My Love Affair with Chobani Yogurt!

Yogurt is often a staple for healthy eating. But up until approximately 6 weeks ago, I would have said that I loathe yogurt and didn't understand everyone's fascination with it. I had tried every brand over the past 30 years or so - Yoplait, Dannon, La Yogurt, Activia, Stonyfield Farms, etc. - and my feelings about them can be summed up with: "Yuck, yuck, yuck!"  That is until I was introduced to Chobani Greek yogurt! OMG! Pure heaven in a plastic container. While in Boston for TFA Induction, one of my suitemates introduced me to Chobani and it's been a love affair ever since. In fact, I would supplement my nasty sandwich lunch by adding a container of Chobani while in Philadelphia. So satisfying.

According to all the nutritional "experts," Greek yogurt is by far the healthier choice over and above regular yogurt.  In a head to head contest, low- or fat-free Greek yogurt has about the same amount of calories, but has more protein, lower carbs and less sugar than the regular low- or fat-free yogurt. I found this article to be a great read about the differences between the two.  Added to all of this, I think Greek yogurt just tastes better!  While I'm sure it's better to buy the plain Greek yogurt and add your own fruit, I'm way to lazy for that. Chobani has 21 flavors available! Here are my favorites: Strawberry-Banana, Pineapple, Vanilla, Peach, Apple Cinnamon, Raspberry, and Black Cherry. I will say I didn't like the Lemon or the Blood Orange.  Both flavors had a weird aftertaste. The Blueberry was just okay. I have not yet tried the Strawberry, Passion Fruit, Mango, Pomegranate or Honey flavored, but I plan on trying them soon.  They also have a kids-friendly line that I'm dying to try. What's better than Orange-Vanilla or Honey-Nana?!  Honey and banana!!!  Yum!!!

Some people prefer the Fage brand over Chobani but I have not yet tried Fage. Perhaps I'll try that next.

So if you have never liked yogurt, I suggest getting yourself a container of Chobani and trying it.  BTW, none of this applies to frozen yogurt. That has always been delicious. Check out George Carlin's take on yogurt.  Oh, George, I miss you!  [Note: I have not been paid by Chobani for this review.  But if anyone at Chobani would like to...]

Career Change: Home Sweet Home!

After 5.5 weeks (40+ days, 967 hours, 58,055 minutes, 3,483,300 seconds - give or take), I finally arrived home last night. But there's not much time to relax. Right now, I don't have a fall placement and quite frankly I'm not trusting that TFA will be able to get me a fall placement in the content area for which I'm licensed. Despite my repeatedly telling them that I don't feel like I have enough training in order to teach ELL students and that I'm not licensed in ESL, they continue to mention that there's a good chance that I'll be teaching ESL in the fall. <sigh>  Seriously, I'm getting fed up with TFA who apparently is not interested in keeping their corps members happy and instead are focusing on their own agenda.  Because of this issue, I'm starting to apply for my own English/Language Arts positions - in addition to hoping that TFA will finally wake up and find me ELA positions to interview for. Not having a placement is a little unnerving but I'm dealing. 

The rest of this week, I'm pretty much left to my own devices with not much work to do, which will allow me to enjoy Newburyport's Yankee Homecoming and watch the Olympics. Starting next week, TFA has arranged for the corps members to continue with some additional professional development over the following two weeks before the various school districts' new teacher orientation begins. Additionally, I will do my own studying by spending the next few days devouring Harry Wong's The First Days of School and Fred Jones' Tools for Teaching, which most teachers consider the must reads for every teacher - old and new. I know teachers who have been teaching for dozens of years who still reread both books every year before the school year starts.

On the personal side, my beautiful kitty made it through like a trouper the nearly 6 weeks of her mom being away. She has spent most of last night and today laying on mom's lap demanding attention, although she occasionally nips at me which is how she shows her displeasure over my leaving her alone for as long as I did. That being said, I'm unbelievably happy to be home. 

Alzheimer's is Horrendous!

The title of this blog is not a surprise to anyone.  Alzheimer's is a dreadful, dreadful disease!

Yesterday, I made a trip that I have been dreading for 5 weeks - a visit to see my mother. Let me preface this by saying that I haven't visited my mother in over 5 years. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease approximately 6 years ago and I found it extremely difficult to visit her for a myriad of reasons that I won't get into. Since her diagnosis, my mother's been in a long-term care facility in Cherry Hill, NJ, which is right across the river from Philadelphia. Guilt finally got the better of me and I made the trek to Cherry Hill with my brother to see her. What a nightmare! We were there a total of maybe 45 minutes and I walked out feeling bruised, battered and severely grieved. Tragically, I barely recognized my own mother and, even sadder, I never want to visit again.  I know this makes me a terrible daughter, but I really cannot handle these visits. This is a disease that I wouldn't wish on my worse enemy ... well, maybe I would my WORSE enemy, but otherwise, I wouldn't wish this on anyone else.

Knowing that Alzheimer's is quite possibly a hereditary disease scares the living crap out of me. I do not want to end up looking like the shell of the person that I saw yesterday.  For all my mother's faults (and believe me there were many of them), I hate to see her afflicted with this ruthless disease. How do I try to not end up like her? My plan is to keep my mind active no matter what - keep taking classes and learning, keep working, keep doing whatever I need to do to keep my brain active. Because this is a disease which sucks the life out of everybody - the person with the disease has no quality of life and their loved ones, who have to watch the disease, suffer monetarily, emotionally and physically.  All in all, it's not a good way to spend your remaining years. My hope for you, dear readers, is that you will never ever have to deal with this dreadful disease.  If you want to learn more, check out the Alzheimer's Awareness website. 

Career Change: Summer Institute (Week 5)

I can say it now - the party's over!  And none too soon. I think if summer institute didn't end this week, someone was going to go postal. Not necessarily me, but someone. By this week, nearly everyone said "enough is enough!"  Even though there were still one or two Kool-Aid drinkers in the mix, everyone else was cooked.

