An Unexpected First Day of School
Fingerprints
have been completed, and it has been deduced that I am not a criminal. With
that out of the way I was able to complete the application process for becoming
a substitute teacher. The last thing to do was a TB test. After they poked my
arm and determined that I did not have tuberculosis, they sent me straight away
to the district office to turn in my final applications. The time was 8:45…
Alright, everything is in order. Are you willing to start today?
What
Well, I know you didn’t sign up to sub for junior high, but
they really need someone to sub for this English class there.
Uh, sure? I mean, I did major in English…
Great! Here are your instructions you better get over there
now class starts in five minutes go
It was
late-start Wednesday, so class started at 9:00. I had very little time to get
dressed into fancy clothes, make my messy hair look somewhat presentable, and
drive over to the school. Fortunately when I got there, I discovered that the
teacher was still there, and would be there the rest of the week. They only
needed a sub there to sit in and watch because the actual teacher was waiting
on some kind of test results, so he technically
wasn’t allowed to teach so they technically
needed to have someone else there. This was easy for me; I was basically his
assistant for about a week, grading papers or going around checking on in-class
work. There was one day he didn’t need me at all so I read The Giver, a book they were going over in class.
This was
also good experience for me. I was able to observe the teacher, see how he
handles his class in dealing with discipline and instruction. With this
knowledge I felt I was able to sufficiently run the class when the teacher was
actually gone one day the next week and the class was all mine. However, junior
highers are ruthless and much harder to control than I thought. My throat
really hurt at the end of the day because I had spent the whole time trying to
talk over the kids who wouldn’t shut up.
I only work
if I get a call at 6:30 in the morning with instructions on where to go and for
whom I am subbing. If not, I get to sleep in and watch more episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars (which I’m
trying to finish so I can watch Star
Wars: Rebels, both in preparation for The
Force Awakens in December).
This last
week I only got called twice, both times to Kaweah High School, the
continuation school for Exeter Union High School. For those who don’t know, a
continuation school is where they send the kids who have failed too many
classes or been sent to detention too many times. But based on my experience
however, it seems like most kids were there because of attitude, not academics.
Trying to control them wasn’t actually much different than at the junior high
school. The kids who wanted to work, did, and those who didn’t, didn’t. The
only difference was that I kept telling them to keep the profanity down and put
their phones away. The junior highers didn’t have to put away any phones, just
Kendamas, a yo-yo type toy of Japanese origin that is apparently the new fad.
So now that
I’ve subbed at the two hardest places to sub, going to the regular high school,
or subbing at an elementary school will seem much easier (probably). I like
that subbing allows me the opportunity to try out different age levels of
teaching. I’m still unsure if I want to go into teaching at all, but this is a
good way of putting my feet in the water. It’s a bit annoying actually that
everyone assumes or expects me to go into teaching. There are many other things
I can do with an English degree. I mean I guess I’m okay with possibly teaching,
but I think I’m just so stubborn that I want to come to that conclusion myself.
I would really love to work with movies or TV, writing scripts or creating
stories or storyboards. I’m just subbing for now to begin paying off my
impending school bills.
Other Stories
Fire is not always
good
I know that
I often joke about my proclivity for pyromania, but in California right now
there is an actually serious fire going on (which I did not cause by the way).
It’s been all over the news, though I honestly don’t actually know too much
about it. All I know is that it’s come dangerously close to many of my favorite
places: Hume Lake Christian Camps, Sequoia National Park, and Wilsonia Village
(where the family cabin is located). I would be really sad if I were never able
to visit these places again. Though I appreciate fire on some levels, I do not
like the amount of damage it has caused both in the mountains and down in the
valley. The smoke and ash from the fire has travelled down and gotten trapped
in the valley, causing the air quality to be even worse than it already was. If
you are reading this, pray for rain. California needs it both for the fire and
for the air.
Mac
After much
research and a lot of consideration on both sides, I have decided to go with a
Mac for my next laptop. My old laptop isn’t broken, but it had been not
performing as well for about a year. I figured I should get a new one before my
other one breaks. There were a lot of reasons I chose this over a PC, though
when I think about it now, I think one of the main ones is simply that I wanted
to get a Mac all along anyway. I’ve never owned a Mac, so I figured this would
be a good opportunity to try one out. Sure, Macs are a lot more expensive than
PCs, but I figured that since I had the money I might as well. Plus, I still
have a few months left of my grace period for my student loans. However, I noticed
when I was looking for different models of Macs that most of them are now
phasing out the inclusion of an internal CD/DVD drive. Most of them now are an
external drive which must be purchased separately. Fortunately, I was able to
find one that still had it included. What I ended up getting is a 13-inch
Macbook Pro. I’m pretty happy with it so far. I purchased more hard drive space
for this one because in my old laptop I always had a problem with running out
of space. I still have a ton of things to figure out with this computer, but
that will be my fun project to work on (since I’m not working on any homework).
Return to Cedarville
Speaking of
no homework, it’s been nice having a break from school. But one thing I miss
about school is the people. The people I hung out with for the past three years
became like a second family to me, and I truly missed them when I left in May.
That’s why two weeks from today I will be there once again. Since most of my
friends there are now seniors, this is really the best time to visit.
Unfortunately, since plane tickets from California to Ohio are so expensive, I
don’t think I’ll be able to visit more than once. I will be there from Friday,
October 2 to Tuesday, October 6. While there I’ll divide my time between my old
unit, my brother, former teachers and classmates possibly, and my uncle and
aunt. If you’re reading this and you’ll be in southwestern Ohio during those
days and you want to hang out, let me know! I don’t expect to write another
blog post until after I’m back from the trip, so you will hear about it then.
