April sample chapter of LMG 2

Hey everyone,

Hope you had a great weekend of pranking, watching college basketball, and NOT giving a present to the kid in my class whose birthday was on Saturday. He asked SO many teachers on Friday if they had gotten him a gift. Too bad, so sad.

Today I am posting a new rough draft chapter of Learn Me Gooder. As always, I love to hear feedback, good, bad, or ugly, so feel free to leave a comment in the, well, comments section.

Oh, and you still have until Monday evening to vote for Learn Me Good in the dailycheapreads.com March Madness Final Four!

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Date: Friday, May 14, 2010

To: Fred Bommerson

From: Jack Woodson

Subject: Milk. It’s what’s for dinner.

Hey bud,

We went on our field trip today! Four months ago, I never thought this day would get here, but we finally got to leave the school and travel. Our destination was The Science Place, which I’m sure you’re familiar with, a really cool center with lots of hands-on activities, visual aids, and graphic displays. Though it's not Chuck E. Cheese's, it IS a place "where a kid can be a kid."

After the bell rang this morning, we didn't stay long at the school. Mrs. Bird and I took the attendance, collected homework from last night, took care of the kids' water imbalances (move some out, move some in), and sent the students from our classes who were staying behind to various classrooms around the school. Lenny, Richard, Bobby, and Violette all lost out on their chance to go with us. Let it be known that No Child Left Behind does NOT apply to field trips.

We filled up three school buses for the journey to The Science Place. Actually, the REST of the third-grade packed into the first two buses, while Mrs. Bird and I rode in comfort and luxury with our classes in the third bus. Or, as close as one can possibly get to comfort and luxury inside a loud, stinky, graffitied school vehicle.

The Science Place is located southeast of Dallas in Fair Park, right next door to where the Texas State Fair is held annually. There is an enormous Ferris wheel in Fair Park, and when that wheel came into sight, I heard several kids gasp, "Oooh!! Six Flags!!" These are no doubt the same kids who shout, "Oooh!! Disney World!!" every time they see a duck.

Once we got there, we really had a lot of fun. There were simple machines to try out, sound and light experiments to play with, restrooms to use -- it was like Christmas in April.

Over in the Health and the Human Body area, there was a full-sized ambulance, with a "trauma patient" in the back. By the time I wandered over to that area, there were about 10 kids packed into every available space around the gurney, and they were all trying to get their hands on the fake heart-stimulator paddles. Clearly, some of these kids have been watching old episodes of ER or something, because they understand that before you can use these paddles, you have to yell, "CLEAR!" at the top of your lungs. What they DON'T seem to comprehend is the true function of those paddles. In their minds, the object is to strike the patient's chest as violently as possible with the paddles. How this could possibly aid the recovery of a human being, I don't understand. But then, I've never really understood the mass appeal of Hot Cheetos, either.

Lunch was nice and serene, out on the side lawn. After everyone had eaten, though, we found that we had a problem. When we had picked up our lunches from the cafeteria in the morning, we also took three coolers full of milk and juice cartons. The cafeteria ladies warned us not to bring back any of the milk or juice. Well, when lunch was over, one cooler was still filled to the brim, and the other two were more than half full. A-ha, I thought to myself. I have a mission.

When I asked my kids who wanted another milk or juice, I only got about eight takers. That wasn't even enough to put a dent in the amount of liquid we had left over. Next I told the kids that they would really be helping me out, doing me a personal favor, by drinking another milk or juice. Surprisingly, this actually got a lot of response. Pretty soon, the juice was gone and we were down to one cooler, but it was still nearly full, and the kids seemed to be getting lactose intolerant. When I discovered that there was a lot more CHOCOLATE milk hidden under a couple of layers of white milk, the kids got motivated again. I can't believe I have so many milksists at my school!

Nevertheless, I was soon standing over a cooler with about ten cartons of regular white milk in it. Timmy and Joanne had each consumed at least four cartons and were swaying on their feet like punch drunk prizefighters. Nobody else was stepping up to finish the job.

