Sub-sistence

Wednesday was one of those specials days. That is, subbing for a gym teacher. But first, let me talk about the days before this one. Monday, I took a full day job at one of the furthest schools from me. It was a bit of a mixed bag as well as a slight disappointment. I knew this was an 8th grade teacher so I was prepared for that. What I wasn’t prepared for was the fact that this was a half-day job that was mistakenly entered in as a full day, so I ended up only working half the day. Actually only a couple of hours. This allowed me time to seek a half-day elsewhere, but I didn’t find one. I did find a half day for Tuesday and took it knowing that a job would be hard to find that day since most school districts had off for Veteran’s Day, but not for Monday afternoon. The mixed bag for this day was the teacher taught both mat and science. When he came back, he taught social studies. Jack of all trades here, like an elementary teacher?

So next day I didn’t set my alarm as my half-day was in the afternoon. Just after six, r-i-n-g! Job assignment opened up for the morning. Cool. So after quickly eating breakfast and getting ready since I had to be there in an hour, I filled in for the special-ed reading teacher at a junior high. Unlike my two periods yesterday, I had to work four periods. Breaking even I suppose. These were actually two block classes so it didn’t seem like four periods anyway. Then I was off to my afternoon assignment. Arriving there forty minutes early (it was almost down the street with a start time an hour after my end time at the other school), I sat in the lounge and had an early lunch. This assignment was pretty much like my assignment last week for two days. I met with a couple of groups of kids in the teacher’s mini-room, typical of some special ed pullout teachers, and went to help in another room later on. Well, I tried anyway- it wound up being another pullout. The last students of the day didn’t need me, so I had an extra break at the end.

Back to Wednesday.  The gym teacher was still there when I arrived, so he explained what he wanted me to do with the kids.  They started off with laps around the gym then moved into kickball.  I had 5th grade at the start, and they of course knew what they were doing.  The second class had a lot of home runs because the teacher set the bar for home runs pretty low.  At least for the older kids.  I’m sure with the younger ones the zone is fine, but with so many 5th graders kicking home runs it really needed to be set higher.  This reminds me of playing kickball outdoors when the weather is nice.  It is really different.  No walls, no ceiling, no automatic home runs, no ground rule doubles when the ball hits the basketball backboard…  Anyway, back to the present.  The second half of the morning was Kindergarten.  After they did their five laps, we practiced basic motor skills like hopping, skipping, galloping, etc before going into kickball.  From 5th to 5- quite a difference.  Now I had to teach them kickball, but they can only take in so much at once.  The real teacher will have to reteach them I’m sure, adding rules I didn’t cover.  There were a few who had played before, but to most it was a new thing.  The afternoon was quite different.  There is a student teacher in this class who was out observing another student teacher in action at another school in the morning.  In the afternoon, they swapped positions and came to this school.  Kickball struck out and the new home run was dodgeball.  Bad baseball analogy aside, it wasn’t regular dodgeball, but a variation with two medics on scooters (those square things on four wheels sat on by gym students across the nation, not a Razor if you’re wondering) who can tag their teammates who are out to get them back in.  Additionally there are pins set up at the back of either side that can be knocked over.  If all of them get knocked over, the other team wins.  During the afternoon I of course took a back seat in all of this, but when the student teacher inserted himself into the game, I just had to join the other team.  :twisted:  Too bad I am terrible at most sports, dodgeball included, but it was a blast anyway.  I’ll have to join in more in the games on the weekends at church.

Today was 7th and 8th grade LA/Lit.  More on that tomorrow though since I will be doing the same thing.

It happens from time to time that I will only get a half day.  Due to the advent of online systems though, it is relatively easy to accept a job and then later cancel when a better one comes up.  I don’t do that too often, but a half day is one reason I try.  Since this half day was for the afternoon I could try even the day of, as long as it’s early enough in the morning that they can get another sub easily.  As it worked out though no other job was to be found.  I was up until about 11 and then woke up just after 6 to try again.  Nothing.  Finally, at around 7 I decided to give up and go back to bed, mostly due to not sleeping well the last couple of nights.  As I write this I am exhausted again.  I don’t know why I usually wait until the end of the evening to write.  Oh, well.

So as it worked out, not only was it a half day but it was at probably the furthest school from me, at the opposite corner of one of the further districts.  It took me about 25 minutes to get there.  It was in one of the mentally impaired rooms, but I knew this at the outset as I have subbed in this school many times.  It was easy.  Silent reading followed by computer time.  Then they wrote a letter to a classmate that had transferred schools (moved I guess) a couple of weeks before.  The writing varied, but generally the kids were pretty slow, letters not well-formed- but remember these are mentally impaired kids.  One couldn’t really write at all, but that didn’t matter.  It will get sent with the rest to the girl’s new school.  After that they went to language lab where it should have been a nice rest for me since it is run by another teacher.  Nope- I was told I would be needed in another classroom while their teacher went to a meeting.  It was another mentally impaired room.  I had worked with several of the boys in that room before, but oddly enough I do not remember ever being in that room.  Maybe from last year?  I will have to go through my past positions to figure this out.  I do remember subbing for that teacher in the past so maybe my memory is just bad.  Anyway, they cooked some muffins.  Well, the boys only got to stir a little, taking turns, but that could be considered a life skill for them anyway.  One of the IAs brought them to the lounge to cook in the oven.  In the meantime, we played some bingo while waiting for the muffins.  The teacher still wasn’t back from her meeting by the time the original class was back from the lab, which by the way is simply working with the kids on communication skills in case you were wondering, so the kids actually stayed in the lab a little longer since I couldn’t be with both classes and a certified teacher or sub is required to always be in a classroom.

As it turned out the teacher never did come back so I stayed until the end in that one room.  I’m thinking the language teacher came back with the other class after a while, but I’m not sure on that.  I do know they came back eventually.  I pushed one of the wheelchair-bound boys to the bus at the end of the day.  It’s interesting that at that school there are about a dozen short buses lined up at the end of the day, half of them wheelchair-capable, as the kids come from all over the district.  So that was it, end of the day.  Until tomorrow folks!