Term One settles in

Fortunately, the veggie plate labs proceeded more or less in order. There was no bloodshed, at least (see previous entry). So we're settling in and picking up the pace.

The incubator has been in the class for 2 weeks now, and the chicks are due to hatch in just a few days. Since this is a long (long) weekend (not complaining!), the eggs and incubator are at home with me. Next weekend, the chicks need to come home with me!

In the meantime, we've started sewing! The grade 8s are making button banners - thanks to the incredible support from our Aboriginal Education people who brought mounds of felt, and then returned with even more mounds of pre-cut animal shapes and letters, so that each student could have their totem of choice and their initials. It's a lot of sewing. I'm not sure how we'll be able to pace it. The students appear to be excited about the project!

The 6/7s are making phone cozies from felt.

We've spent some time on design, and now we're onto practice sewing, with relatively few complaints. Overheard (from the back of the room) - "I'm the best at sewing". Retort from the other side of the class - "You wish". Aside from that, they're working pretty hard and not being terribly noisy about it. Maybe that's just the block 7 class. After the chaos of a very large grade 8 class, and a large 6/7 class, the smaller end-of-the-day group has startled me with their composure. Must remember to enjoy it while it lasts!

Of Bears, Blood and Apple Crisp

In the middle of the afternoon, the principal's tenor came through the P.A. system. The bear is cleared. Business as usual. And I stood there completely perplexed. What did I miss? Shouldn't there have been an announcement stating the appearance of the bear? What had I missed? And when did I miss it?

Eight years at this school and there hasn't been a bear sighting in all that time. Some of the neighbouring schools are plagued by wandering bears all the time. Our side of town, just isn't really bear country.

The students were happy to fill me in - the announcement was before lunch. Although WHEN before lunch varied a great deal. It seems that there was an announcement as I was cleaning up the first cooking lab of the year. No wonder I didn't know there was a bear on campus!

If my first foods lab last year had been like this one, I certainly would have resigned the post, on the spot. Tomorrow is "Let's try to fix this mess and produce an edible apple crisp". I'll settle for an apple soggy.

I gave my demo, explained the salient points carefully, tried to not overload them... and set them to their task. Within minutes I was told someone was bleeding. Not unusual, that... but I scurried over to assess the damage. The patient was a little green. He couldn't tear his eyes from the wound, which was quite hypnotically dripping... into the sink, onto the floor... Yikes!

Switching into First Aid mode, I had him apply pressure, coaxed him to breathe more deeply... all that. Meanwhile, 20 some odd 11 and 12 year olds are on hold waiting for their ingredients, not knowing what to do. I assign a Teacher's Helper, who does her valiant best to deal with the supplies... it's a big job. My patient is still bleeding. I send a runner for help, and I move the boy out of his unit so he can sit down and I try to get the rest of the class running more smoothly.

No, it didn't help. By then, it was really too late for the rest of them. I have a fridge full of apple crisp in various states of assembly. The patient was attended to by the staff first aider, and returned before the end of class, looking much less green.

I may have been a bit green. There was blood to mop up, and while I'm not all that squeamish (I'm a mom, after all), it doesn't take much blood to make a big mess. And I was worried. Cutting your finger with a vegetable peeler must hurt... a lot... so he managed the whole situation very well.

The other classes have been told that no one is allowed to get hurt, at all, that all the turns were used up this morning. Let's hope it gets better. Tomorrow, we have to fix some apple crisps, and the 8s have Banana Muffins to bake.

Will the Poltergeist get the last laugh?

Things have gone missing and have moved, seemingly of their own volition, throughout the year. Mostly, it's just been irritating. The item that worried me was the Chef Knife. I have six, new, not-very-good-quality-but-sharp knives. Okay, I have 5. One has been missing for a few weeks now. I didn't put it in any of my silly hiding spots. The Community Schools group swears that they didn't touch it. I can't see any of the kids sneaking off with it (Really. It disappeared between labs, and they'd have to get into a cupboard and into a drawer.) None of the other staff know anything. It's just weird.

Well, it got a little weirder today. I found a knife. Not that one, either! Actually, I found 3 knives, a chef's knife and two paring knives. They have a decent edge, so I assume I sharpened them this year, and then put them... into my ESL lesson bin?