But then I got a brilliant idea. A super-fantastic, genius idea. I reached down into the cooler and pulled out the object I had spied. I held it up over my head and shouted, "Whoever drinks a carton of milk gets a free ice cube!"

The kids closest to the cooler almost got trampled.

All this time… All I needed was to offer ice cubes, and my kids would have bent over backwards to learn their lessons? Oh well, I’ll have to remember that for next year.

Talk to you later,

Ben Afflactose

Bracketology

It hit me on Saturday that I had totally forgotten to bring home something that I was going to work on over Spring Break. My laminated Big Bracket poster. I actually didn't use it last year, as it was the first year in my teaching career that I did not hold a March Mathness competition with my kids. Part of that was due to laziness, and part of that was due to me just being particularly annoyed with that group of kids.

However, I don't want to skip it again! So I was a little bummed once I remembered that I had forgotten. Oh well, I can still pair up the kids on a smaller sheet and post them on the poster next week (LOOOONG LONG away still).

In the meantime, INTERACTIVE MONDAY today is not a question, but rather an invitation to join my March Mathness group on ESPN.com. This has absolutely nothing to do with my classroom version of March Mathness, and I'm not offering any prizes other than bragging rights, but it's fun to be part of a group, so why not be part of mine? Just go here: March Mathness
Sign up, if you need to, and join the group called March Mathness. No password necessary.

Also, Dailycheapreads.com is having a March Madness type tourney, featuring books that they like. Learn Me Good is currently doing quite well in the first round voting. Second round will be sometime in late March. I'll post when that happens, and I hope you all will go and vote for me!

March Tattleness

It's March! And with it comes Madness, as all good college hoops fans know. Nevermind the ladies at my old place of employment who thought, when I suggested adding March Madness activities to the calendar, thought I was suggestion a shopping bonanza.

Since it's the beginning of a new month, I am posting another sample chapter of my work in progress -- Learn Me Gooder! This chapter is all about a common enemy of every teacher -- Tattling.

Enjoy, and as always, feedback is appreciated!

Date: Friday, November 20, 2009

To: Fred Bommerson

From: Jack Woodson

Subject: Whose whine is it anyway?

Hey bud,

In case I haven't mentioned it, my class this year is extremely immature. I've never had so many kids that still suck their thumbs, display a total lack of listening skills, and repeatedly do the same things over and over and over again, despite being told not to. Case in point, Patty, who, even after all this time, continues to get in trouble for talking in the hall.

I also notice that many of my kids have a supreme sense of responsibility when it comes to OTHER kids in the room, but they can't seem to look after themselves. They are so worried about the kids around them no following the rules, but they never seem to notice when they're not following the rules themselves.

I think it's great for kids to take on responsibility, but one of my boys, Bobby, always winds up taking responsibility AWAY from somebody else. I'll ask one of the kids to hold open a door so the class can walk through, and seconds later I'll turn around and Bobby will be holding the door. Or someone in my class will ask if they can take a basketball out to recess, yet Bobby is always the one who winds up holding the ball after lunch.

Maybe he's been reading his Spiderman comics backwards again and thinks that with great responsibility comes great power.

Yesterday, with a few minutes before the bell rang at the end of the day, I asked everyone to clean up the area around their desk, as I always do before we leave the classroom. Usually, it's the kids with the lumber yard right under their desk that ignore me and keep talking, while the kids with a few atoms of dust under their desk are lying prostrate on the floor, trying to make it clean enough to perform surgery.

As I'm asking everyone to look on the floor around them, I'm looking directly at several scraps of crayon wrapper right underneath Bobby's chair. Rather than looking around his own area and picking up the trash, Bobby notices that Nolan, on the other side of the room, has a small piece of an eraser under his chair. So Bobby goes running towards Nolan's chair, does a power slide on his knees that would make Tenacious D weep with joy, and picks up the eraser. Then he looks at me like I'm going to award him the Silver Star Award.

Mrs. Bird has started calling him, "The Sheriff."

Still, the worst of it all is the tattling. I know, I know, I should be used to it by now. After all, tattling in grade school is like the kilt in Scotland – ever present, expected even, but never welcome. Nevertheless, it continues to annoy me.