Even my students had had enough. Their behavior this week has been out of control.  On Monday afternoon, the dean of students, the principal and the head of security held my class for 30 minutes after the end of the school day to have a long discussion about the class's behavior - how they weren't meeting the school's expectations at all. It came to a head on Monday morning when one of my students (normally a quiet, respectful boy) decided to practically overturn his desk and curse out another student during my class and I had to throw him out of the class, because calling someone a "mother eff-er" is not acceptable behavior...in any classroom.  They were slightly better on Tuesday but by Wednesday, they had returned to their beastly ways.  The only decent behavioral day was Thursday due to them taking their final exam for nearly 2 hours and even then I still had to put one kid in detention. All things considered, I love my students and I will miss them, but I am glad to be leaving them here and heading home. There is one student, Richard, whom I would love to carbon copy and take home with me.  He's that one of a kind student who is mostly on task, rarely goofs off, is smart, funny and adorable, and is eager to learn.  (See the photo?  So sweet!) 

As bad as my students were this week, nothing compares to how horrible the TFA sessions were.  I never want to hear the words "let's reflect on..." ever again!  I'm pretty much done with "reflecting" on anything.  Seriously, this place got more and more cult-like over the last couple of weeks and very few corps members at my school were actually on board with this.  So of course, we all sat together, making snide comments to each other. All I can say is that I'm glad that summer institute is over and by tomorrow night, I will be home, annoying my cat and watching 5 weeks of saved Hell's Kitchen episodes.  Huzzah for snarky Chef Gordon Ramsay.

So to summer institute I say the following:  Farewell, dorm room with the uncomfortable twin bed, which squeaks horribly and wakes me up nightly. It's like sleeping on a crouton. Ciao, dining hall which I have a feeling will continue cause me intestinal issues for the next week or so. Toodles, shower stall that has something growing in the corner which frightens the hell out of me. Buh-bye, soggy PB&J sandwiches on over-sized white bread that was my daily lunch. Auf Wiedersehen, yellow school bus that is not air conditioned in 93 degree humid weather. Good riddance, annoying co-teacher who is a shallow, insincere git and probably won't last long in this profession! I will not miss any of you.

There are 2 things that I will miss from this time in hell - (i) my corps member adviser, George, who was the only person who completely understood my frustrations and annoyances with TFA and kept me focused on the importance of what I was doing with my kids, and (ii) the only decent thing to eat in the dining hall - the cookies, which explains the five pounds that I gained!

On another note, it appears my placement at SeaCoast High School is in jeopardy. I finally got an answer from the TFA placement office on what happens if (more likely, when) I fail the ESL MTEL. Apparently they ask the school district to get a waiver which will allow the unlicensed teacher to teach for a year while studying and taking the test again. (A really bad idea in my humble opinion. Particularly with a specialty subject like ELL, you really need to have someone licensed who is knowledgeable in the subject.)  So the placement office put in a request to the Revere school district on my behalf for a waiver and this was the email I received from the placement director: "I spoke with Revere today and it seems unlikely that they will be able to request a waiver at this point for the position.  I'll have a definite answer on Monday." So now it's back to square one on finding a position. I have mixed feelings about this. To put it mildly, I wasn't thrilled about teaching ELL students because I feel unqualified but I liked the school, the principal and the location.  <sigh>  Oh, well.  Not much I can do about that now. The perfect position is just waiting for me somewhere! I just have to have patience.

Career Change: The Last Day of School

Today was the last day with my summer school kids and I wanted to share something that happened today which made this whole summer worthwhile. If you remember I had an issue with a student (Raheem) 10 days ago when he wrote about his brother who had been killed last year.  Well today, something similar happened in my classroom but to a much better conclusion.  First, a little background:

On July 24, in Philadelphia, two teenage boys (ages 17 and 13) were killed in a drug deal gone bad. Read the entire story here.  A few students in my class knew these boys.  Today, I tried another writing assignment which I thought would be fun for my kids.  I had them all write the first line of a story and then pass their paper to the boy who sits behind them who then added the next line to the story and then passed it along to the next student and on and on.  I got lots of stories about how great basketball is.  But here’s what five of my wonderful boys came up with [I’ve fixed their grammatical and spelling errors]:

“It has saddened many people to hear that two teenage boys were shot and killed in their house.  These two teenage boys did nothing wrong to anyone to get shot in their own home.  The teenagers’ death saddened hundreds.  I was friends with both teenage boys and it was upsetting to hear that my friends died in my area.  I knew Rohan from my cousin, we were real close and when I heard the news, it was devastating and I hope they find their killer.  RIP Rohan & Chris.”  (See the photo)

What was the most amazing thing about this story is that it was Raheem who started the story in the first place. The fact that all these boys, especially Raheem, felt safe enough and supportive enough to write this story in my class and allow me to read the story aloud to the entire class was probably the most moving and amazing moment of my summer.  I managed to keep it together emotionally in front of my students but a couple hours later when I tried to tell this same story to my CMA group, I completely lost it and needed George, my amazing adviser, to read the story for me.  It means so much to me that these boys trusted me and their fellow students enough to share this story. This piece of paper is going in my scrapbook!

This was the first day I felt like an educator!  I also used the story to discuss themes and morals of stories and they unanimously came up with the moral of the story – Don’t have anything to do with drugs!  Such bright boys!  Unfortunately, I still had to put three of my students in detention for behavior issues.  Oh well, no day is perfect. 

Check back tomorrow morning for Summer Institute (Week 5) post.

Not so 'Awesome'

Okay, the grammar Nazi has another complaint.  This time it is with the word "Awesome," which is arguably one of the most overused adjectives in the English language.  Today, as of noon I heard the word used over 100 times - then I got tired of counting. Now I fully admit to being guilty of this overusage. (I used it 8 times myself when I was counting.)  Therefore, I am not advocating the stoppage of using this word.  After all, it can be the best word choice in certain circumstances, but I think we need to start limiting the usage.  There are so many more word choices out there.  Here's a brief and not complete exhaustive list of alternative words (courtesy of dictionary.com):

alarming, amazing, astonishing, awe-inspiring, awful, beautiful, breathtaking, daunting, dreadful, exalted, fearful, fearsome, formidable, frantic, frightening, grand, hairy, horrible, horrifying, imposing, impressive, intimidating, magnificent, majestic, mean, mind-blowing, moving, nervous, overwhelming, real gone, shocking, something else, striking, stunning, stupefying, terrible, terrifying, wonderful, wondrous, zero cool.

Personally, I find 'hairy' the most interesting!  And while not all of these words are completely exchangable with the word awesome, many are.  So let's start changing up our vocab and try using some new descriptors.  Wouldn't that be just awesome?! 

Friends I Can't Wait to Meet!

Best Shakespearean
actor of our time!