As I tidied the detritus of the year, I spotted the contents of a plastic tub. "Tchaikovsky? I was going to teach music? What was I thinking?" So, I opened up the bin to rummage through a melange of music books and Canadiana. And 3 knives.

So far, I cannot think of what prompted me to put 3 knives in a bin and then forget about them, for most of the year. I hope I remember. But until I do, the Poltergeist gets the blame.

I should have told them to peel the banana, first

Well, that's it for the year. The last cooking labs are complete and class ends in a few days.

The quinoa brownies turned out really well. The students seemed pleased - or at least satisfied. The last group told them the brownies were gross, so their expectations were low. I don't think you should take culinary recommendations from the group that ruined their recipe. Or the group that measured their salt OVER the dry ingredients. (It's really hard to pick the extra 4.5 ml of salt out of a bowl of dry anything).

The 6/7s made blender smoothies. I'd saved it for last simply because I'd anticipated hot weather, which hasn't arrived. I just didn't want to be baking on a scorching hot day. Four classes of using blenders... they're still a bit iffy about how to wash the silly things, but overall quite good. As we entered the final class, I was feeling pretty good about their ability to complete the lab.

Group 5 erupts in dismay - it's a blender blowout and smoothie ingredients are oozing onto the counter. The problem isn't that the blade assembly is mis-threaded. It's that the blade assembly is sitting, loose, inside the jar. Not attached. At all. No wonder it's leaking!

I get them cleaned up and re-started. (I want water-proof blenders so that I can just deal with a blow out by giving the thing a good rinse. So much faster!) I turn to the group next to them and begin to survey the room. The Special Ed. Assistant swoops in behind me to Group 5. Utters things in disbelief. The boys look baffled. She holds up an unpeeled banana that she intercepted on its way into the blender.

I should have told them to PEEL the banana before putting it in the smoothie. Is it ironic that the next day, some visiting high school students ran past my class dressed (among other things) as a banana?

And that's my first year teaching Home Ec. And you know what? I'm looking forward to next year.

The Applesauce Must Go On!

There are so many good reasons why I should have stayed home the past two days.

1. I am a bad role model. I should not teach cooking labs when I am sick.
2. My classes are noisy, and that much noise on a stuffed up head is very unpleasant.
3. Now, I'm really tired, and it will take me that much longer to get better.

Oh well. I had one good reason why I chose to come to work with a rotten cold.

1. The 6/7s are making applesauce.

Yesterday, one class was cooking, and another was prepping. Today, the final class was cooking. I don't feel comfortable leaving cooking labs for guest teachers, unless we can discuss in advance and ensure that they can and want to deal with it. While I have no doubts that a certain Guest can indeed handle anything and everything that comes up, would she choose that harrowing experience, or would she rather pick up another on-call job? Yeah, I don't blame her either. (I told the kids that Ms. T. could handle the job, but she might not be my friend afterwards. They think that's funny, but they nod, sagely.)

Since this lab involves grade 6/7 student handling knives for the first time, and boiling pots of apples and sugar, I decided to just deal with it.

Good thing! Another teacher in my school was away, and no teacher was sent to replace her. The principal and vice principal covered her class. I probably wouldn't have been replaced either. Yikes!

The kids are actually quite nervous about the knife skills lab. We go over knife handling and safety (especially around dishwashing - and some classes did hear about the time my little brother put the just-sharpened knife in the sink without telling me, and I got cut AND I got in trouble for swearing at him!)

I'm more concerned about the cooking part. Six stoves, each with a boiling pot, and 25 kids who bounce around like Tigger. Anyone who cannot behave sensibly gets sent to the hallway to compose themselves. If they calm down sufficiently, they can come back. (Everybody does - No One wants to miss a cooking lab!)

So... Applesauce lab successfully completed. One injury - not related to either knives or boiling pots (she slipped on the floor during clean up, and bashed her leg on the table, poor thing). The rest of the classes were content to watch Bill Nye the "don't bug the teacher, she's sick and lost her voice" Guy. I love you, Bill. Never change :-)

Poltergeists

Who you gonna call?

It was irritating when kitchen utensils moved from drawer to drawer whenever I wasn't looking.
It was confounding when measuring cups would disappear, then reappear from one class to the next and cookie sheets would hide in plain sight in the cupboards.
But now it's dangerous. My poltergeist is playing with fire.

