Current Events Woes

Taking our cue from Time's Person of the Year, The Protester, "protest" is our current events subject this month. We're not all the way through the grading of the written reports or the hearing of the oral reports, but already we have evidence of the process having gone awry in several ways.

One of the subjects was the Tea Party. It was nestled there on the signup sheet (done in outline form) just ahead of The Obama Campaign as a Protest Movement, and just after the protest movements of the 1990's. I had stressed to the students that they were to be sure to consider the context in which their subject appears--not writing only on the words in the subject line. Imagine my astonishment to hear that one class was treated to a speech (a.k.a. oral report) on the Boston Tea Party. "My subject was pretty easy," the student announced afterward in my hearing, completely without shame.

Wrong century. Not current at all. Protest? Certainly, but still wrong. This discovery came in the middle of typing class, and the whole class roared with laughter--the hapless student, right along with everyone else.

Another student wrote about protests in Egypt, with nary a mention of Tahrir Square and the toppling of Mubarak. That's sort of like writing about the summer of 2011 in Kansas with no mention of the heat and drought. I will finish grading the paper after the necessary information is added. I had stressed that the "country" reports were to focus only on events during 2011, so I don't feel remiss in requiring this. I did learn something though about several other protests in Egypt. I didn't know those had taken place.

I have felt greatly in need of a bit of levity of late, so these chuckles came at just the right time.

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Yesterday in Home Environment class I apologized for the way I looked and talked with my cold sore. "Uh oh," it's a sign of stress," one student commented.

"I know," I answered. I did not comment further.

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Yesterday the temperature soared to 70 degrees and we had the windows wide open in the classroom. Even so, some students were too warm and wanted to start the fan.

"Sure," I said, so someone went to turn it on. The blades didn't start turning right away, but as we watched, the oscillation function kicked in and the fan slowly wagged its head from side to side, still with the blades motionless. We laughed at its miserable performance and soon gave up and turned it off entirely.

I had traded out our old fan for this better looking one after I got tired of looking at the old one's perpetually downcast appearance. Couldn't lift its head to save its life. I guess I should have settled for humble and functional, if the only alternative turns out to be handsome with no heart.

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Today we had weird hair day and clash day all rolled into one. On short notice, students came up with some real doozies. I sometimes participate, but this year I completely forgot till I was ready for school, and not at all ahead of schedule. I traded my olive green sweater for a teal blue one, to wear with my avocado dress. It looked sufficiently terrible to pass as a clashing combination. I'm a little sorry though that I missed my chance at a skunk hairdo (I've got the white stripe down pat), or a giant form of the "tin" my mom used to use for the toddler girls in our family, or a dark brown braid to wind across the snowy hair that is usually visible. Perhaps another day.

"I wish you wouldn't have forgotten," one of the students kindly said. "You had such a cool hairdo last year." I don't even remember what it was.

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Pilgrim teacher's retreat starts tomorrow evening at Oasis. Good timing.