In scrambling for a blog topic, I went back to Chris Brogan's 100 Blog Topics I Hope YOU Write posting that I used to come up with my 10 Guilty Pleasures blog and found "Friends I Can't Wait to Meet!"  That got my creative juices flowing.  There is a list of people that I swear if we had a chance to meet, we would be BFFs!  Sadly, these people aren't aware of my existence.

Here's a short list of a much longer list of must meet "friends" - in no particularly order:

1. Kenneth Branagh
2. Hugh Jackman
3. Emma Thompson
4. Kevin Kline
5. Nathan Lane
6. Jon Stewart
7. Hugh Laurie
8. Ralph Fiennes
9. Bill and Hillary Clinton
10. Elton John

I'm just putting the following message out there: if anyone knows any of the people on my list and would like to introduce us, that would be fantastic!!  Otherwise, I'll just wait for fate to intervene!

Career Change: Professional vs. Personal

I've noticed a curious thing while at institute - the crossing of boundaries between personal and professional between teachers and students.  Many of the TFA staff who are either current or former teachers talk about how they have 'friended' their students on Facebook.  What?!  In my opinion, that's crossing the line. Of course, I have a fairly recent rule which is that I don't "Friend" anyone that I work with.  So no one from TFA, my new school, students, etc. But especially students.  I just think that's crossing the line from professional to personal.

I also have another issue that is bothering me: teachers who give their students their cell phone numbers. I don't know why this bugs me, but it does. It's like giving out a home address or home phone number.  It seems to be that there should always a professional distance between student and teacher. Maybe I'm just old fashioned, but I'm not a fan of giving students my cell phone number.  Parents of my students are another story altogether.  I don't mind that so much because one would hope that parents will have boundaries. 

As for email, I have created a new email address which I will specifically use for students and parents.  An email which is completely separate from my personal email address.  Again, it just seems like a smart move.  So many people are willing to cross those boundaries, but I'm not one of them.  Maybe it's because I have lived in the real world quite a bit longer than the under 30 crowd.  The only thing I was thinking of doing with social media was creating a Ms. Smith's Class website if I feel the need to have a social media space - one where I can post homework, lessons, worksheets, etc.  That is if my school doesn't already have something set up. 

I'd love for some other teachers to weigh in on this issue.  What are your hard and fast rules when it comes to your students and social media/email/contact info, etc.?  Am I being overly cautious? 

Countdown:  3 days left until I'm free from institute!

Career Change: Upspeak is Driving Me Crazy!

Please, stop talking in upspeak!

I have been sitting in dozens of TFA sessions over the past 5 weeks and the entire TFA staff (with the exception of my awesome adviser) all talk with this annoying upspeak. If you've never heard upspeak, be grateful. What is upspeak? According to the urban dictionary, upspeak is: an affliction affecting many in today's society (not just teenagers) where a person makes a question out of a sentence that isn't a question (or more simply speaks "up" at the end of a sentence).  But within TFA, it's even more insidious than that - they actually upspeak in the middle of sentences! Oh my good god! It is the worse!!! I'm not sure that I can do it justice in print, but it goes something like this: "So today?, we'll be talking? about how your students? can better understand? the content? that you're teaching?"  When reading that, hear the voice go up with every question mark and put a very slight pause before starting the next part of the sentence!  And that's what I've been listening to for 5 flipping weeks! ARGH!

I'm not sure how this maddening practice got started but as an actor, a grammar Nazi and a linguist snob, I want to bash my head into a brick wall every time I hear it.  The worse part is that it is now spreading out from the TFA staff to the TFA corps members.  I'm hearing it all over the place - at Temple, at my school, on the yellow school bus to and from school. It's like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and I'm Dr. Miles Bennell.  I haven't yet decided which is worse - upspeak or the 'like/ya know' issue!  Oddly enough, my street smart African American students speak better English than the so called educated TFA'ers. 

On a brighter note, 4 days until the end of institute and 6 days until I'm home sleeping in my very own bed!  Yay!!!

A Loss is a Loss...

One of my students has been on my mind a lot today.  I wrote about his situation earlier this week.  He's the student whose brother was killed last year.  I'm not sure how it happened, only that it was a tragedy that he will most likely never get over.  I think the reason his situation has stuck with me is that we are both suffering and dealing with loss.  I feel so deeply for what he is going through. Even though our situations are different, they are also very much alike.  Both of us have lost someone who means the world to us, both of us expected that we would have this person in our lives forever only to have them cruelly ripped out of our lives, and both us will suffer the loss forever.  The only difference in our situations is that his brother has physically left this world, while my loss is still very much alive and, I hope against hope, doing extraordinarily well.  I, unfortunately, will never know because I have accepted that I will never see this person again.  It's hard to imagine that the pain that my student feels will ever ease, but I hope it will grow more bearable over time.  My pain is still very raw and palpable - even though it's been a couple of years, but I still live with the loss and pain on a near daily basis.  If I keep myself busy, the pain can be held off for awhile, but it ultimately returns. And sometimes at the weirdest times.  The littlest thing can trigger a memory which is, at the same time, joyous and painful. I'm certain that my student has the same issue.  He has been out of class for the past couple of days dealing with his loss.  I only hope that when he returns to school that he will feel comfortable enough to turn to me if he needs help during the day.  Although I cannot imagine the pain that he feels, I can empathize over the situation because as I said - A loss is a loss... no matter what.

Career Change: Summer Institute (Week 4)

The entrance to
my school

Week 4 is completed - 1 more to go!  I can't wait for this to end.  Again, not because I don't love my kids and teaching but I cannot repeat often enough how tired I am of dorm life, horrendous dining hall food, and 800 22-year olds.  Plus I really, really miss home.  I know I've done a few mini-posts this week about some aspects of the career change, but here's the entire week summary:

This week was a rough student week. Between having one student dealing with the first anniversary of the death of his brother, another student had a death in his family of an uncle, and a third student being expelled for shoving another student, it's not been my best week in my short lived career.  The student shoving happened on Thursday. These two students had been working together on an assignment.  The student who did the shoving has emotional disturbance issues which, as his teacher, I was not informed of, although I could tell from day one that there was some sort of issue there.  Also, I hadn't been told that he had failed his freshman year at Boys' Latin due to his ED issues and that he was scheduled to repeat his freshman year.  According to the Dean of Students, this student will not be returning for the rest of the summer session (one more week) and probably will not be returning in the fall.  But again, the shoving happened on my watch and I didn't even see it happen.  I had turned my back to deal with another student and bam, it happened.  The boy who was pushed is my best student and is the nicest kid so I'm not certain what happened.  Yeah, it's been a tough week for students.

