I *just* realized the problem with teaching junior high: the boys and the girls are very, very different creatures. I mean, obviously, right? Even in my 20s, I don't understand men. But at 14 years old, they are at such a different developmental stage than the girls are, it's amazing that everything manages to hold together until high school, when the boys start to catch up.
Example: they LOVE body humour. I coached the grade 9 boys last night at a volley ball game and they couldn't stop making jokes about the ball bag, which they called the ball sack. Who wants to touch the ball sack? Who wants to reach in to the ball sack? Miss J, Evan stole my ball sack! No, it never gets old. When I showed them the serving line up and number 6 HAPPENED to be playing next to number 9 in the back row ... well, it was mayhem. Today, I sent an email out to the team congratulating them on their hard work ... and apparently even the word "hard" is funny.
And then the girls look at them, roll their eyes and continue waiting patiently for them to grow up.
I'm up to my nose in report cards, planning, coaching, meeting and teaching right now. I had a great class today with my grade 9s (yes, the very same ones) about corporations and I felt like I was flying. Good days are so good here and when things go right, I'm convinced that I have never been happier. When things go wrong I feel defeated. Most days are somewhere in the middle.
On an unrelated note, today, while talking about the subjectivity of perspective with my grade 7s, one student made a comment about his perspective on uniforms He drove his point home by saying, "if you dress like a slut, you feel like a slut." My jaw almost dropped to the floor, but I pulled myself together enough to take him out into the hall and ask what the hell he was thinking. Where do 11 years olds get this stuff?
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