Foot in Mouth

Yesterday, we had a parent thing. They called it something like "TAKS Training Camp." It was meant to inform parents about how we prepare their kids for TAKS and what they can do to help us prepare their students.

I don't know if I've mentioned Mr. C before. He's our new 6th grade Assistant Principal. He's really cool. He's Mexican American, and he's a little different than the people we've had before, but he's not revolutionary.

When we first met with him, he, of course, did the obligatory speech to introduce himself and yadda yadda. I was taken back when he said our school's name. Most people never say it the way he does because the way he says it is with the Latino accent. He also referred to his daughter as "mi'jita." With that, I felt really comfortable around him and the feeling has only grown since.

So when he gave me the basket with door prizes and tickets, I replied, "Why me? What did I do?"

"I'd give the to Orozco, but he'd steal them. Es una rata." (He was kidding of course. We give Orozco a hard time.)

I was glad to have something to do. I felt useful standing by the door greeting parents and handing out tickets. Being in charge of this also meant I got to draw for prizes. Halfway through the presentation, Mr. C came up and told me to hold off on the door prizes for a bit because we didn't have enough to do one after every presentation. Since he whispered this to me, the coach didn't know we weren't doing a drawing before his presentation.

As coach walked up to the promethean board, he said, "Is there a door prize?"

The only words that came out of my mouth were, "Nope, you are the door prize."

As you can imagine in a room full of women, there was a lot of laughter and a lot of red on my part. Fortunately, he blew it off and continued. My colleagues who were standing around me couldn't stop laughing, and I'm sure I resembled a ripe tomato.

You'd think that'd be enough foot in mouth syndrome, but nope. Not for me, I'd have to shine the light on my a little more.

When our enlightening training was drawing to and end, I sauntered up to the front of the room with what I thought was the final prize, a $25 Wal Mart gift card. I allowed Mr. C to draw the last number, but he was confused. He'd put a card in his pocket thinking it was the one I had.

As I said before, foot in the mouth once a night is not good enough for me. When Mr. C said he had another one, I said, "Well how many did you hide? You got one under your hat?"

Everyone in the library cracked up.

All day today, the A-team (the administration) teased me about my foleys. I don't really mind it. I could have been written up.

Doing the Right Thing

I haven't been able to log into my account for the longest time. Anyway, here is a post I wanted to post a couple days ago. I have another post I've been working on too, but it's not ready yet.

Last week, or maybe the week before that (I get the past all mixed up these days), Mr. C walked into my class and told me that my name had been drawn for the ground breaking ceremony. (By the time the kids I have now are in 8th grade, we will be in a new building.) The principal has asked that we nominate people to attend, and I had nominated our team leader.

Last year, like me, she was a new teacher to the school. However, unlike me, she has been teaching for about ten years. So for her, it was a transition. She quickly caught on and began to create an environment that I was really comfortable with. She’d always check up on me when she hadn’t seen me making jokes or I’d been hiding in my room too much. This year, as team leader, she has done that and more. She makes our meeting useful and fun by keeping us on track and having some sort of door prize drawing.

So when Mr. C told me that she had drawn her name and how much she wanted to go, I knew what I had to do. I didn’t tell him immediately, but later during the day sent him an e-mail asking if she could take my place. At the end of the day, the principal sent out an e-mail naming the teachers that would be going to the ceremony.

She was confused since she’d drawn my name and neither Mr. C nor I had said anything to her. During d-hall duty, a lady walked in asking for a student, and I walked her to the office so that someone could page her daughter. When I walked in, Shelly was standing in Mr. C’s office. Upon seeing me, she said, “You didn’t have to do that!” and gave me a big bear hug. I knew right then, I had done the right thing.