I think that if teachers didn't receive any base salary at all, but they were given $25 every time one of their students tattled on someone, they could all retire to the Bahamas by the end of the second year.

There is a significant difference between telling the teacher something and telling ON someone. For instance if Susie is hanging upside down from the monkey bars by her shoestrings and can't get down, then yes, that's something I need to know. However, I think I can do without hearing that Billy laughed when Peter dribbled chocolate milk down his chin.

There are many cases when I just have to fight mightily to resist the sarcastic response.

Student X: Jimmy pointed his middle finger at me!

Me: Really? Then he's not doing it correctly.

Student X: She called my momma fat!

Me: Your momma is not fat. But does she ever Porky Pig?

Here onboard the Tattlestar Galactica, two of my kids take things to the extreme.

I have unofficially given Puddy the cabinet post of Tattle Tale General, since he assaults my ears as soon as he sees me each morning, laying out the general school population’s misdeeds with military precision.

"Sir, status report, Sir! Tommy kicked Lisa's book bag, Kelly was making faces at a second grader, and Donnell is jangling pennies in his pocket. In world news, Lindsay Lohan was busted on DUI charges again."

Then there's Janice, who is constantly tattling about someone or something. And apparently, to anyone who will listen. This morning, her class was entering the cafeteria for lunch, and I exited through the other cafeteria door, behind her class, so she was not aware that I was standing there. I actually witnessed her tattle on one of her classmates to some random woman walking down the hall! It was probably some poor second-grader's mother, just minding her own business, suddenly accosted by a little girl claiming, "Excuse me, Miss, he just hit me!"

Of course, this lady was able to do what I always wish I COULD do. She kept her eyes straight ahead, didn't make eye contact, and just kept on walking.

Mrs. Frisch told me that she told her kids at the beginning of the year that she doesn't want to hear any complaining, unless it involves one of the 3 B's – Barfing, Bleeding, or Broken. Of course, she has to deal with Roy'al every day, so I think tattling is the least of her worries.

I've overheard Mrs. Bird on more than one occasion tell one of our kids to, "Save it for tattle-time." The trick here is that there never IS a tattle-time, but the kids don't seem to catch on to this.

I'm considering creating a tattle patsy. This will be a stuffed animal, or a poster, or even just a stapler – something that I can send the kids to when they really, really have to tell on someone. After all, Janice and others like her just want to speak the words into the air anyway, regardless of who is listening.

I just need to be sure that "Tattle Toby," the stuffed elephant, has eyes that can roll.

Later,

Penn and Teller

An open letter to Coach K

Dear Coach K (rzyzewski),

First, let me offer my congratulations on once again getting your team into the NCAA tournament -- something that your biggest rival, the Tarholes, were unable to do. Your team this year has shown inconsistency at times, but they have pulled together when it has counted, holding everyone off to win the ACC championship. Singler, Scheyer, and Smith have been awesome, and it has been great to see the emergence of Brian Zoubek as a presence in the paint.

Let me get to the point of my letter. As you may or may not know, I am getting married in July, and while that is still a ways off, I would like to request my wedding gift from you now. While you have not actually received a Save the Date or an invitation, please know that, if you are available, you are certainly invited.

As a gift for our special day, I would love to ask that you win the NCAA Championship this year. But that seems a little much. So instead, I'll merely ask that you take it to the Final Four. No embarrassing losses to Louisville, Purdue, or A&M. If there is a rematch against Villanova, please take your rightful revenge and knock them out of the tourney.

So to sum up, early wedding gift -- Final Four. Oh, and if you DO make it, and could swing courtside TICKETS to your games? That would be spectacular as well.

Good luck and God bless.

Sincerely,

John Pearson

One Blogging Moment

Alack and alas, March Madness is officially over. The Tournament has ended, with the dreaded North Carolina making it a lopsided, and incredibly boring, victory. However, this was good news for Joel of So You Want to Teach, who correctly picked UNC as the winner. His "Mariachi Madness" entry in the ESPN pool has won him the History Channel DVD set! Joel, I'll send that spinning your way sometime in the next few weeks.

