It was the end of a great first week as a SIATech math teacher. Progress was slow for a few students, but they still made some progress. Only two students were a major concern for me. The boxer was moving slowly through practice assessments and inching his scores higher as I’d pass by, see what he didn’t know, give him a quick lesson, and let him loose on his practice assessments again. The student I’ll call Boomerang was not making progress though.
His nickname, Boomerang, was earned, because whatever any teacher teaches him, he twists the lesson around, finds fault that the teacher or test writer caused, and never takes any responsibility for his own failings. When I asked him how long he’d been taking this one final assessment on Module 1, he showed me his paperwork and said, “January. I don’t see why I have to pass this final test when I passed all the unit tests. These tests are wrong, too. They’ve got wrong answers.”
After he left at the end of the period, I started taking his Module 1 Final. Nope, the answers were all right in that assessment. I just needed to teach him a few techniques, so he could pass that assessment. I rummaged through a lot of Pre-algebra workbooks and tagged pages for Boomerang to do for practice. Then today I explained that he should do these pages, and he’ll do much better on the assessment. I gave him a brief lesson as well that he watched via a suspicious sideways gaze.
When I returned to grade papers, I watched him not work on the workbooks and start the computer assessment again. He completed that final assessment and failed again. I walked over and said, “Do you know that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result?”
“Are you calling me insane!”
I calmly reassured, “No. I’m explaining to you the definition of insanity. Doing the final assessment over and over again for three months and expecting to pass it without trying to do anything different is insane and will just make you angry. I’m not calling you insane. Don’t take my statement personally.”
Class ended and soon my teaching day ended. On the way home I had an extreme need for kayaking. I needed to get out into the wide open spaces and focus on all the beauty in this world! Driving directly to the Sacramento Aquatics Center at Lake Natoma, I borrowed a rental kayak, since my private kayak launch area was overtaken by a sports team bonding session, and got into my peaceful zone.
I found a lot of birds. I saw a type of wood duck with a cool, rust-colored head with tufts of feathers like a horse’s mane on the back. I found egrets nesting in trees with cormorants. Down south in San Diego the cormorants nest on ocean cliffs and the egrets nest in the wetlands. I’d never seen them nest in high trees before and in such a large nesting colony.
The vultures were all nesting next to the trees with the egrets and cormorants. I guess even other birds don’t like vultures! They are not only honor less scavengers; they’re the ugliest bird, too.
Canadian geese are all over Lake Natoma. They’re usually in mating pairs.
After discovering a well hidden rope swing, curiosity lured me to explore the abandoned water pump station for the former river----which has been partially submerged when the waters of Lake Natoma rose.
It dawned on me as I was paddling that I had no idea what time it was while I was paddling back. My waterproof watch was attached to my kayak’s seat. This borrowed kayak had no watch. I used the sun as a gauge, but I didn’t know what time the sun sets. I paddled so hard that my elbows actually started to feel it, but I made it back to the Aquatic Center before they closed the women’s locker room at 7pm. They actually kept it open for me, because I arrived at 7:08pm. At least I have a spare car key on my lifejacket at all times, so I could have gotten home if the front desk left.
P.S. To my blog readers: If you want to support a struggling math/engineering teacher and author, please buy my first book, "The Romance of Kilimanjaro," soon to be followed by my second book at: https://www.tatepublishing.com/bookstore/book.php?w=9781613464960 Thank You!
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