As usual, most of the TFA sessions have been pretty pointless or annoying, and overall I'm just glad that we're winding down and will soon be heading for home.  There's not much else to report from this week.  Not counting the weekend, 5 days left before heading home!  Woo hoo!

As I mentioned last week, I was scheduled to retake the ESL MTEL last Saturday.  My prediction is again complete failure.  Out of 100 questions on the test, I guessed at 86 questions - educated guesses, but guesses all the same.  I don't have high hopes at all that I did well.  I'm not certain what that means for my fall ESL placement.  I've been attempting to get answers from TFA about this situation but they keep giving me the "let's wait and see what happens" speech, which really ticks me off.  

Career Change: RTC for BMC at TFA!

Teach for America does love their acronyms. Just to name a few: TFA, LS, CS, CMA, SOM, BMC, CFU, CM, etc.  I won’t bore you with the details of these acronyms.

Today I received Real Time Coaching for the Behavior Management Cycle (“BMC”).  Teachers will understand this concept far faster than anyone else.  What is BMC?  BMC is “an approach to classroom management developed by Lee Canter[, a classroom behavioral specialist]. It involves a high level of teacher control in the class. It is also called the 'take-control' approach to teaching, as the teacher controls their classroom in a firm but positive manner. The approach maintains that teachers must establish rules and directions that clearly define the limits of acceptable and unacceptable student behavior, teach these rules and directions, and ask for assistance from parents and/or administrators when support is needed in handling the behavior of students.”  What does all this mean?  It means I sound like a moron in my classroom, but these moronic sounding directions effectively control student behavior.  I’ll give you an example of how BMC works:

“Today, students we will be talking about themes in literature.  When I say go, get out your notebooks and pens and prepare to take notes.  Go.  Susie has her notebook out and is ready to take notes, Johnny is sitting up in his desk and prepared to take notes. Bobby [who is not paying attention], the expectations are for you to get your notebook out.  That’s a consequence.”  Yes, it sounds stupid!  But for some reason students – even high school students – respond to this.  Now I would think as a high schooler I would be insulted by someone talking to me like that but apparently I’m giving them way too much credit for being a little more grown up.

I unfortunately really suck at BMC, which is why today I got Real Time Coaching (“RTC”).  What does RTC entail?  A BMC specialist sits at the back of my classroom and coaches me on how to effectively use the BMC.  Through walkie-talkies with ear pieces, the coach’s transmits the BMC directions.  Talk about an annoying process, but I will say that it does work. Just to have that little voice in my ear saying "Narrate now" or "Give a consequence" worked.  My students were actually better behaved.  Not perfect mind you but better.  Alas, once the coach left the classroom halfway through my lesson, it quickly went to hell in a hand basket, so I still have much work to do.

My friends here at Institute are annoyed with me because I keep behavioral managing them at mealtimes.  "Lindsay, is eating all her vegetables.  Sarah, is sitting silently and eating her meal.  Meghan [who is refusing to eat the truly awful food in the dining hall], the expectations are that you should be eating your dinner.  That's a consequence."  Ahhhh, teacher humor!

Career Change: Maybe I'm Just Too Old...

Okay, so I'm starting to think maybe I'm just too old for this career change.  Of course, it would have been better for me to have had this thought months ago before I set myself on this course.  So yeah, having another Ugh type of day.  

Let me first say that I really do like my students, but most days I'd like to strangle a few of them.  I guess biggest issues I'm having is the blatant disrespect that they show their teachers.  I know that incoming freshman still have that BMOC mindset  from being 'kings of the hill' in 8th grade, but even so, I don't understand the major attitude that they have.  Now my students are really smart kids, but it appears that no one in all the years that they've been in school has given them instructions on the proper behavior during class. Of course, I'm not looking for little robots, but when I was growing up, I always had respect for my teachers. It's what was expected of me.  Have times changed that much? This is why I'm starting to think I'm just too old to be doing this.  I know some of my discontent is stemming from being utterly homesick and really, really tired of dorm life, but I am really getting fed up with being on the receiving end of extreme belligerence from 14 year olds.

So I have about 4 really mouthy kids in my class who when they're on task can be fantastic students, but it takes forever to reel them in and then when you give them consequences for their bad behavior, they smart mouth back. I know it's partly because they hate being at summer school (which is mandatory for all incoming freshman), but everyday 4 different teachers over the course of 4 hours give the same speech over and over about behavior and the consequences.  These kids end up in detention every day, but they just don't seem to get it. 

Okay, Sandi... just 9 more days.  Hold on for 9 more days!  I'm hoping my classes in the fall will be better. Otherwise, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to make it.  The really sad thing is that I love teaching and all I am asking for a little respect and cooperation from my students. That's not asking for much.

Career Change: A Truly Bad Day!

How do you get through a bad day when you step in a big pile of doggie doo?  I’m having major guilt and anxiety over an innocent error that I made during my lesson today. It wasn’t anything malicious but the end result was appalling.  This is what happened. 

Today I was teaching “theme” and in order to connect it to Animal Farm and the theme of power and corruption, I had my students write a short paragraph on their experience with “power” in the form of police, government, school, parents, etc.  I wanted to hear their experiences both positive and negative so I could make the connection to the book’s theme. One of my students wrote the paper and then completely shut down. Next thing I knew, he was sitting in his seat while other students were working in groups around the room and he was crying.  I went to check on him to see what was wrong, and after some time, he told me to go read his paper.  I read the following: “The police helped find and arrest the person who shot and killed my brother on July 18, 2011.”  My heart dropped.  Naturally, I did not know about his brother but even so it doesn’t mitigate my feelings of guilt.  I spoke with my student and I apologized for the assignment.  And even though this brave young man understood that there wasn’t anything malicious with this assignment I still can’t help but feel horrible about the whole day.  With tomorrow being the anniversary of his brother’s death, I’m sure it has been on his mind and I exacerbated his feelings of loss. According to my other co-teachers, the rest of this student’s day got steadily worse.  I'm not certain that I even handled it all that well.