Wednesday. Block 5. Right after lunch. Ten or fifteen minutes into a knitting session. It's noisy. They don't knit quietly. "TEACHER! That burner's on... maximum. It's glowing red!"

Yikes! The group seated in front of the blazing stove denies all culpability. They appear genuinely puzzled. And offended. They know that this offence is worthy of a visit to the principal.

In their absence, I tested the burner to see how long it takes to heat up, and turn red. Two minutes for the heat to be palpable, almost 4 for it to turn red. The smell is distinctive. It has to be happening during this class. If it were the class before lunch, I'd notice the second I walked in the room. In fact, I'd probably notice before I even left the room. It's not the sort of thing you'd overlook.

Thursday. Block 5. Same thing. "TEACHER! Someone turned on our stove again!"

The only visitors to that group has been the girls from the neighbouring group. Not your prime suspect types either. But, let's be objective. They were at the scene of the crime, so I enquire, quite seriously. "I did it yesterday", confesses one," but I didn't do it today."

Hmm... I launch into graphic descriptions of the dangers of clothing and hair catching fire, and hope that I've subdued them. They seem subdued. Good thing that the boy closest to the scene of the crime has very short hair. Longer hair, or a carelessly placed gym bag could have spelled d-i-s-a-s-t-e-r.

I spent a lot of time thinking about how to avoid a repeat, or worse. At the beginning of this term, I noticed that someone was flicking the oven closest to the exit door on as they departed. I had worried about kids hiding someone's gym strip or math book in an oven the way they like to hide things in the drawers or cupboards. Now the burners.

Should I sneak something onto the burner that smells so that I catch it sooner? Or would that make it worse? If I caused the fire, I'd certainly be in trouble! Maybe I could just switch the stoves off at the fuse box. If I could find which switches control what.

The fastest way to get great answers is to email the other Home Ec teachers via the listserv, who respond with amazing speed, with diverse, thoughtful and sometimes funny answers. Most of the early answers were similar and advised cutting the power to the stoves. Some teachers have a master power switch for the room - very handy during fire drills (something I hadn't quite worked out how to handle).

Friday. Block 5... the caretaker and I spent a long time trying to track down the fuse breakers for each stove. He didn't have any more success than I did. We found 3. Maybe 4 (that oven's not working anway). The others, he unplugged. Just before the end of the block, would you believe it? "TEACHER! It happened again!" At least the power was off this time.

 I do not look forward to unplugging and replugging the ovens each lab, but it's almost summer break. Maybe by fall, I'll have a better idea.

Or I'll learn how to placate my poltergeist.

P. S. My voice is missing. The latest in a rash of mischief in the Home Ec room. I blame the poltergeist.  It couldn't possibly be this awful, rotten cold I picked up.

Bill Nye in the Foods room

I love Bill Nye. I admit this freely and without hesitation. Bill Nye is awesome. That show, on tape, has played a supporting role in my classroom since I started teaching. Enter teaching Home Ec... Goodbye Nye? Not a chance. He's Bill Nye the Home Ec guy in my class now, and we've watched "Germs", "Nutrition", "Agriculture" and I've saved "Pollution Solutions" for emergencies. I do, often, have to deal with the question "Isn't he dead?" (Thank you, The Onion - the students have no idea what you are, or what a parody is, but they've heard the urban legend)  Happily the answer remains "No."

The 6/7s are still happy to watch Bill Nye episodes, and they giggle, or chuckle at the jokes and sight gags. The 8s require an apology in advance -  that I acknowledge that this is too young for them, and a little outdated, but the information is still quite relevant... then they can cut loose and enjoy Bill too.

Today, after 4 terms of Home Ec, and about the 10th showing of "Nutrition" (which really does have some good gags) I found out something interesting about my students: students with autism REALLY love Bill Nye's gags. They are the kids who laugh out loud, even when no one else does. They have huge grins on their faces, and are clearly having a wonderful time. The students who are developmentally low find some fun in the show's gags, but don't really get the jokes, so don't laugh as much.

I'm recommending Bill Nye videos as a diagnostic tool. Wondering if you have autistic students in your class? Show a Bill Nye video. Let me know what you find out! Science Rules!