I don’t know why I have played this game so long. I suppose because I have wanted to do right by the kids. I’ll finish out the year. But that’s it. I suspect I am retiring. Maybe I should plan myself a party.

Eduhonesty: I’ll have time to take this blog more seriously soon. I seem to have readers. If I do attempt to do more with the blog, I promise not to plant insurance pop-ups and promotions for skin care products next to tabs that take you to car ads. I hope to make comments easier, too. I’d have done that sooner but, when I’ve tried, the spam was overwhelming.

Maybe I’ll finish my science fiction novel. I’m not sure what’s next. But I know that I want off the proving grounds. I believe it’s time to retire although I’ll wait a few months on that. I can at least look at nearby schools before I do any official paperwork. I won’t drive more than 15 miles, though. I live in a desirable area for teachers so I don’t know that any options will arise within my little circle.

Time to get dressed. I wish you all a Happy Day, readers.

My last post is part of my attempt to tease out the answer to a mystery: The break room is filled with complaints about testing. Professional development meetings are filled with complaints about testing. The media latches on to the theme at times. Yet while the testing theme spurts into internet threads, excess testing has not quite gone viral. I suspect the lack of virality (sic) comes because many teachers are not unhappy. If we were all miserable, our voices would have been heard by now. But we Whos in Whoville are still waiting for Horton’s response. Maybe that’s because a number of Whos are perfectly happy to test, test, test. Testing comes directly out of teaching. Are there happy Whos who prefer to teach less?

Eduhonesty: “From there to here, from here to there, funny things are everywhere,” as Dr. Seuss once wrote. Maybe some of us actually like this madness. It’s possible.

This post may not reflect well on me, but I feel like it’s time to write this down.

Testing is a major stressor for students. Too much testing early in the day and I can end up herding cats on catnip at day’s close. Students end up feeling jangly, overamped, excitable and even angry. Whether tests go well or badly, student excitement levels notch up, as fight-or-flight reflexes kick in with no place to go except the next period. Evolution has prepared humans to meet threats; we are not good at recovering from the swift changes that prepare us for those threats.

But I can meet that challenge. I can prepare my lesson plan with the understanding that morning testing is best followed by afternoon movement, kinesthetic activities designed to be fun and expend energy. If I loosen the reins, I’m fine, although I may have to hope that one of the many peripatetic “coaches” does not choose to wander in at that time. If I’ve considered the politics of teaching, I’ll channel my movement into small groups to prepare for that observer.

I’ve gone off-topic here. What I intended to write about was the effect of testing on me. All considerations of students aside, I am finding testing easy. I used to do much less testing and much more teaching. Now, a Friday where I test all day is not uncommon. My teams prepare the tests I am required to give. I give the tests. I look at those days in my lesson plan and, while they are no Martin Luther King Day to go shopping with girlfriends and get my nails done, they are definitely a sort of day off. I put on music and we listen as the Titanic cruises to its doom. Often I play CDs made from songs they like. I wander around providing cheer, support and occasional hints, while cleaning the room and updating my files. I do the things I might do during prep time, if only meetings, subbing and random activities did not always eat up my prep time.

Testing days are light days. I have many more of them now than I used to have. In fact, I seem to have them all the time. That calculation from a couple of weeks ago when I spent over half my available teaching time giving tests over a nine-day period? That was a lot easier on me than teaching new material would have been. I read a script. They wrote answers. I read a script. They wrote answers. One portion of one test was boring — I wish they’d rewrite the speaking portion of that test some year soon — but nothing I did was particularly mentally taxing.

I do rely a little too much on the guy across the hall to tell me what I am doing on testing days but he’s obliging. He’s marvelous, in fact. He tells me what I’ve done, what I am doing that day and what I still need to do. I mostly know this stuff already, but it’s reassuring to listen to the plan. You can get in big trouble for messing up the standardized-test-of-the-moment.

Eduhonesty: This post meanders a bit. Here’s my observation/concern: I wonder if I am coming to like testing just because of its effect on my workload. I still object to the crazy test time stolen from learning for the sake of my students, but the truth is that I view that testing day in my lesson plan as a weak version of a day off. I am not teaching. They are only learning to the extent that writing answers down on a test can reinforce those answers in the educational long-run.

A teacher could learn to like all this testing. Maybe that’s why not all the classroom voices are rising up to protest testing’s infringement on learning. If I were coasting, endless testing might suit me just fine, especially if I did not even have to write the test. Some mostly-college-bound districts may be able to deliver scores without extensive teacher interventions. Even where interventions are necessary to success, that full-test Friday still becomes a day to relax for me. The morning test day requires a bit of planning, but may lead to a fun afternoon with the right planning.

