Thursday, April 29, 2010

Odds and Ends Thursday 51

We’re in the middle of mid-year exams, which is awesome because work-wise, it’s half days all week. Also, I don’t have to teach. But the other side of that coin is I come home every day with a huge pile of tests to grade. The load isn’t nearly as bad as it was last November, but the final tally will probably be somewhere around 200. Surprisingly, I find grading to be the most loathsome part of teaching. Lesson-planning is a drag, and disciplining students is really annoying, but neither compares to the drudgery of grading papers. What a snooze. Here are some other odds and ends from the week:
  • I just finished grading the exams for my year 10 English class. On part of the test students were given a choice of essay topics to write about. Essays on one popular topic, “My grandfather’s birthday,” had a similar progression. They would start with, “I really love my grandfather,” and then they’d go on about his birthday. And then things would take a turn. “And then he died.” Whoa. One kid even wrote, “And then the next day, he died.” Usually there’s at least as much ink about the death as there is about the birthday.
  • NBC’s “Community” is really funny. I’ve watch 11 episodes in the last 24 hours. I hate grading papers.
  • Cheers to SamoaTel for fixing my phone line in an extremely timely fashion. I filed a complaint yesterday, thinking it would take weeks before anyone showed up to correct the problem. The guy showed up today. It turns out the problem was with the switchbox far from my house. I can use the Internet from home once more. Hooray!
  • I was sitting out in front of Lynn’s faleoloa tonight eating a chicken curry pie (Never had one before. They are delicious.) waiting for the rain to stop. A wall of torrential rain moved down the street. It was like you could draw a line between where there was downpour and where there was sprinkling. Rain here is amazing.
  • A year 13 from last year came into my house without knocking on Tuesday to ask me to help her sister with calculus homework. Thank goodness I was clothed.
  • While proctoring tests the last three days, I’ve had to confiscate one student’s test each time because s/he was talking. Each time I’ve then waited for everyone else to finish and leave the room, and then handed the test back to the student to finish. It’s been a pretty effective tool.
  • I watched “The English Patient” tonight. That movie’s great. It seems to get better with age.
  • I did the New York Times crossword puzzle for April 29. I haven’t done one in a long time, but I did pretty well. Joey 81 through in a little help. The clue was “______ metabolism” and he figured out the answer was “basal”. Thanks Joey.
  • I lost the key to my computer lab. I’ve been using my pule’s key, which means I have to ask him every time I want to go inside my classroom. I think I might start using my own padlock. I have an extra from when I moved in. What did I do with my key?
That’s all I got for today. It’s late and I’m exhausted. I hope you’re well. No pictures today.

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