I have already posted on my junior high science teacher’s most famous reprimand for students who step out of line.  Today, I discovered that he may just be getting rather lax in his distributing of “15” in his old age.  I found it ironic that Shelby should bring it up because I thought that he had retired a few years ago… my mistake.

It seems that my oldest niece stayed up WAY too late last night.  She was sleeping in class.  Her friend sitting next to her attempted to revive her to no avail.  Moments later, Mr. Stoll went to her table and (apparently) quite gently nudged her and revived her.  HA!!!! I got fifteen for two separate incidents (and ALMOST a third) in my day for less than that!!!

A few years ago, I had a cousin who passed through the hallowed door of the science teacher.  I would periodically hear her relate tales that would have led to her writing spelling words as well.  I don’t think she ever got the pleasure.  To this day, I think Charnel was his pet.  It sounds like he has another.

A few weeks ago, our kids were chronically misbehaving.  Our oldest, a tween, was sassing back and saying “no” too much, her younger sister (the “spirited” one) was throwing lots of tantrums and trying to cause trouble with her sisters, and our youngest daughter was constantly upset and insecure about the continuous chaos in the house.  Desperate times call for desperate measures, so one day while the oldest kids were at school and the younger ones were sleeping, my husband took off work for an afternoon of “toy culling”.  This is a drastic discipline measure we only use in emergency situations.  It is time-consuming and intensive labor for the parents, but well worth it, at least in our house.

Toy culling consists of us going into the girls’ room (the three oldest girls share one big room, and our baby boy isn’t yet old enough to cause trouble) and taking out every toy.  We leave the tv, computer with educational games, books, and the clothes and board games in the closet.  Everything else goes – dressup clothes, doll clothes, dolls, stuffed animals, all the little miscellaneous toys that can really junk up a child’s room quickly, etc.  If you have lots of time, you can sort it all by what you want to keep and organize the rest, but we are very busy people and so we just took all their junk and put it in our son’s room for now.  He’s a baby who wakes in the night so he’s still in our room.  When it’s time to move him into his room, we’ll have to clean it out obviously, but for now it was a means to an end of the horrible behavior of the girls.  We leave the board games, and they know that they take one out and put it away when they’re done, just like the books that are left.  If the rules aren’t followed, anything that’s left on the floor in subsequent days gets culled.  You need to check their room everyday, and it’s imperitive that you follow through with rule-enforcing.  And for some reason, this process really works.  I don’t know what it is…  Perhaps a feng shui effect where the much more pleasant ambience of the room and the mucho extra space is what leads to the kids being in better moods and hence, less trouble and more obedient.  It could be the fact that there are less toys over which to fight.  Maybe they’re happier not having it constantly hanging over their heads that they’re going to have to clean their room.  But I don’t care what the reason is, the toy culling has worked wonderfully the 3-5 times we’ve had to set aside a chunk of time to do it.  My kids are now putting their dirty laundry in the hampers that are provided, and their trash is going into garbage cans.  Also, their room is staying clean, and I don’t have to worry about it staying that way because they don’t have anything with which to mess it up!  And, as the behavior improves, they can earn their toys back – you don’t have to spend money to get them any special reward PLUS the kids feel senses of accomplishment = WIN/WIN.  Toy culling proves that less is more, and it helps put a damper on the sense of entitlement that can cloud the good attitude of even a generally well-behaved child.

I think I first read about the method in a parenting column in the newspaper.  I’m not sure which expert gets the credit, but I do know that I highly recommend toy culling!  And oh yes, early December is a perfect time to do this – makes room for the burst of new things they might receive for the holidays!

When I got home from small group last night, I did a check again for jobs, and came up with one district that had two postings.  One was closer, one was one of the furthest schools from me.  People who know me know my love for driving, or rather how much I love to not have to drive much in traffic.  So the choice was obvious of course- I took the second one.  Say what?  You’re thinking, “Didn’t he just get through saying…?”  Well, yes, but I mentioned in one of my comments a couple of days ago that there is a position I vowed never to take again.  This was for one of those teachers.  ELL at that one middle school is a nightmare I wish never to repeat, err, again.  I actually subbed for these teachers (two ELL teachers on the team) a few times but I finally had enough last year.  My theory is that discipline is far more strict in Mexico (these were primarily Hispanic kids) and so when they come to the US and enter our education system, we are far more limited on what we can do for punishment and so it’s like a cake-walk to them.  Our worst is no problem to them as long as they only break rules and not laws in which case they finally have justice meted toward them.  In any event, coupled with typical low-income for this area they are very difficult to work with.  There is another middle school in the district, but oddly enough I have never actively chosen to not sub for ELL there.  Maybe the difference is the grades are separated over there but all combined at the first school.  6th-graders learn how to play the system sooner from the 8th-graders since they spend a lot of time in the same room.  In any event, as possible proof of this theory one of the days a student actually threw his binder at another student’s head (in retribution).  In front of me while I started to deal with the initial problem.  Besides this, there was just a constant lack of respect overall.

