Yesterday I was pouring over and filling out the literature that was sent home this summer for Boy-Child#1's junior high school registration that is coming up next week. Yesterday was not a good day for me, emotionally, to be taking on such an endeavor. I was all PMS-y. But, as any PMSing woman knows, you can't talk yourself out of these things when you're in that state. At least not without a heavy dose of Prozac. So when I started having a mild panic attack, I kept telling myself that I was fretting over nothing, dammit! I was irrationally worried about Boy-Child#1 not being able to figure out his locker combination in gym class and picturing the rest of the guys standing around like, "Dude, what's wrong with you?". And then I'd tell myself, uh, yeah, everyone has been able to figure that out. But still my heart was beating a wee too fast and my breath was coming a little too quick. Then I got to the class schedule. What monster organized this:
REGULAR BLOCK SCHEDULE - ROTATING PERIODS
- Monday, 8/18 Per. 3, 5, 1
- Tuesday, 8/19 Per. 4, 6, 2
- Wednesday, 8/20 Per. 5, 1, 3
- Thursday, 8/21 Per. 6, 2, 4
- Friday, 8/22 Per. 1, 3, 5
And to think I was worried about a lil' 'ol gym locker combination. Godspeed, Boy-Child#1. May the force be with you.
45 comments:
Um, where you really up at 4am?! I was cursing myself for waking up 15min. b4 my alarm at 7. Poor boy-child number 1, may the force be with him indeed. Oh, i did that meme.
Yes, that block scheduling is the most f---ed up idea since...since...skimpy swimsuits. Not only does it leave kids sitting in class too long each day (I mean, how much can you learn in one sitting, really?); it means that if you miss a day of school, you've missed 2 classes worth of material in math or whatever instead of 1. I feel sorry for teachers coping with keeping junior high age kids interested for a full 90 minutes or more.
I don't understand it at all. But it looks very scary.
I remember when I went to high school we did have a crazy schedule, which they made us figure out at the beginning of the year and write out in different color markers for each class. With pretty borders and all.
Seriously. I still got lost all the time.
Holy crap! They instituted block scheduling at my old school, but it was long after I left those hallowed halls. Can you imagine two hours of math class, though? UGH!
But the school's probably right. He'll have it figured out in no time.
Maybe the schedule IS the locker combination.
I feel the same way...My extreamly shy boy will be starting middle school with NO FRIENDS...we moved last year, and he just didn't connect with anyone...So that, with the new schedual (which changes every 6 weeks!!) and locker, and riding to school...AAARRRR...Maybe I should just home school and save me the stress...
LOL at the schedule is the locker combination.
At our middle school, they have A days and B days, and A weeks and B weeks. The kids picked it up instantly. I never did. And I'm a substitute.
I have those bad dreams about college. Finals week and I forgot to attend the class. *shudder*
Yah, my boy had block scheduling when I lived in Boston. They get it right away, I never could figure it out and eventually just had to believe he knew what he was doing.
Our jr. high also has block schedule, and apparently the teachers and the kids love it. Enough time to finish an entire science lab, enough time to get homework done, and the kids are really saavy about knowing where to go and what to do.
Remember, these are the toddlers who figured out how to program the VCR (remember those?), and who can text message while skateboarding.
We have difficulty ordering a margarita and taking our eyes off the waiter's crotch. I'm just SAYIN'. The kids can handle it.
So like what? They are in 3 classes for like 2 hours each day? My COLLEGE ENGINEERING LABS weren't that long for chrissakes! I don't get this.
KEEP BELIEVNG
Um, that scedule made me throw up in my mouth a little.
Tell your young grasshopper to go with the force and be strong.
Is that a normal schedule now? Wow. I would have to have the thing laminated to my handy-dandy trapper keeper for the entire semester. I thought I was the only one with dreams about a project due and I couldn't find the class...
When I first saw that thingy, without having read the post yet, I thought you were sharing your Aunt Flo tracking scheme. I think it would make more sense used that way.
WTF? Looks to scary for me - I have a couple more years till this...Thank God!
That's like a college schedule. When I was in high school, we had a rotating schedule where only periods 1-3 and 8-9 rotated. Periods 4-7 always remained same time (because they were lunch periods). So, whatever you had period 1 one day, you had that for period 2 the next day. Whatever you had for period 9 one day, you had first the next day. It made it so that a teacher wasn't suffering through teaching Trig to a classfull of zombies everyday at 8am and so that teachers didn't get the same group of kids for the same class at the end of the day. It *was* tough to wrap your brain around it, but once you started doing it, it was fine. That was high school though, not middle school!
Blah, blah, blah...a lurker w/o a blog
I is confused ;)
when i was a kid i had dreams about being late for the first day of school. now i have that dream for my kids. and every year it gets more complicated (going to school, not the dreams).....
Don't get me started on block scheduling. That has done more to decimate school band/choir/orchestra programs than pretty much anything else. Ticks me off to no end.
When I was in high school, we had mod scheduling. And if anyone reading here has had that scheduling, you know how effed up it can be. And how awesome. Having 15 minutes free in the middle of the school day? I could go to the bathroom and not have to dash off! I could swing by the library! I could go down to the cafeteria for a snack! Or, as I always did, I could go hang out in the band room. Once a band geek, always a band geek. ;)
I was SO scared about my locker when I got to high school. I never had one and I was bad with combo locks. If I got it, he can get it.
Oh goodness. I never heard of this. Soon I will be fretting over when my 4yo has to go to his new school year after next to start kindergarten. I guess I have a little while to go before the Block sched. That does seem silly.
WOW going to school in August seems so foreign to me - we always go back after labor day. But we only get off the end of June.