I almost don't want to go back tomorrow because I can't imagine that this young man will want to talk or see me again. Tonight my plan is to call his mother and check in on my student and hope that she can forgive me for this innocent mistake.  My adviser says that I shouldn’t feel guilty for something that I couldn’t know about but that doesn’t help alleviate the unnecessary pain I put this young man through.  I know this will be the first of many mistakes that I will make as an educator but I can only hope that the rest will not be as horrendous as this mistake.

Any advice on how to deal with this situation would be welcome because I feel like complete crap.

Ten Guilty Pleasures!

I was trying to come up with something to write about today and was drawing a blank.  In perusing the interwebs, I came across one blogger's post in which he listed a 100 blogs topics for people to write about.  In looking through the list, I came across #40 - Ten Guilty Pleasures and thought, "what a fun topic to write about."  I've actually already written a blog on one of my guilty pleasures - Judy Judy.  Here are the other 9, plus JJ.

1. Judge Judy
2. Hershey's Dark Chocolate Nuggets with Almonds
3. Starbucks Chai Tea Latte
4. Any show with Chef Gordon Ramsay, but especially Hell's Kitchen
5. The Southern Vampire Mystery novels (I almost want to cover the book up when I'm reading them)
6. Spending an entire day reading instead of cleaning my apartment or something else productive
7. Barry Manilow - I'm going to get a boatload of crap for this one, but yes - I am a Fanilow!  I have been listening to Barry since I was 10 years old and I still enjoy it.  It's an occasional guilty pleasure, not something I indulge in very often.
8. Buying new pens.  I'm not sure when or how this guilty pleasure happened, but I'm incapable of walking into Staples and not walking out with new pens...even when I don't need them.
9. Staying in my pjs all day.  This happens so rarely that I almost didn't put it on the list, but it's definitely a guilty pleasure.
10. Books, books, books!!!

Care to share some of your guilty pleasures??

Homelessness

Yesterday, as I was walking around Philadelphia with my brother, I couldn't help but notice the amount of homeless people and it made me sad. Before moving to NYC, I had a typical reaction to seeing homeless people - sadness mixed with a little disgust. I am not proud of that. But I'm even less proud of the reaction I had after several years of living in NYC, which was a complete disregard for these people and outright anger at the government for not being able to help fix the situation. Mostly because I got tired of seeing it day in and day out and having to live with it. Again, not my proudest moment. The thing is: when you live in a city, homelessness becomes common place and you just try to ignore it. Because you can't help everybody, you end up helping nobody.

Now that I have been away from city living for over a year and I have much less contact with this societal issue, I find my humanity about the homeless has returned. I don't know what can be done, because smart as I am, I am not THAT smart. I'm not certain who can fix this issue, if anyone even can. But it just breaks my heart when I see people living on the filthy streets of a city, whether that be Philadelphia, New York, Boston or anywhere.  It's just not right.

Career Change: Summer Institute (Week 3)

I just finished my 3rd week of summer institute (2 more to go!).  This week was another roller coaster ride of extreme highs and aggravating lows.  I'll start with the highs...

My students!  Yes, they're tough inner city kids who bring a whole lot of attitude into the room, but they also bring bright minds, funny personalities, and enduring energy. I love it and them!  But they are a trying lot. It's clear that my classroom management skills are severely lacking! While I adore my little scholars, they're impossible to control because they are so bright and so articulate. They apparently have a lot to say and decide that they're going to say it all at once. Now I'm all for the Socratic method of teaching, but when it gets out of control, then no one is learning. But I had a nice long talk with them about their goals and aspirations and how much I believe in them. While the classroom still has some issues, it's much better. Of course, they'll probably be perfect angels the last week that I have them and then I'll go home and have to deal with a whole new set of students a month later! Rock on! We did have two great parts of the week, both on Thursday. On Thursday, my students took their midterm assessment and made some reputable improvements over their diagnostic test. Additionally, they gave myself and my co-teachers some serious props for our teaching.  See the photo below of what one of my students had to say about little ole me!  This is one of the reasons I wanted a career change. 

Now for the lows: T F-ING A!  Okay, that's a bit harsh, but really this teaching corps is unbelievably bad at so many things that it just boggles the mind how they've even remotely been able to stay around for 20 years. While their core value of trying to bridge the achievement gap is laudable and something I believe in and support wholeheartedly, their methods leave a lot to be desired!  From the lack of communication to the poorly written summer objectives to the hours and hours of wasted time to the badly planned lesson plans, these weeks are annoying and exhausting. Just when you think it can't get worse, it does.  Okay, Sandi, focus!  "It's about the students, not TFA.  It's about the students, not TFA."  This is my new mantra.  Oh, that and... "Only 14 days left."  Yes, I've resorted to counting the days until I go home!

The other huge low for me is my co-teacher! This is someone that if I could drop kick off the side of a cliff, I would. This still-wet-behind-the-ears 22 year old is the bane of my existence.  Apparently someone who is 22, who has a bachelor's degree in social work has decided that he knows more about teaching, literature and just about everything else in the world than I do. Therefore he feels he can tell me what to do and when to do it. I've come close to slapping him down a few times, but I unfortunately need to keep an air of congeniality and cooperation, so I'm stuck biting my tongue.  For anyone who knows me, know that this is the most difficult task. I've almost severed my tongue several times this week. <sigh>  "14 more days, Sandi.  14 more days!"  :-)

Okay, so this still is not the best experience I've ever had, but again, it's about the long-range goals of getting into the classroom.  Seriously though, if you plan on applying for Teach for America, contact me first.  I can give you insight into this program and you can see if it's right for you.

My goal for this week is to spend more time getting to know my students and relating to them and less time worrying about the ridiculous objectives that I have shove down my students throats.

Another note on my career change: as of yesterday, I have officially been granted a preliminary license to teach English by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts which is valid for 5 years. Yay! I have to pass the ESL test (which I am retaking today) before I can be licensed to teach ELL. I do not have high hopes in that regard.

I wept when I read this comment from another student!

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 30 - 5 Years Into the Future

This post is the final writing challenge assignment: 5 Years into the Future!  Wow, I almost don't want to do this assignment, simply because in 5 years, I will be 51.  I'd rather not think about being in my 50s.  :-) 

Quite frankly, I don't see my life being all that different from right now.  I suspect that in 5 years time, I will still be working at a school somewhere on the north shore of Massachusetts, teaching English literature and drama; still living in Newburyport with my cat; enjoying my free time with friends and perhaps finishing up my Ph.D. I'm hoping by then to have ticked off a few things on my bucket list, but otherwise I don't really see any major changes. 

