oh my god so tiredToday I wasn't on the side of the building that I expected to be on... which means two things: lower functioning students (always entertaining, more on that later) and more money. The other side I'm not even sure what it's for exactly. It's a post-secondary program that has students who arent quite special-education level.
Today really went quite smoothly. In the morning the students come in, get their stuff put away, and go down to breakfast. When they come back, they get out their morning work and are on their own until things actually start around 9. A good portion of the class was gone on work sites. I've gotten to go and do some interesting stuff with some other classes on occasion. I've gone and folded cloth napkins at a restaurant before, I've gone to Red Lobster and folded silverware up in paper napkins (so if you ever wondered who does that tedius job... now you know- (at least in saginaw) it's the mentally disabled).
I didn't go to the job sites today. I was with the groups that remained at the school. In the class I was subbing for, there are 3 aides in addition to the teacher. One of the aides was a sub too. So the other sub lady and I were in charge of keeping rotation going on the morning classroom activities.
Activities included:
- cards with outlines of paperclips on the edges- real paper clips had to be lined up in the outlines.
- sorting activities with colors or shapes, usually involved placing like things in groups.
- combined sorting and counting activity that no one seemed to want to do.
So that was pretty much the morning. When I had my lunch break, I made a hot pocket and then I read french and ignored the faculty lounge gossipy talk until it was time for me to head back to class.
Directly after lunch they have about 45 minutes in which they socialize. So during that time I sent text messages to assorted people. Apologies to anyone who wondered who the hell was sending them frowny tired messages around 12:15 - 1:00 EST. It was me. (which reminds me
chaosinaskirt, I need to type a little about my dream in a bit). The first work portion of the afternoon I spent with a group working on recognizing and identifying (with limited success) signs one might find inside or outside. (No parking, Walk, Don't walk, Caution High Voltage, Wet Floors, No Smoking, Escalator blah blah blah). The second work portion of the afternoon was spent playing a board game with 2 students. It quickly grew tedious. The board game was supposed to help with assorted life skills. Each player would roll the die and move his piece along the board. On all but 4 spaces were questions. Some dealt with signs (similar to the first activity) and some had questions like "Where should you keep your money", "Should you get into cars with strangers", "How do you use a payphone?", "What is your telephone number"... and so on. The other 4 spaces were "draw a card" spots. Each card had similar questions. The one boy did not know any of the answers to any of the questions... except for the not going into strangers' cars one... I think. He can't really speak very understandably but I'm pretty sure he said no. So after the 3rd time or so of him landing on the "What is your telephone number?" space and him just shrugging his shoulders I was really ready for it to be done.
Then they had free time. Then they went home.
I think tomorrow in the AM there will be a movie with popcorn and in the PM they will play games. I have to say that if there is any day when one can be happiest to sub in a special education school, it's friday cause you don't do a goddamn thing.
This brings me to my next thought. Tomorrow it would be nice if a few people would send me text messages. If you send through your phone or through AIM I'll be able to reply (my AIM is on my info- it forwards to my phone when I'm not signed on and I can reply). I can receive for free and its only 10 cents for me to send- and seriously, after a certain point I just don't give a quack about a few dimes. If you want to do by phone you can email me for my number (provided you think I'll give it to you... here's a hint, if I know you on here or I know you in person then yes. If you message me on yahoo, NO)
and the dream.
I wish I remembered it better, really... I only remember the end right before I snapped awake. I was with
chaosinaskirt and she was encouraging me to drive recklessly and there was this huge hill and you couldn't see where you were going until you got over it and the point was to just speed so fast you could cruise through the intersection that was at the bottom of it and hopefully avoid being mashed. I think the point was to just go for it and not worry. I actually remember how it felt. It was quite exhilarating. And as soon as I made it past the intersection I was awake- a few minutes before my alarm would have gone off. Interestingly, in my dream my brain identified her by her LJ name and not her bustie name... which surprised me once I was awake and thinking about it.I apologize that this is structurally and grammatically fucked in places. I'm just not in the mood to make it pretty.
EDIT: ok I couldn't take it. It's a bit better now.
