OH MY GOSH...

Can you say crazy day?

Hectic day?

How about...

batty day?
deranged day?
beat myself over the head day?

Yeah. It was one of those. Things I know for sure: - Students did not turn in their during reading assignments. Technology decided to completely renounce any connection with me starting.... 1st period. Good thing the books we're reading are ultimately the most captivating part of it all - cause the fact that most of my students couldn't take their eyes off of me or their noses out of their books was the best assessment I could use to see if they were on-task.  - I'm going to kill The Outsiders if I keep reading it like this. We got through 10 pages today after doing our journal write, attempting to send an assignment, establishing new procedures for students getting their novels at the beginning of class, explaining how students will know if they have an assignment.... Yeah. 10 pages. Were they a GREAT 10 pages? Oh yeah. These kids were eating out of my hands. Still - I don't see a way that we can read the whole book in under 4 weeks while still completing all of the other assignments necessary like vocabulary, background information, critical thinking... GAH. I hate it - but I think I'll have to try some chapter summary, show movie clip kind of options. Oh the days of my idealism - thinking I could teach 4 novels in a year.... (don't be mistaken, I still think I could, even after today. I just have realized how IMPOSSIBLE it would feel).  - My 8th graders love my voices. Downriver has some characters from lots of different places with lots of different personalities. Rita, the don't-mess-with-me-New-Yorker, got laughs out of my students when I read her dialogue. Loved it.  - I'm being worked-over. I had a new student come to me today asking if she could transfer to my class. I asked why - thinking that would be enough and she would be honest with me - and she said she had some class changes and her schedule didn't work out with her old English teacher. Today, said English teacher comes into my class, asks if I have this new student, and says that I was lied to. Yup. Her schedule worked fine to stay in this teacher's class - she just didn't know anyone in the other class and wanted to transfer to a class where she did know people. So, my BS-radar might be much more off than I had anticipated. Never even saw that coming. And now I'm feeling like a dope for not speaking with the other English teacher about it. I mean really - wouldn't a "together" teacher have talked with her old English teacher about the student before giving in blindly and saying "Yes, of course! Totally fine!"  - I need a tool that works. Desperately. We've used Edmodo - it was great, but, with the iPads, I couldn't figure out a way that students could download an assignment from the library, work on it, and UPLOAD it back to Edmodo to submit it to me. That is why everything got emailed. Well guess what got disabled over the break? The Mail App on the iPad. So, they introduced this new program - iAssignments. I thought it'd be great. I can push out my assignments to all of my classes, they can open it in notability, work on it, and resubmit it back to me. There's no way to give them individual feedback through the program, but it was an option. Now? iAssignments is the most temperamental app I have ever worked with. It works for 5 students in the class, then randomly shuts down. Works one period, not the next. And the classes/teachers haven't been updated, so any of my new students can't see assignments I've posted yet. Oh - and some students just can't log on. Period. Great. So, today, I'm learning about iTunesU. Maybe I can create my own class there and THAT will work. I have no idea. I'm just trying what I can. But if I choose a new program, I'd better count on using another class period to teach students how to use that technology.... Vent over? Maybe.... It really was great to see so many of my students - including my non-readers - engaged in the novels today. I'm excited to see what they have to offer.  I'm gonna spend the next 5 minutes breathing, crossing my fingers for my next two classes, and listening to some tunes. I can do this.  Here's to achieving what sometimes feels impossible to achieve. You better believe I'm gonna do it.