My (relaxing?) weekend away

 

This is a photo I took of the Silver River last weekend. It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon and I wanted my friend, who had never been, to meet the large, alligator snapping turtle who lived on the kayak/canoe launch down the River Trail. 

I have been visiting this particular state park for 20 years or so and every time I walk down this trail and step on the launch, which is metal, this turtle sticks his head out. I am sure it is due to people feeding him, which you are not supposed to do, and I worry that some child is going to reach out for him and have their hand taken off. 

But I can't control others or their children as I found out last weekend. There were three little girls with their Moms? throwing Vienna sausage to this turtle and then laughing and screaming when the turtle dropped the food and the fish swarmed around to eat the leftovers. I then noticed one child had a stick that she was poking in the water. I told her to stop poking the turtle. Whew, then the adults began, "She wasn't poking the turtle. She was only trying to help the turtle get the food." Are you kidding me? Do you imagine that the turtle wouldn't eat if your child wasn't poking him? The ignorance is so strong. I imagine these were uneducated in any kind of science, but then, that would be judging them. 

At this point I knew I couldn't win the argument because they were going to do what they wanted to do, regardless of what was posted all over the park about not feeding things. 

It reminded me of the last trip I made and my advising an older woman who was obviously a tourist, to not let her little, white, fuzzy dog walk to the edge of the river and down in to the shallow water. I tried to tell her that alligators loved little, white, fuzzy dogs but she didn't listen because, you know, she is entitled to do what she wants. I hope she doesn't lose that dog, but it was obvious, she wasn't listening. 

The next day we went to the other side of the park for a glass bottom boat ride. I have been to many times to count but my friend was new to the park. As we were walking through the Ross Allen area, over the bridge named in his honor, (his Reptile Island used to be here), we both noticed the plastic water bottles thrown over the bridge in to the swamp and said something at about the same time. To watch people have such a horrible attitude that they believe they have the right to throw garbage in this most ecologically sensitive area continues to make me angry but I saved the best for last. 

Why, oh why are they allowing motor boats to come all the way up to the headwaters of the Silver River? Apparently, you can boat on up any springs as long as you only use wake/idle speed. I am stunned and a little bit, just a little, surprised. 

The state can scream about protecting our water but if you are going to allow people to take boats up in to the springs with no thought to the pollution, the manatees, the fish and turtles and the quality of the water, they you need to re-evaluate what your job function is. 

I know the pollution boats cause is an effect that we seem to want to gloss over and once again, the "I pay taxes and am entitled to do what I want, when I want" seems to be the norm, I wonder who in the heck is holding on to common sense and where did those people go that truly love our state and want to protect it. They obviously are keeping pretty silent at this point. 

Political emails are becoming unbearable

 "Jean, I'm falling behind" continues to clog my mailbox on an hourly basis. Does anyone else have this problem?

I have never tried to hide my political leanings. I have always tried to vote for the best candidate for the job and in almost every case, the Republican party is not my party of choice. Because of this, I do what I can during every voting cycle to make sure my candidate wins. Sometimes they do, and other times they are unsuccessful. I do not stop trying.

I am a political junkie. I have loved politics since I told my father I was going to be President after JFK was killed. I was 6 at that time. I dreamed about going to law school and when I went to college I received my degree in Political Science. I never made it to law school and there are way too many skeletons hanging in my closet to ever be involved in a political race but I follow politicians with a magnifying glass. 

On occasion, not very often, I have sent in small donations to political candidates. I can assure you they have never been more than $5 or $10  because I am a teacher, and I live pretty close to a budget. The candidates I do support are normally local or regional. I feel like the national party should have enough money to help the candidate without my small contributions. 

Every day my in box is flooded with political candidates wanting money. Over and over from Minnesota to Georgia, Virginia to Texas, candidates send me emails. I won't even mention the ones from Florida. I get so many from them, I have stopped counting. 

Do I want to defeat DeSantis? Absolutely. Do I think Little Marco and Rick Scott are two of the most useless, corrupt politicians our state has ever elected? Yep, I do. Can I afford to send just $3 or $5 every time I get an email from candidates who are running against them? Nope and them promising the world will end with every ignored email doesn't make them nearer and dearer to my heart. 

Social media, in my opinion, has ruined most normal talk and debate about political races. They do not exist any longer. We search for like minded people and never read anything that is in opposition to the way we think. When anyone tries, the anger and vitriol becomes unbearable. The left is as bad as the right and no one stops and listens to how they sound or what they are saying.

Maybe that is the reason for all the emails. Who can take the time to argue back? Who can discuss the truth or lies which lie in the printed word? Who will take the time? 

I use to read everything I could about politics. The most I see now, politicians are doing nothing but dunning me for donations. So I just send them all to the trash and go on about my day. I find that very sad. 

 

Teacher challenges have become the norm

 

Every day I read about another teacher leaving the profession due to a myriad of issues that we face on a daily basis. Many of these issues are not in our control but many teachers and administrators do not make our job any easier. 

I am not a new teacher. I have been teaching longer than three years and although there were times I wondered what the heck I had gotten myself in to, I have never regretted making teaching my second career. I have been supported by some wonderful professionals through my teaching; teachers who went out of their way to help and administrators who were so wonderful, I hated changing schools. 

I now teach at a Title I school where many of my students are either ESOL or ESE students. Many have just begun to learn English and many have learning disabilities, some to the extreme and others less noticeable. I went back and received my certification in ESE K-12 to help me better teach the students who are mainstreamed in regular classes. 

I also work in a great department (what history department isn't great) where all the teachers are supportive of what we are trying to do. Last year, I approached all the U.S. History teachers and asked them what was the most important thing I could do as a World History teacher to help pave the way for the students to succeed when they arrived in 11th grade. I took their suggestions and incorporated them in my lessons to help the students. Not one of them suggested that to be a good teacher, I should teach them U.S. History lite version while teaching World History. 

This year I have a student who has a SLD (Specific Learning Disability) and he cannot read or write. He can understand language but it must be verbal. He uses programs where he can listen to meaning and it helps him understand lessons. Although his grade is not where it could be, we are slowly working towards getting it up.

I had a teacher come to me yesterday to ask about this particular student and to get some suggestions on how to help him succeed. I offered what I knew and his response was he was receiving pressure to not teach so much of the part of his class that could benefit the student, but to concentrate more on other parts of the curriculum because then the teachers' job would be easier when the students arrived next year. 

I immediately asked him how long he had been teaching and sure enough, it was the 3 year mark. I wanted to tell him to teach HIS kids the way THEY would learn, not because next year the teachers wanted it easier. I tried but as most new teachers, he doesn't want to upset anyone or make anyone angry. He has not learned to have a voice in his students' education.

He will end up leaving the profession. I could just about bet money on it. He doesn't feel he has a voice or is worried if he uses it he will be chastised, even though he loved my ideas for this student. They won't be implemented and this student will probably fail this class. 

We are faced with challenges like these every day, on top of the pandemic, on top of parents who think we indoctrinate children or parents who can never be reached and could care less about their students' education. We have students who never come to school or students who come to school and sleep. We have paperwork and paperwork and more paperwork. Throw in evaluations and meetings to make sure we are good teachers and it is incredible they stay as for as many years as they do.

I love teaching and I am good at it. I normally form great relationships with most of my kids. They continue to stay in touch long after I have ceased being their teacher. I wish all new teachers had that. I wish the bully teachers would go away. I wish administrators would listen instead of shrugging off concerns. I do know that no matter how hard I try, I can't save all the students. I wish new teachers were as outspoken as I was. I think the students would be the beneficiaries of that.