We have now come to the end of this 30 day writing assignment. Some of the assignments were really interesting, some not so much, but I am certainly glad that I accomplished this task. It's important to set goals and to work hard to accomplish them. I have succeeded.  Huzzah!

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 29 - Tests

Day 29 - Tests!  I suppose I feel the way most people feel about tests: I'm not a fan but I recognize that unfortunately they are a necessity.  We certainly cannot hand out driver's licenses until we test people's skills before getting behind the wheel of such a dangerous instrument. But what I despise mostly about tests is that more often than not standardized tests are solely used to measure students. The reality is that standardized tests are here to stay, but it doesn't mean that I like them. In Massachusetts where I will be teaching full time starting this Fall, the students take MCAS tests (Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System) and each time I applied for a teaching position, the interviewer would ask my opinion on standardized tests and I would give my best answer which is that yes, I will do everything in my power that my students pass their MCAS's but that I believe that students need to be measured by more than just what's on those tests.  Students should not be subjected a "one size fits all" test.  The truth is some people just naturally test better than others and we should not be educating students to pass these tests, we should be instilling them with knowledge and once they learn that knowledge, they can apply that knowledge toward the test. Unfortunately, I'll be spending 4 weeks this summer doing exactly the thing I hate: teaching for the test.  ARGH!!!!!!!!!!

Final assignment: Day 30 - Write about where you see yourself in five year.

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 28 - Honor Roll

Day 28 - Honor Roll??  Who wrote this list anyway??  Okay, the honor roll.  I remember being on the honor roll a few times in elementary and middle schools, which isn't saying much. In elementary school, as long as you colored between the lines you could be on the honor roll. But I will say that when I was in high school, I was a bit of a slacker. I didn't work to my full potential, therefore I never ended up on the honor roll. I didn't have terrible grades at all, but I didn't work my butt off either. I was mostly A-/B+ student. But when I got to college, then I hit my stride.  I never was on the honor roll in high school, but was on the Dean's list in my community college and graduated summa cum laude from university. This is not bragging, just stating a fact. Because neither one of those accomplishments mean much in the real world.

What a dumb assignment!  :-)

Next up: Day 29 - Write About Tests

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 27 - My Perfect Day

And now day 27 - My Perfect Day!  I'm going to end up sounding like a sappy, hopeless romantic, which I suppose I am.  Which is also why I am such a cynic when it comes to romantic relationships. One of the few things I would have liked to have in my life, hasn't happened and pretty much guaranteed it won't happen, but I can still dream of my perfect day. It's sort of a fairy tale, which is perhaps that is why I watch Disney animated movies as much as I do. Here's my perfect day:

Waking up on a sunny and warm Sunday morning in late spring with the person I love and who loves me equally.  Getting up to have a lazy breakfast and catch up on any little tidbits from the week that we hadn't discussed.  Maybe reading the Sunday New York Times and discussing the articles - maybe just enjoying each other's company.  After breakfast, we'd head over to the farmer's market to purchase some fresh produce and anything else that the market has to offer.  On our way back home, we'd stop by Starbucks for a beverage.  After dropping the produce back home, we'd head out for the day.  Depending on our mood, we'd either go for a long bike ride, or perhaps head out in the car to do some sightseeing, or even perhaps, we'd head into the city for an afternoon of theatre and dinner.  Any and all of these would make my day perfect.  After spending the day out and about, we'd return home, curl up on the couch with the cat and watch a movie.  

Now that's a perfect day. Yes, I'm a hopeless romantic.  Always have been, always will be.

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 26 - Archery

Day 30 - Archery??  What the...! Okay, okay. Archery!

When I think of archery, my thoughts automatically go toward Robin Hood. Robin Hood was known to be a highly skilled archer. I have always loved the story of Robin Hood and really, who doesn't love a story about a heroic outlaw? I have probably seen every movie made about Robin Hood from the 1938 film with Errol Flynn, to Walt Disney's Robin Hood, and Mel Brooks's Robin Hood: Men in Tights and on and on.  The worse of them being the Kevin Costner version. Whoever said that Kevin Costner could act was highly mistaken!  

Today, archery is mostly known as an Olympic sport. In a couple of weeks when the London Olympics are in full swing, I will most likely watch the archery contests. Not because I love archery per se, mostly because I generally enjoy watching all the various Olympic sports. I'm amazed what these talented athletes can accomplish and really enjoy watching the various competitions. I've even been known to watch a curling match during the winter Olympics. But I only watch those matches if I have insomnia. Talk about a snoozefest!

One more thing to note about archery. I remember archery being a part of  my physical education classes in middle school and I personally hated it. It was a fairly painful sport with the bowstring always rubbing against the inside of my forearm and the plucking of the bow on my fingers caused blisters. Even the protective gear didn't help my sensitive skin. Ergo I knew from an early age that I would never be a great archer. <weep>  ;-)

Day 27 - Design a Perfect Day

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 25 - Penguins

Today's assignment: Day 25 - Penguins.  Now this is a topic that I can write about!  I love, love, love penguins! When I lived in NYC, I used to visit the Central Park Zoo as often as I could and just hang out in the Penguins & Puffins house where I would sit and just watch them. They are just amazing creatures. When March of the Penguins was released in 2005, I went to see it 4 times within a month because I just couldn't get enough of these waddling, tuxedo-wearing, flightless birds. I do love seeing well-dressed men and women! 

One of my favorite comic strip characters is from Berkley Breathed's Bloom County and Opus comic strips - Opus the penguin. Yes, Opus has his own Wikipedia page! He is an "existentialist penguin," quite the dapper dresser and a definite ladies' penguin. 

Too bad I can't have one as a pet! If you aren't aware, owning a penguin as a pet is completely illegal (and I wouldn't be able to care for a penguin properly anyway). Although since I can't actually have one as a pet, I'm seriously thinking about donating to the World Wildlife Funds' Adopt an Emperor Penguin Program. That might be a good compromise. In the meantime, there is always the New England Aquarium in Boston who can supply me with my penguin fix!

 Next up! Day 26 - Archery

Not only is Opus styling a
fashionable tuxedo, but
what an awesome hat!