Even more exciting than that, CBS must have read my letter and listened, because the One Shining Moment video was great! It was by far the best one I've seen in over a decade, marred only slightly by the croaking of Clark "Frosted" Kellogg at the end. Thank you, CBS!!

Today was the 5th grade math TAKS test, and it was an INCREDIBLY long day for someone who had to monitor the exam. Like me.

I'm going to watch One Shining Moment one more time, then I'm going to bed.

An open letter to CBS Sports

Now that March Madness has begun and the crazy, wonderful, sweet, sweet tournament games are underway, I feel that it is as good a time as any to openly petition CBS about something that has bothered me for many, many years.

I am not going to begrudge CBS for their overall coverage, even though way back when, when the tourney was covered by ESPN, you could watch every game if you so chose. You might have to stay up till 4AM to see a rerun of the 2-15 blowout, but you could still watch your team if you wanted.

I also applaud CBS for their recent step of getting rid of Billy "Fudge" Packer, a man who, admittedly, knew his stuff when it came to college basketball, but who also had the disposition, personality, and charm of a rotting jack-o-lantern. I am SO thankful that I will not have to listen to Packer claim that a team is losing merely because they are playing inside a dome or that no team has a chance of winning without 2 swingmen.

No, what I want to address in this letter is the crowning jewel that comes at the very end of every Final Four weekend. The recap of the entire tournament known as "One Shining Moment."

One Shining Moment used to be 3 minutes of pure brilliance, capturing all of the highlights of the entire run of games. It used to be one last chance to see every awesome dunk, every blistering blocked shot, every bone-jarring charge.

However, over the past ten years, it has become a mere shade of its former glory. Does anyone truly consider a shot of a cheerleader clapping a "shining moment?" Does anyone in his right mind actually think that a highlight of the tournament is two drunk fans high-fiving each other??

And I almost don't even dare mention the debacle from about 7 years ago, when some (obviously drunk and/or high) CBS exec decided to trick up the video by adding visual special effects. Thank you, but when a player slam dunks the ball, I really don't need to see a big glowing ball of energy come out of his butt.

Anyway, CBS, I entreat you... When putting together this year's One Shining Moment video, PLEASE adhere to the following criteria...

Buzzer beaters are a no-brainer.

Slam dunks are next in line. The harder they shake the backboard, the better.

Players running down the court, holding up a finger in the "we're number 1" gesture makes for a nice feel-good moment, but HAS NO BUSINESS being in the highlight video.

Close-ups of high-fives and lingering shots of crowd reactions are acceptable. . . If the tournament is shown on the Oxygen Network. On CBS, get that @#*) outta here.

Save the cheerleader shots for a separate video titled "Girls gone Mad-ness" -- DON'T put them in the Shining Moment video!!

OK, so just to recap. If you want to restore One Shining Moment to its former greatness, pack it full of dunks, blocks, dagger shots, and hard fouls. Get rid of the cheerleaders, the fans, the highfives, and the spheres of light coming from nether regions.

I trust that you'll do the right thing, CBS.

Tickets wanted!

Hey everyone, this post really has nothing to do with teaching or education. But I'm wondering if anyone out there happens to have, or know how they could get, a pair of tickets to the NCAA men's basketball Final Four in San Antonio this season?

I entered the lottery selection to get a couple of tickets back in August, but I was not among the fortunate who were selected. I know that I could buy a pair of tickets off of Stubhub.com or Ebay, but those are hardly reasonably priced.

So if anyone has any alternatives, I'm all ears!

Thanks in advance.

March Mathness

Hello boys and girls! Today was the last day of the regular season for college basketball (as was unfortunately witnessed in the Duke-Carolina debacle), which means March Madness is just around the corner!

I have set up a group in ESPN's Men's Tournament Challenge called March Mathness. If you would like to join my group and pit your bracket picks against mine, just click the link and create an entry. You won't be able to actually make selections until March 11, but you can go ahead and join my group in the meantime.

Hope to see you there! It's Awesome with a capital A, bay-bee!!