they do – sort of an insurance to secure their jobs for the future. Maybe that’s what teachers need to do as well – keep a detailed record of everything we do during our days. Too bad we can’t get the students to submit a “Support Request” every time they need something from us….

Silbojokk  (just pronounce the j as y in yo-yo and okk as ock in rock) on the other side of one of the lakes/water reservoirs along the road to Norway.

At first we planned on traversing the gully to get to the other side, but we stopped on this side of the willows and juniper. The vegetation at this altitude is wickedly dense a mere half meter from the ground and our legs would have been scratched into tartan patterns. Besides  - Loki was constantly wrestled to the ground by the bushes.

Labrador Tea

This is one picture I am truly pleased with. Can’t say exactly why, but I like it!

This picture was taken around 8 PM when I just had to get out for a walk after a long day of interviews with candidates for the position of  Director of Schools and Culture. Odd combination you might say, but in a small county there are advantages to slimming organisations.  In any event, my head felt as if it was stuffed with cotton candy after all the politically correct phrases and catch words I had listened to since 9 AM, so I really needed a walk to clear my mind.

Did we find a someone suitable for the position, you ask?

I think so – but do you ever know that until the person has been tried and tested? At least this person has experience both as a teacher and as an administrator on county level, so he should at least know the framework even if he doesn’t know the operations here.

Tomorrow I’ll be leaving to spend the weekend with Dad and Barb. We’re but a few days away from the summer solstice and this is traditionally THE biggest weekend in Sweden. I might regale you with stories about a few of our peculiar customs over the next few days. Otherwise you can google “Swedish midsummer” and maybe have a few laughs – or questions…

Playing Hooky

My blogging friend kcinnova commented on my admission that I was skipping school the other day – or rather that I have been known to encourage students to do the same on occasion. From what I understand about the school system in most American states, this could be reason for dismissal (or at least a severe reprimand)  – Canadian school boards would surely take a dim view of a teacher who undermined the authority of the system in such a manner!

At the beginning of my career I would have wholeheartedly agreed – of course students need to be in school every lesson, every day! Since then my views have become reality adjusted in more ways than one, but for now I’ll stay with the skipping classes part.

I would of course never encourage all of my students to take it upon themselves to decide what classes to attend. I will however tell some of my students to slow down, take a weekend off, allow themselves to be teenagers, chill, not chase after 100% on every single test -  and skip an occasional English class, just because!

What type of student is it we’re talking about?

Highly ambitious, burdened with high expectations from home, active in sports and/or other organisations… and most often girls. They are often seen packing down their books on a Friday, “just in case” they will feel like revising something or other during the weekend. They crumble over a result less than 95% in Grade 7, they turn pale when their essay in Grade 8 doesn’t garner them accolades and by Grade 9 they’re all too often stressed out – if not stopped along the way. I often talk to these girls about the need to pace yourself, to not burn all of your reserves in grade school, but sometimes you need to be more drastic than that. I’m quite sure the students I’ve had over the years have benefitted from my unorthodox approach – even if they felt guilty as all get out when they snuck out the entrance as their classmates entered the classroom.For some it was enough just knowing they COULD skip a class – they never did – but they knew the possibility existed and that was enough for them to relax and thus improve their results.

So, what do you all say? Am I wrong, or is there some merit in what I do?

Wish Me Luck!

Tomorrow I am to negotiate salary, schedule and a few other things regarding my new job. Since it’ll be 50% administrative and 30% teaching, I”ll be working under two different agreements so we need to find a way to combine the two. Admin. presonnel has regular holidays, while teachers have summer holidays – Time is also calculated in two different manners, so this will take some thinking to work out.

Here’s one from last October just as the first ice had formed. I think I used the middle section of it in a banner for a short  while but I never published the entire picture.

Testing, testing

I feel as if I’ve been running the gauntlet these past days. Through some extremely poor planning on our part, we managed to invite all parents to a thematic evening – right in the middle of a week with bi-annual meetings between parent-student-mentor. This also happened to be the same week that saw the Grade 9 students write the essay for the standardised test in English….