Career Change: TFA Summer Institute (Week 2)

This was the craziest week ever!  I had extreme highs and extreme lows, but, all in all, after spending a week with my students, I can't imagine a better way to spend my days.  Yes, it's been long days and grueling nights of trying to wrap my head around some of the tasks of teaching, but in the end, seeing their faces respond and light up when they learn something new is a treasure.

This past week, I finally got to meet my new students - 17 very bright, VERY rambunctious soon-to-be 9th graders. These are smart, savvy, streetwise, funny boys who like to challenge me on who is boss in my classroom. Sad to say, they ruled the class on Tuesday, but I got back the power on Thursday with giving out consequences for bad behavior; something I neglected on Tuesday. There are mixed reviews on Animal Farm, some think it's weird, but like it; some just don't like it. That's not surprising at all - it's actually not my favorite book, but enjoyable enough. Next week I plan on bringing in some short stories that I think they'll love, like "The Tell-Tale Heart."  Pretty much all teenage boys love gore and Poe is the master! 

Much as I love being in the classroom and teaching these bright young minds, the TFA session are becoming increasingly infuriating. Mostly we're having sessions which are a complete waste of my time and not purposeful at all.  The types of sessions we really need for them to focus on are on teaching content.  As am an English literature major, the objectives that I'm set to teach this summer (and in the fall, BTW) are objectives that I've been doing for eons. I know how setting in a novel affects mood or who the protagonists and antagonists are in novels, but what I don't know is how to disseminate that knowledge to my students! This past Wednesday, while trying to figure out my lesson plan, I had a major breakdown and thought that I made a huge mistake in going the TFA route.  I have since made up my mind that I will muddle through this summer program, doing my best for my students, and hoping against hope that I don't mess them up completely. In the fall at my placement school, I will (hopefully) be surrounded by seasoned teaching professionals and should be able to get ideas from them (plus all my brilliant teacher friends) on how to handle teaching my classes. The next two years will be on-the-job training and, as I'm very smart and dedicated, I will be able to make quick adjustments.

There's a lot of criticism around about Teach for America's training and effectiveness and I sort of concur that TFA is lacking in a lot of areas. Here's a really interesting article about TFA from Campus Progress, which is pretty much spot on about the "break neck training" and the "lack of retention by corps members beyond their 2 year commitment." Frustrations ran amok this week at my school when seriously dedicated teachers wanted to spend more time helping their students with after school tutoring but were told by the TFA staff that it was more important to spend time in the TFA afternoon sessions (most of which are useless). This mindset goes against TFA's own mission statement about students coming first. But I have not made my commitment to TFA. I have made a commitment to my students whether the ones I have this summer or the ones I will have this fall, straight through to the ones I have 20 years from now.  My career change is not about TFA, and I need to remember that! It's all about keeping perspective!

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 24 - Anniversary

The hanging of Lincoln's assassins.
Mary Surratt is on the far left

Today's task: Day 24 - Anniversary.  Again this is a somewhat vague topic. What type of anniversary are we talking about here?

I have no frame of reference for a marriage or relationship anniversary so that's out. I'm currently not employed, so employment anniversary is out. I could do a major event anniversary that is significant, but I can't think of one coming up (i.e., 9/11, the Kennedy assassination, etc.).  Ummm.  How about this?

Today, is the 147th anniversary of the first woman to be executed in the United States - Mary Surratt, for her role as conspirator in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Thank you, History Channel.  It's the best I can do!  

I suppose the only good thing about the horrendous assignments of the past few days is that I am able to bang them out pretty quickly because I either have nothing to say, nothing good to say and/or zero experience with the topic listed.  Good, because I'm really, really crazy busy right now!  :-)

The next topic is Day 25 - Penguins

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 23 - Valentine's Day

Day 23 - Valentine's Day.  7 posting left in this challenge!  Woo hoo!!

I've actually already covered this topic on day 3 - The Holidays.  I loathe this day with a red hot fiery passion. (See what I did there?) I couldn't decide which of the "I Hate Valentine's Day" photos to post because there are so many wonderfully funny and accurate photos out there, so I am posting two of my favorites. They pretty much sum up my feelings on the subject. A picture is after all worth a thousand words.  So here's two thousand words worth.

Next topic:  Day 24 - Anniversary

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 22 - Worst Relationship

Today's task is to "write about your worst relationship." Soooooo, again as with a few of the other posts, this task is a bit vague. What type of relationships do they mean?  Romantic?  Friendship?  Family?  Any and all??  I'll try to cover all, I guess.  As my longest romantic "relationship" was only 3 weeks and 30 years ago, I feel I can't really comment about the worst romantic relationship.  Technically, I've never had a long term romantic relationship and short term dating cannot be considered relationships and are not worth the time or effort to comment about. Additionally, I've spent a good portion of the past couple of years dealing with some of my worst friendship and family relationship issues and don't really feel like I want to re-visit any of it again. Therefore, I'm choosing to not comment on them. So what does that leave?  Hmmmmmmm.  I guess that leaves me with not much to talk about.  So here's a picture of a cute baby polar bear. I'm posting it because it makes me smile no matter what kind of day I'm having.  If you want to see 24 more cute baby animal photos, check out this blog.

Awww, isn't this just the
sweetest photo!!

Next up:  Day 23 - Valentine's Day

Career Change: Wishing I Were Home!

Yesterday, I had the strangest experience - that of homesickness.  Our calendar here at institute is so jammed packed that we barely have time to breathe, let alone miss anything. Yesterday (the 4th of July) was a slightly slower day, with having only a half day of sessions and no school.  I ended up with almost too much time to myself. Due to the amount of work that I needed to get done, I spent the entire afternoon huddled up in my dorm room and quickly discovered that I am really missing being home. Being away for nearly 6 weeks is tough, I can't imagine how people who have significant others and/or children are doing it. Mostly, I'm missing my cat terribly and just in general being able to sleep in my own comfy bed and walk around town, see friends, etc. I know it's not much by other people's standards, but it is my life and it's really, really difficult to be away. And there are more issues than just the homesickness (which is huge in and of itself).  It's also really difficult being around 800 22-year old much as I like them. Additionally, the TFA model is not very well done and there are big gaping gaps in the curriculum that they're trying to teach us, which is why now I'm questioning my decision to do a teaching corps. I spent a portion of yesterday doubting whether I made the right choice, that perhaps I should have gone the traditional route of a 2-year teaching certification, but what's done is done. For anyone considering going the TFA route into teaching, think long and hard about your decision. Yes, it's a quicker way to career change, but it's way harder and much more infuriating than I thought it would be because TFA hasn't really been supplying the tools we need to teach our content area. Although, I now know tons about diversity - not really all that helpful when you're facing 17 students and you're not sure how to teach your objectives for the day. Adding to all of this is the fact that I've gained 4 pounds because of the really bad choices of food available here and that nearly nothing we are served is healthy.  Okay, enough complaints. I just have to push through the next 23 days and then I'll be homeward bound and I'll have to hope that in the fall if I need help in my class, I'll have a ton of experience professionals in the school who can be of assistance. In the meantime, I hope my kitty remembers her mommy. <sniff>

Awww.  What a sweet girl I have!!