Never again.

So of course that same position just showed up for tomorrow, but no alternative assignment.  I am still looking for something for tomorrow…

Of course there are even worse positions.  A nearby district actually has a lot of gang activity at their middle schools, though it is really not as bad as what I hear of from the city.  I no longer sub in that district.

One of my favorite quotes has always been one for which I have no idea for whom credit should go: “Heroes are ordinary people who make bad decisions at good moments.” Surely with my wide-ranging blog someone must have a good idea from what source this comes from. I have thought long and hard for several years and have come up with nada.

Today, I was fortunate to attend a memorial service for a man who could be seen as a hero in the eyes of many in the very small community I was raised in. I know of at least one individual who considered Mr. Peverly their personal hero, my Uncle Bob.

The memorial service was a bit unusual. The atmosphere was very light and dare I say, fun. The Elementary School gymnasium was adorned with pictures of high school sports teams, trophies, and a batting cage. Over the speakers, music from the 1950s played (“Yakety-Yak,” “Rock Around the Clock,” etc.) Far from the slow, sober music one might expect for a funeral.

Mr. Peverly taught high school math from 1956-1988. He was perhaps better known as the coach of baseball, basketball, and cross country. Unfortunately, he retired from teaching one year before I entered high school. I did however have him as a substitute for French class; which he told us he knew absolutely nothing about. A good thing for him it was mid-term exam day.

Mr. Peverly and my uncle have had a very long, interesting relationship. My Grandfather Swary passed away when Uncle Bob was 15 years old…. years before either of my older brothers were born and before my parents were married. Being the youngest of 3 (and the only boy), Bob needed the guidance of a male figure. Because he saw in Bob someone who was more inclined toward sports than classroom studies, Mr. Peverly took him under his wing and nurtured him into the man he is today.

As one of the three speakers at the service, Uncle Bob told one very interesting story from his youth (one my entire family knows by memory). It seems that during his senior year, the varsity baseball team lost the Regional finals game 2-1. That night, Uncle Bob and some teammates decided to go and “Break some training rules.” They went out and got drunk. The next day, Robert was called to Coach Peverly’s office where he was asked (with his mother beside him) if he indeed did “break training.” Since Coach was one of the few people he could not lie to, Bob confessed. Punishment included sitting out the rest of the season (there were still regular season games left to be played) and being ineligible for MVP honors (for which he was sure to win and was even scouted by the KC Royals ballteam). Years later, Coach Peverly went to Uncle Bob’s house with the MVP award.

Everyone has a hero who they either looked up to in their youth or someone they continue to look to for inspiration. It was very comforting to see someone I have grown to respect give tribute to one of his heroes.

And to prove I do have some prowess in math Mr. Peverly taught math for 32 years at one school. If only he had stayed another 4 years. He must have known there was another Shaffer boy coming and ran.

Or incomplete reporting? A story in today’s paper talks about a choir director who quit after the school disciplined him by reducing him from director to assistant director, accompanied by a 20% pay cut. What was his infraction? He let two students who “recently violated the school’s co-curricular code” dress for a concert though they did not actually perform. School code says they could not even dress for the event. Wait, they dressed for a performance?? How… how could the director allow this? Hang him by his thumbs! The students didn’t actually sing? Well so what? Hang him up anyway! To me, this punishment is only a little less ridiculous. However, before I get all bent out of shape, I have to admit to myself there may be more that the paper isn’t reporting, such as were there any problems before this that may have caused the punishment to be more severe than it otherwise would have been? However, the article really gives no indication there could me more than meets the eye.

Prospect High School choir director quits over punishment

On a side note, the former choir director at this school was convicted a couple years ago of sexual abuse of some of his students. It was all over the paper at the time and I actually had been in a musical with him at one time. So had someone else somehow involved at this blog site- you know who you are. 🙂 Just thought I’d mention it even if it’s not at all relevant.