How I Became a Tutor

Thursdays are after-school tutoring days at my school, which just makes them about the longest days ever -- second only to Parent Conference night. Come to think of it, conferences are always on Thursdays.

Tutoring has not been bad this year, but my morning class really got under my skin today. There are 19 kids, yet it always seems to be the same 3 or 4 raising their hands and answering questions. When I call on others, they stare blankly at me or they give me crazy answers. Yet these same kids don't pay any attention to the kids who give correct answers. Very frustrating.

We also went on a field trip today. We went to the Dallas Children's Theater to see their production of How I Became a Pirate.

I enjoyed it. We had read the story earlier this week, so it was fun to note the differences and similarities between the two. We'll be doing a compare and contrast in class later, so it will be interesting to see what the kids come up with.

There was a 10 minute intermission during the play, during which 3 kids begged me to let them use the bathroom -- despite my very stern warnings before leaving the school that they could NOT go once we were there. When the intermission began, one boy in front of me turned and said, "Man, this is boring! All they are doing is dancing!"

His neighbor argued that he thought it was interesting, and the first boy amended his statement to say, "It IS interesting, but it's just a little boring!"

Overall, the kids were really well behaved, and the show was enjoyable. I think the funniest reference was on pirate shouting, "We're gonna need a bigger boat!" when a shark appeared off the bow.

Tomorrow appears to be another shirt and tie day. I really miss casual Fridays. We have them sporadically, but not nearly often enough.

Maybe I can just dress as a pirate and say it's class-related...