summer stuff

Summer theatre = fun as usual. Gotta love Fiddler! We have a very good cast and this year have more people qualified for parts than we have parts to give out. That's a plus.

Got called for jury duty in mid-June. I was called once before but couldn't serve b/c it conflicted with something important at school. Now it just conflicts with ESOL classes, which I'm happy to be forced to miss.

ESOL classes suck. These are courses required by the state of Florida for public school teachers who come in contact (ie. have on their rolls) a student labelled "ESOL" or "ELL". Those stand for English for Speakers of Other Languages and English Language Learners, respectively. I have literally never met a teacher who did not despise this requirement. It's not that we don't have a legitimate desire to teach ELL students effectively. I honestly think we all want to teach all students effectively, and if a student has a special need we want to address that need effectively. But ESOL is universally hated by Florida teachers.

I am required to take 300 hours of ESOL training because I am an English teacher. Some teachers require 60 or 120 hours instead, depending on their level and subject matter. Secondary English teachers luck out with a whopping 300 hour requirement. Each course is 60 hours long, so we have to take 5 total. We have a couple of years from our "first contact" with an ESOL student to do this. I left the country for a year and my clock kept ticking, so I wound up "out of compliance," which means they can actually FIRE me if I don't get the hours by next August. I have done one class and am now taking my second.

So what's the problem? The trainings are horrendous - repetitive and pedantic. The thing is that teachers are trained to include students with all sorts of special needs in our classes - gifted, ADD, depressed, medicated, drug addicted, abused, slow, fast, and every other exceptionality. Actually, every kid has some kind of special need. The ESOL classes basically repeat to us exactly what we already know how to do - ESOL students have needs. Get to know the kid and his/her family (if possible), include the kid, give accommodtions as needed. DUH. So we spend 300 hours hearing about things like allowing extra time for some types of assignments, allowing reading of native-language texts for choice reading, etc. We don't get this kind of training for other students.

It's also insulting becuase, in high schools, students who simply speak NO English don't get placed in regular English classes. They are placed in ESOL self-contained courses where they are taught in their native language and in English until they are proficient enough to move up. Then they are put in a regular English class AND kept with ESOL programs to help them. THEN they are placed in a regular English clas and continue to get ESOL program support for things like final exams and writing assignments. To go from one level to the next the child must pass both written and oral tests to demonstrate readiness to move up. The ESOL teachers are trained thoroughly. So why the rest of us have to do 300 repetitive hours is beyond all of us.

The class sucks. I'm too tired to write more about it tonight.

Things with Andrew remain confusing. I love him. He loves me. He doesn't live with me. He is getting ready to go to Colorado and grade AP exams. He isn't sure about our future. I don't want to break up. I love him too much, and I know I always will. ::sigh:: Life is hard sometimes.