One Crazy Week

So this week was very crazy and chaotic. It started Monday. I arrived at school to be greeted by a substitute, who after I stated that I did not know that we were having a substitute responded "Oh, they didn't call you!" Over the weekend my cooperating teacher had not been feeling well, so her husband took her to the hospital. There they determined that the reason for not feeling well was having had a heart attack. She was in the hospital for the week and is now at  home on bed rest. The substitute stayed for the week and will be with us this coming week as well. We are not sure what is happening after Thanksgiving. We are all hoping that Mrs. Gabriele will be able to return to school.

On top of Mrs. Gabriele not being at school, the week was crazy in many other ways. On Monday, we had a fire drill while the students were moving between the two classrooms and we got outside to realize that we were missing two students. We did end up finding them. We also had one of our students come in with poison ivy, so he was itchy and disruptive all day. Then one of the girls went home because she had cold sores in her mouth and was extremely uncomfortable. Later her dad called the school and told us that she had lice. We then had to take all of the students down to be checked for lice by the nurse. While we were standing outside the nurse's office the girls were freaking out. I tried to calm them down by telling them that it was not the end of the world. They responded by asking me "Wouldn't you be freaking out if you had lice?" I responded that "We did not know if any of us have lice and that we probably don't. Also, if I did have lice I would not be screaming in the hallway. I would get the special shampoo and do whatever else I needed to do to get rid of the lice." Then the principal came out in the hall and reprimanded me that we were not discussing it with the students and that a letter would go home. The students all knew why we were down at the nurse's office because the substitute had already told them. I was just trying to settle them down, so that they would not continue to disrupt the entire school.

The rest of the week went relatively well compared to Monday. Dr Jarrett came in on Thursday to observe a lesson. I did not really have a lesson to teach at the time that she was coming in, so I did the best that I could to make a lesson out of reviewing what an action verb is and what the past, present, and future tense are.

On Thursday, we had a bus drill. The students seemed to be doing fine and then one of the boys screamed. We then found out that a few of the other boys were verbally bullying him and telling him that he should just go home. The substitute reprimanded them and dealt with the problem. We then continued the bus drill and finished too early to take them to lunch. So we walked them down the hall and back to use up the time.

Friday was a half day for parent teacher conferences. Mrs. Gabriele's conferences have been postponed until she is back, but not all of the parents knew this. Some of the parents of the ESL students showed up because the letter telling them that conferences were going to be rescheduled had not been translated.

All in all this was the craziest week that I have experienced. These were just some of the highlights of the week. I truly hope that the coming weeks come and go with less excitement and that Mrs. Gabriele is able to return soon.