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Spokeswoman from the Komen anti-cancer folks explains why fighting breast cancer is so important: "Because everyone has the right to live, to fall in love and get married, to watch their kids grow up, all of that ( Read more... )

So naturally I got to work around 6:45 AM and set to work preparing for today's field trip, which had no rationale to it whatsoever except a show of school unity and a photo op: we spent four hours and at least $8,000 buying matching t-shirts for everyone in the faculty, staff and student body, then taking buses downtown, spending half an hour or ( Read more... )

Last night I was discussing with S the difficulty with tweens of convincing them that there's more to creating something than just seeking someone's approval. There's a fundamental conceptual gap that has to be crossed in order to realize that there's a difference between a mere test and a product, and that your WORK creates something that isn't ( Read more... )

Every now and then I catch myself doing something thoroughly out of character. It's usually a good thing. Last night, and last week, definitely ( Read more... )

A letter is about to go home to all the families explaining that, starting next year, the Level IV Gifted curriculum will be the default curriculum for all kids at our school. In short, we're going to teach ALL the kids as if they were not just Gifted but Top Level Gifted, including those kids who were already struggling and failing with the ( Read more... )

I spent much of the day worrying that the aggressive ex-lawyer mom of the sweet kid I was bending all the rules & my own spine to give another 24 hours to turn these C grades into B's would come in blazing and tell my boss how shameful it is that I let her boy fail to do his homework yet again...then his much mellower dad came in to help us plan ( Read more... )

Dear LJ -

You are not Facebook.

You are not a gaming platform.

You are making an ass of yourself.

love,

Manko

I fall awake at 4 AM thinking about the kid who has turned in NO classwork OR homework all quarter, thinking I have failed him, we have failed him, his parents have known this for weeks and haven't shown much interest in it, the whole situation is full of FAIL and it's not even halfway through the year and there's no reason to think stuff's gonna ( Read more... )

Had lunch with a coupla Birthers. They asked if the restaurant had any food. The waiter showed them the menu, but they insisted on seeing the original. These things can be easily forged, after all ( Read more... )