This week has just been weird. A day off in the middle just feels wrong. The kids were off too, and today is Friday the 13th. And it rained last night, although I see blue skies now…that’s just one window. Not sure what it looks like to the east. I know it’s supposed to rain more later. File it under “Things that make kids lose their minds”. Some kids have disappeared for days; their parents just don’t think they need to go to school? Or they’re so sick they need to stay home for over a week? I mean, I know that’s possible, but it’s already happened twice this year with one of these kids and there’s no documented serious illness. How am I supposed to catch that kid up? I don’t even know. One of them already has like 36 absences. And they’re bright, but not bright enough to know what we did in class. I’m constantly telling kids to advocate for themselves. Tell parents they don’t want to be gone for that many days, that they don’t want to be late every day. It’s hard because it’s not always the kid’s fault…but the kid is who suffers when they’re not at school. I gave a test yesterday based on stuff we’d done over the previous three days…and there are multiple kids who’ve missed all those days. Are they going to go home and watch all the videos we made and finish all the notes? Probably not. Ah well. We all do the best we can. Maybe there are jobs where someone can just not show up for a week and no one minds? This one kid has a low GPA (and he’s bright) and tons of absences, and he’s like, but Miss, I was sick. OK. All the times, you were sick? You can’t go home and complete some of this missing work? There’s the kicker right there. And I don’t blame them…if there’s no one at home supporting them in getting their missed work done, because some of our kids DO go home and finish things…but without that home support, it’s hard to find a middle-schooler with that level of persistence.
My mom would’ve killed me if I didn’t do my work. I was aware of that. And she sent me to school with a wide range of illnesses, including chicken pox. So there’s that.
Knock on wood, I’m not sick. And this is Friday. And we’re doing a lab where I had to tape 20 yardsticks to desks a certain distance apart and then mark a foot (because they can’t measure to save their lives, in centimeters or feet or inches) so they can do collision labs today…which a ton of kids will miss because it rained last night and that’s a reason to stay home.
Artwise, I’m in slow but steady and occasional flail mode. Putting embroidery details on this piece…
Freckles…
Details…
Flowers? Who knows. Scribble doesn’t.
So last night, at my stitching meeting, I was talking about the tree and how I didn’t really like it, and my stitching friend Julie says well just put fabric on there, which duh, I’ve done on one of the other dye paintings, so I went and found a fabric I liked, but then how to make it the same shape and size? Need tracing paper…
I swear there’s tracing paper in this house, but I couldn’t find it, so I’ll buy more, and when I die, children, that is why there will be 17 pads of tracing paper in the house. So that’s on the list for after school today.
I also finished the top for Sue Spargo’s Rooted, a mini block of the month from 2021.
I like it. And these are easy to quilt. I should do that.
And I almost finished this block…I was working on the worm…
This is from Spargo’s Critters and Clover, but this is only the March block. They’re all appliqued down; I just need to do the embroidery, which is fun and relaxing and I rarely get time to work on it. The worm needs little hairs and antenna. Then the frog is next.
Here’s yesterday’s sky as I was leaving work. Very interesting.
And yes, it’s almost dark when I leave now if I have anything to do after school (like tape down 20 yardsticks). Not ideal.
Today, I’m teaching collisions. I almost wrote ‘we’, but my co-teachers are behind me and dealing with other issues of learning, inability to do labs, etc. I have one ‘buffer’ day next week, but honestly, it’s not a buffer day…it’s a ‘finish the test you didn’t finish yesterday’ day. I want the unit done before Fall Break because the next unit JUST fits between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Honestly, when they’re on task, they can get the things done. I give them extra time on stuff and they just find ways to waste it, so I’m not slowing down for that. I have all the honors kids and they ARE done and ready for the next thing, so we move on. I was trying to help some of the low students yesterday on the test, almost laying it out for them, and still…there’s some learning disabilities there that require more time and energy than I can spend on one kid in a class without leaving the rest doing nothing or doing busywork. It’s frustrating, especially when parents decide the student doesn’t need extra support. Hey mom, come sit with your kid as she struggles through a test where she can’t Google the answer. Then tell me she doesn’t need that support.
Sigh. After the test, I have duty. Then get the room ready for next week. Then go to ceramics hopefully? Oh wait, pick up sewing machine first. Then ceramics. Then home to grade stuff (I’m behind again) and wait, I need tracing paper. I had one more place to look. If it’s not there, then I have to go to Michaels on the way home from ceramics. OK, that’s a lot. I feel tired already. I was up at 4 AM with rain and thunder. Sleep is not my friend. But at SOME point, I’ll be working on that tree. I think. Yup. Totally.
