Friday, Monday, and Tuesday

The last three days have been pretty uneventful, just trying to keep the girls motivated to keep working. One interesting thing happened yesterday while I was observing a different math teacher, Ms. Wooster who teaches 9th graders. This class wasn't as bad as the other math classes taught by women i've observed, but it still was wonderfully managed. Students still talked out of turn and were obnoxious and rude to eachother. Ms. Wooster chose to talk over them instead of waiting until it was silent. To get them to be quiet, she would simply say their name to remind them to stop talking out of turn. At the end of the class, she asked me if I had any questions when I was thanking her for letting me observe and so I asked her about any discipline policy to deter students from talking out of turn. I tried to be non-threatening and curious explaining that all of the other classes I'd observed had the same issue. I just said, "What stops them from talking out whenever they want?" and she couldn't really answer me. She said it was something she needed to work on. I didn't mean to put her on the spot or make her feel like I was criticizing her teaching, but I was curious. Today was a good day because I was able to help Porsha with math and with a paper she was struggling with. I enjoy working with Porsha because she responds to my questions and accepts my help. I attempt helping some of the other girls, but after my suggestions they still seem lost. I can only do so much aside from doing their assignment for them. In the morning I attended a 9th grade advisory meeting on racism. Michelle, the assistant director, led a discussion and activity to begin discussing racism. The 9th graders have been having issues with students calling eachother racist, so the teachers organized a meeting to learn about what it means to be racist and to give the girls a forum to voice their opinions. It didn't take long for the students to be engaged and actively participating in the conversations. Michelle controlled the discussion which was a physical activity where the girls moved to different sides of the room based on how felt about a statement Michelle posed. One of the statements was "I know exactly what racism is" or "I have no idea what racism is." The students decided where they stood on the continuum and stood in that designated part of the room. The activity was extremely interesting, but unfortunately the bell rang and they had to go. Michelle did a tiny debrief, asking the girls if they would be interested in doing something like this again. The rest of the day I continued helping Porsha and I also helped another senior Mari with some math.