Over the weekend I still managed to get the warp through heddles and  reed. This was the point where I realised that I had a couple of mistakes to correct…

… but after that I could make the first pattern. The beginning is always sort of wavy and weird, but it’ll all work itself out by the time the whole rug is ready.

When It Rains It Pours….

A heading well suited for this post!

This week has really tested my multi-tasking ability to the utmost. An annual general meeting for the union, meetings about my two guys, negotiations regarding proposed staff-cuts, regular classes and standardised testing to prepare – a bit more than I normally have to face in any given week. Today I sure am glad this week is over, but part of the reason why I’ve been thinking about a possible career change lately is that I can perform too much of my present job on sheer routine.

We’ve been using the same textbooks in English for a number of years. I have tried most exercises, know which ones are good tools for learning, which ones are OK and also which ones are downright useless. I can use my instructions for each text/chapter mostly without changes from one year to another…. Boring! For me, that is – the students are a different bunch every year… Still and all – I feel as if I’m stagnating and nothing scares me more than the thought that my teaching will turn stale. I don’t think that is the case yet, but…

No wonder the job offer I received (and have -sort of – accepted, but not negotiated all terms of) felt like a gift from the heavens! Yes – I’ll be using the same textbooks for my classes next year, so no change there. I will however be challenged with new duties during part of my workday, and I think this will benefit my students as well. The need to think in new and different ways during part of the day should “spill over” into my teaching… Going from teaching-only to teaching/admin also meant that I could step down from the position of chairperson for the union local. Truth be told – I was more than ready to do so, as it must be one of the more thankless jobs there is! I’ll remain as a member of the board though, mostly to help our new chairperson during her first year in office.

Yesterday my students in Grade 9 did two parts of the standardised tests they have to sit. This was reading- and listening comprehension – remains an essay and an oral examination done in groups of two or three. I’ve done a lot of preparatory work with my students during the week and I could see that it was beneficial for many of them. One student who threatened to skip school left the room with a smile on his face and there were many of them who seemed to be much more confident than what they were even a week ago!

I went through all of their answers last night and by the looks of it everyone will get a passing grade!

Now for the one thing I hadn’t factored in for this week. Dealing with a bureaucrat.

There has been some disturbing events surrounding the youths who are placed here while their applications for refugee status are being processed. A couple of them (among others -B-) was jumped by some local thugs at a recent disco dance. They have met some rather unsavory comments from others in the community and the level of frustration is on the rise. A handful of them have been given refugee status, but the majority of them are basically waiting to get deported. The other day one youth was to be escorted to the nearest airport and sent back to his home country – which really set off everyone else. No surprise there!

Right in the middle of this, a minor bureaucrat with the county insisted on holding interviews with the two boys I am entrusted to care for. An interview which is NOT called for – unless they have received their permanent visas and travel documents, indicating their future status of becoming full-flegded citizens.

I tried reasoning…

I tried explaining…

I finally said I did not want the interviews to take place at the present time and signed a paper to that effect. With that I felt the matter had been dealt with.

Not so.

This person went behind my back and arranged for interviews with the two boys and an interpreter. As a trustee for these teenagers I am in the place of a parent for everyone – except a bureaucrat who can’t read the regulations by which her job should be exceuted.

Oh yes, I almost forgot to tell you what the interviews were all about…

Every person who receives a permanent visa is required to have an Introductory Plan to determine what level of education they have, what further education is required and what career path they envision for themselves in the future… The interview CAN be conducted before the person has received their visa – but. it. is. not. necessary.

The result?

-H- was totally befuddled and couldn’t understand why he would have to answer all these questions now… -B- took the opportunity to voice his rather selfish feelings about everything under the sun, but refused to answer her questions…

After this she can, however, put a tick mark in another box on a list of  To-Do’s.

Isn’t it amazing that snow can be this viscous? You’d think this is snow on ropes but it’s not – just the stuff that has sort of slid off the top of the djungle gym.