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 21 - Pillow Talk

ARGH!  Pillow talk?  Really?? <sigh>  They're really scraping the bottom of the barrel with these past couple of topics. Again, I have nothing.  Although it did bring to mind the Doris Day-Rock Hudson movie from 1959. As opposed to yesterday's movie connection (Clueless), I have actually seen Pillow Talk, which is an enjoyable, if somewhat dated, romcom, about a man and woman who share a telephone line and despise each other, but then he has fun by romancing her with his voice disguised.  See... dated, but fun!

Beyond the 1959 movie, I cannot really comment on pillow talk as my pathetic love life can attest to. By the way, I know I've mentioned a bit about the sad state of affairs of my love life. Please, do not think that I'm in any way bitter about it. I'm a realist and this is just what the fates decided that it should be for me. I'm a little disappointed to be sure and even mildly amused about how pathetic it really is but not bitter. Que sera, sera! (Did you see what I did there??  Who was the original artist on that song?? Doris Day! It's come full circle.)

Next!  Day 22 - Write about your worst relationship

Career Change: Crazy Dreams and Nightmares

For the past few days (ever since I knew I was going to face actual students and feeling thoroughly overwhelmed and under prepared), I've been having some truly crazy dreams and nightmares. All of them have been in connection with teaching.  For example, one dream last night had to do with me buying a bottle of ink (like it's the 1800s and ballpoint pens aren't de rigueur) and then having that bottle of ink get smashed in my bag all over my lesson plans and homework assignments. In the dream, I cried and cried. Another nightmare had me being held hostage by my class until their demands were made for longer lunch hours and shorter lessons. The dream ended in a standoff.  I have a feeling it didn't go well for the teacher.  :-)  

Okay, so yes, I've been feeling a little out of my element for the past couple of days and it's definitely eking into my subconscious and coming out to play during my limited sleep time. This isn't anything new for me. I use to have similar nightmares about former jobs, so I'm used to it, but it's still a little disturbing to be held hostage for hours by some unruly teenagers. I have a feeling the nightmares will get worse before they get better.

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 20 - Clueless

Today's topic is Clueless, which is kind of a weird topic to write about. The first thought that popped into my head was the Alicia Silverstone movie, which I, quite frankly, have never seen. But that's honestly the first connection I made to the topic at hand. Did anyone think of something other than that movie?? For giggles, I Googled the word and the first 7 search results were about the movie.

And the 8th search result was a comparison of the movie to Jane Austen's Emma, which I'm guessing the movie is loosely based on. Without even watching the movie, I am certain that it does NOT equal in quality to Emma. I would place a huge bet on that statement being accurate! But I am an Austen snob, so...

As I said, my first thought was the movie, but the second thought was about the 22 year old pishers who current surround me. They're pretty clueless. For instance, there are a number of female corps members who, when told to dress professionally, have decided that wearing skirts so short that if they bent over, you'd see everything they have to offer and/or wearing low plunging necklines in which their boobs are hanging out is professional. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, these are the recent college graduates who decided to go into teaching. They apparently do not realize that they are dressing completely inappropriately and as unprofessional as you can get (unless your profession is the oldest one). And that they are teaching teenage boys! Clueless! 

Next up:  Day 21 - Pillow Talk

30 Day Writing Challenge: Day 19 - Love Letter

Day 19 topic is "love letter."  Oh great, yet another topic of which I have zero knowledge. Yes, it's true and it's rather tragic but I have never actually received a love letter in my life. So in theory I have a vague idea of what it might be like to receive a love letter, the reality is I have absolutely no idea. <shrugs> 

Beyond that I'm not sure what else I could comment about in regards to this subject except to say that one of my favorite A. R. Gurney plays is Love Letters, a brilliantly, funny and touching play, and I would love to someday perform that show... Soooooooooo... Ummmmmm....  Hmmmmmm... Yeah, I got nothing else.  

Day 20 - Clueless

I HATE the Word Like!!!

Okay, I don't actually hate the word, especially when it's being used in a manner to which it was intended. For instance, "I like ice cream." Or "Apples are not like oranges." One is a statement of fact and the other is as a comparison. What I hate is the overusage of the word 'like' as a filler word. (Like) when I'm talking and (like) I don't know (like) what to say, so I (like) keep using the word like. ARGH! Why am I so cognizant of it these days? Try spending your time with nearly 800 20-somethings who are college graduates, but apparently never took a public speaking course the entire time they were in college. Or they took the course and the professor failed to fix this serious flaw.

Now, if you want to use the word 'like' as a filler in social conversations with friends, fine. Annoying, but fine. But for the love of Pete, please STOP saying 'like' when you are in a professional situation, particularly if you are planning on teaching!  The last thing impressionable students need is to have a teacher who doesn't know how to speak properly. We must work hard to end this assault on the English language! Can we create "Like-Free" Zones or something similar? 

When did 'like' become such an integral part of the American lexicon? I blame the 1983 movie Valley Girl for (like) introducing (like) this annoying (like) habit into our (like) conversations (like)!  "Valspeak" (or "Valley speak") is the correct terminology for this particular way of speaking and I just HATE it!  It really makes me want to punch someone in the face whenever I hear it. And I can do without the words 'ya know' as well.  "(Ya know) I really hate (like) when (like) my mom says (ya know) that she (like) can't (like) do my laundry (ya know)." I recognize that I am a grammar Nazi and I accept this about myself and actually I am proud of it. And I don't think I'm being overly critical of this annoying habit that young people have gotten into. As a new educator, I will do my best to rid this tendency among my students.

This video is an example of exactly what I've been dealing with for the past couple of weeks.  Hilarious in this clip, but truly annoying to listen to on a near constant basis!