Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

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Drunk on anger

July 29, 2010

It isn’t often that I write about the dark side of my students though they tumble into my school with long unspoken histories. Most of them have been arrested more than fifteen times and that’s only counting when they got caught. When students get kicked out of the residential rehab it is often for drug use but sometimes it’s because they’ve become angry, even violent. Christopher left yesterday. I ran into him on my way in to work and he said he was leaving to go to another program. “I pushed someone,” he said. Christopher has a mohawk and small curled goat horns tattooed above his hairline on each side of his head. I heard he pushed an older guy on the stairs during a scuffle.

Christopher would come in to my school drunk on anger. If he got frustrated with a math problem he would storm out rather than ask for help. I worked with him to practice multiplication on paper. He was making slow progress in his arithmetic, but had no patience for the learning process. Standing beside his packed bags, Christopher expressed sadness in not being able to finish his math studies. I didn’t buy it but I tried to be supportive.

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Police blotter

May 21, 2010

Today my Diogenes, who has turned out to be a pretty terrific student, asked if he could write a letter of intent to be allowed off property. He asked me to print a copy and I was so struck by it I read it aloud.  “It reads like a police blotter,” I said. Here is an excerpt:

On May 13, 2010, on a Wednesday, Vincent, Fernando, and Emilio went to a book signing at the Library. During the reading these three students spoke out and asked questions during the Q&A.  A teacher at a charter school approached them to see if they would like to be guests at her school to speak to the kids about gang prevention. The teacher offered to pick up the students and bring them back.

Diogenes, your case is convincing. I hope you get to speak at the school.

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Jaded, harlequin, fable

May 14, 2010

Terry is getting ready to leave the program. She is already off parole and trying to secure housing. Terry is transsexual, male to female. She’s beautiful in the most androgynous way, both delicate and handsome. I made it clear from the minute I met Terry that she was safe in my class. There would be no off-hand remarks, no sotto voce slanders from the other residents; there would be lots of freedom to “play school” as Terry called her time in class. Terry sometimes picked out vocabulary words for our class, flipping through the pages of the big red Webster’s, and I’ll miss this. Who could resist her flair for spelling lists that included: jaded, harlequin, fable, bottomless, astride, gadabout. Today, my supervisor told me I need to start teaching vocabulary that appears across the curriculum, words like dependent, challenge, and adjacent — boring!

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Midway

February 17, 2010

Carlos knocked on the back door of my school today. “Can I come in? You know I split and I’m not supposed to be here but I was wondering if you could look up my scores on the GED test I took two weeks ago?” Carlos looked different. He had cut off his dark curls, he looked…conservative. He told me he was living with his family and had a good job.  I looked up his scores. He passed all five sections of the GED, but he failed the exam because he was short 20 points.  Carlos scored 2230 and he needed a score of 2250 to pass. His average was 446 and you need a 450 overall to pass. Heartbreaking.

Still, he was optimistic. We both agreed he should retake the writing section. He blamed his low score in this area on a malfunctioning pen they gave him. “I gave you a brand new pen for the test,” I said as I handed him my card. “Call me when you get the results on the re-test.”

Carlos giggled. It’s odd to hear a grown man giggle but I got used to it and will even miss it a little.

Posted in adult education, education, GED, parolees, students, teacher, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

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A minus-minus is a plus

January 29, 2010

Carlos is excited. He will take his GED exam on Tuesday. He’s spent 250 hours preparing for the test in my school. But as he reminds me I am not enough help when it comes to math. He has fellow residents at the rehab helping him around the clock. He got a hold of a white-board erasable marker and is practicing pre-algebra on the mirror in his room. I imagine them all gathered around the mirror: “A minus-minus is a plus. Any number to the zero power is one.” And you thought addicts only used mirrors to snort cocaine? Carlos giggles when he gets a question right, as if you just gave him candy. I’m anticipating his big day too. Stay tuned, the test is just around the corner.

Posted in drug recovery, education, GED, parolees, rehab, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

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78 words

January 18, 2010

A new student says he has a low reading level but makes his money counting cards; says he has been kicked out of several casinos, can count up to 5 decks at once. Meth and more meth. Carly told me she had her pregnancy terminated because the baby wasn’t developing. Rain and more rain. Even adults need to be read to. I might read The Little Prince to my students, the perfect antidote to Avatar. Hope and more hope.

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The teacher is in

January 15, 2010

My students often rely on me as a confidant, though we are taught nothing is confidential in our line of work. Somehow the fact that I am not parole or corrections puts them at ease. At the rehab students often tell me how they are doing, they check in. Today A.J. told me he was very unhappy, thinking of leaving and using, in this case crack cocaine. I steered him toward support, peer counselors and big brother types that are always available to talk to. Isn’t rehab great. He came back later to work on his spelling and thanked me for encouraging him to talk to someone. Another student Cory came in, his face all flushed and pink from crying. He admitted in my ear that he told on his friend who was being thrown out of the treatment center. Seems Cory told staff this ‘friend’ had brought a gun with him to the rehab. “You did the right thing,” I told Cory.

Remind me to put ballistic vest on my wish list for my birthday.

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