I had a a block schedule for middle school, but the numbers were IN ORDER. And with your son's, it looks like periods 1, 3 and 5 get a whole extra day? What about 2, 4 and 6? On our fifth day, we just had all of the classes for a shorter time.
I survived, but look at my brain now. It's not doing so great.
One day, that's all it takes them. I've sent 4 kids through middle school and I still never figured it out. But then, I didn't need to!
What kind of crack were they smoking when they came up with that schedule? And will they be letting the children smoke it too so that they can understand it?
May the force be with him is right!
OMG Standing Still has me laughing out loud on my couch. That schedule is seriously the most facocked thing I've ever seen. Also, which lucky classes get 6 hours per week, while the others only get four? I'll bet it drives those teacher BATTY to have to adjust their lesson plans to try to do 3/2 the work in 2/3 the time. Or whatever the math for that is.
This is too funny. We had block scheduling in high school but junior high? I guess that he will get used to it.
And, I thought 4th grade was going to be tough.
You need an abacus and a protractor to figure out the middle school schedule.
LOL! I still have nightmares about my school schedule and locker combination. 20 freaking years later. I can't imagine going through that all over agin!
I think I'm sleeping through Hope going to high school.
THAT just made my head hurt. I can't even imagine having to figure that out.
My thoughts are with Boy Child #1. And also with you.
When I taught fifth grade and my kids were terrified at the thought of middle school, I would remind them (and now you):
Everyone is starting Jr. High for the first time (well except for the mean older punks), they are all in it together. He may get lost, his friends may get lost, but eventually it won't seem to big and scary.
Before you know it, he'll know the place and their wacky schedule like the back of his hand.
My sons first day of jr high school I got mobbed. I went because he wanted help with his locker. OMG the kids didn't get it. They were hollering this sucks, mine is broken. And, one by one I opened them up. Just remind him to spin it in between codes and if he messes up spin it 3 times to erase what you did. That was the part they got stuck on. My kids didn't have that crazy schedule but did have a day planner they handed out called a "binder reminder". If they don't give him one, buy one that single thing saved us. They were required to write any assignments in there and when they were due, for themselves and their parents.
How does that schedule even work?
Oh man, those poor kids. I despise the block schedule and the modified block schedule and the split block schedule and the bipolar hybrid block schedule. Actually, I think I made that last one up.
OK, so if it's the FIRST class of the day, on the FIRST day of the week, why IN THE WORLD is it called period THREE? Was ONE just too obvious a choice? Why not call them periods Clock, Glove, Cake Mix, and Doorknob? It wouldn't be as confusing. And why do they rotate order? Do they think that if they confuse the kids, that will keep them from making out in the hallways and knocking each others books to the floor? How many teachers show up to class prepared for the wrong group of kids? I certainly would. :-)
Actually, I think this is the sign of a rockin' awesome junior high school. Teachers and kids drool over this block type of scheduling because it cuts way back on wasted time and homework and reviewing and, well, I wouldn't know because we have the same schedule you had in school (based on collegiate Carnegie units, blah, blah, blah) and it rots.
Tell your son that Mrs. Thatsthewayitis says that he is going to a school run by very smart people, and he will love it (even if you don't). tee hee
Oh sweet mothah. I just mentioned junior high in a blog and that made me a little sick...then to see this? Yikes. Poor boy-child #1. Much luck to him!
Just reading this is freaking me out. I swear my pulse increased.
Don't worry - I'm sure your son is super smart and will master the schedule right away.
I taught at a school with 8 class periods, only we only taught 6 classes a day. The day was divided into morning classes (A,B,C,D) and afternoon classes (E,F,G,H). The lunches were called X,Y,Z. The classes rotated and dropped one morning class each day and one afternoon class each day. Also, the lunch period rotated according to whaever the student's first afternoon class way. Here's how it went: day 1- class A, B, C, then lunch, then E, F, G. day 2 - class B, C, D, then lunch, then F, G, H. day 3- C, D, A, then lunch, then G, H, E. etc. Okay so lunches rotated this way: week 1-X lunch goes first, then Y lunch, then Z lunch. Week 2 - Y lunch goes first, Z lunch goes second, etc. etc. You figured out when to go to lunch depending on what was the first afternoon class you had that day. So, for example, you might actually go to class like this: B, C, D, F(split), lunch, f (Second half), G, H.
I have no idea how this cockamamie idea ever got approved. You may think I'm making this up but I'm not. I taught at Ursuline Academy in St. Louis. I think they still do it the same way today.
My point is this: Every girl, even the freshmen, had it mastered by the end of September. Because they do it every day. If they get confused, they just find a friend who's in their class and say, "Do we go to lunch now? Or homeroom? Or what?" Friends are good that way.
Texan mama~ My brain hurts.
That's seems pretty FUBAR'd if you ask me. Luckly we still have regular 1-6 periods every day here on the east coast.
(Well wait a minute - maybe we don't - it's been a while and my kids aren't there yet....)
Okay...so really....WHAT?
can't. concentrate. still trying to. figure. out. that. schedule.
Obviously, it DOES take a rocket scientest to do stuff at junior high!!
They had a similar schedule when my kids were in school. My older daughter literally never knew what day of the week it was....
OMG! I've had that same dream....except maybe the naked part. Except now I'll probably have the naked part. Thanks.
And I've never seen scheduling like that. Good luck.
The high school I work at keeps trying to do this. I don't even know that I'd be able to figure out what to teach on a regular basis. I can't imagine trying to figure it out as a kid. Because the raging hormones apparently aren't confusing enough.
What the hell? That's a school schedule? does it change the following week so that periods 6,2, and 4 are on MWF, and periods 3,5, and 1 are on TTh?
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