I’m doing O.K. I am doing less planning and less teaching than ever before. I plan less because other people are writing my plans and even selecting my materials. I teach less simply because I cannot be teaching while I am testing and, as is evident from recent posts, I am testing a lot.

I am sure that my students would be doing better if I had more time to teach, but my schedule has slipped outside of my control. I fully intend to try not to get fired this year and if I refused to give the tests, I would lose my job. So I test. I teach to my tests.

And I relax into the testing. Since there’s nothing I can do to stop or slow the train, I am simply enjoying the ride.

I checked with my last class of the day. This thirteen-person, small class had only three students with computers at home, and one of those computers was broken. Only one student lived in a home with a full computer set-up. Almost all students had internet access through their phones, but two students had no internet access at all.

A better operational definition of the word “disadvantaged” would be hard to find. My own children were practicing keyboarding before they entered elementary school, and always had access to a computer with an internet connection and printer. They were perfecting internet search skills in elementary school. My youngest constructed a couple of rudimentary websites before she left elementary school. In contrast, my students find information retrieval to be a baffling process at best. A few have problems with log-ins. Many classrooms in my school have only a few laptops to share within small groups, laptops that must be picked up and returned daily.

Eduhonesty: Normally, I stay away from school finances. Money can be overrated as a fix for educational difficulties. Some older, math textbooks are easier to understand than their prettier, new counterparts. Expensive calculators are often overkill, at least before high school. Students don’t need Promethean boards. They can definitely learn from transparencies placed on overhead projectors.

With that said, I’d like to observe that keyboarding, along with computer search-and-retrieval skills, should be taught at an early elementary level. As finances are allocated, getting computers into the classroom ought to trump almost all other considerations. A number of middle school children in my classroom cannot figure out how to look up what happens to a plant deprived of sunlight. These children have fallen frighteningly far behind.

I need a few more plusses. Let’s start with this one: I am never bored during the actual school day except when in meetings, and I remember from corporate life that everyone is sometimes or regularly bored in meetings. My work remains challenging. Once the day starts, I am on a rocket ride to the other side. Time never slows except in meetings. Even meetings can be a welcome break if you don’t listen too hard. I contribute to meetings regularly. Whether I am fascinated by the minutiae of the lesson plan or not, I have always been a talker and I do like to improve things around me. Student responses always interest me. Trying to keep student attention engages me. Finding a tenth way to say the same thing to the same student, in hopes an idea will somehow connect, helps me to think outside my personal boxes.

Eduhonesty: I never have a dull day — frustrating and crazy days, yes, but never dull. I often have fun moments with my kids. I don’t have to sit. I don’t have to stand. If I am a caged bird in this time of HyperTesting, at least I occupy a super-large cage filled with construction paper, scissors and protractors. My cage has cheery walls covered with inspirational sayings, along with decorated pieces of construction paper, marshmallows and toothpicks. I have a trapped audience who share my fondness for marshmallows, toothpicks, construction paper and scissors, although maybe not protractors.

Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, I was a financial analyst. I read annual reports all day and assessed corporate credit-worthiness. For all the perks of that job, I’d rather teach.

The paper was important and the student understood that. He was allowed to use the laptop for his research. The question was not too difficult: What would happen to a plant kept in a closet? I started reading his answer and the first few lines were confusing. Then I realized he had copied from a site on how to grow cannabis in your closet. Unlike other closet plants, his cannabis was growing gangbusters.

Most of the class’s plants were failing to thrive, deprived of light and water. I’ll have to talk to the minority who think there is no air in closets. But despite the good laugh I got from Pot Man, I can’t avoid a soupçon of concern. I’d like to think Pot Man was joking. Unfortunately, I’ve talked to him. I lean toward believing he was copying the first response he opened after he put in his search term without considering the meaning of the words in front of him.

Eduhonesty: If he wasn’t so young and his eyes weren’t so clear, I’d suspect Pot Man of sampling his product.

Testing makes my day easy. Nevertheless, that’s two days of testing this week and one of those required tests barely relates to content that has been taught in class. I spent 164 minutes today on a test that I fully expect will have nuked my class. I doubt anyone passed. I’m doubt anyone CAN pass. I morally object to this test. But every math class in the grade is expected to simultaneously administer this travesty of an assessment instrument. So I did. As tenure becomes attenuated, careful teachers don’t take chances. I can be fired. Refusing to give that test would be insubordination.

Eduhonesty: I reassure my class that this test will not figure into their grade. It’s only for data-gathering purposes. I tell them to do their best. I try to convince them that data matters. I put on the music. I hand out the tests. I field multiple complaints. The tests roll on.

In the past five days, instruction has barely managed to edge out testing in my classroom as the two great rivals, testing and instruction, continue to duke it out for student time. During the epic days of Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, new material was actually presented as instruction boldly faced off against testing, claiming chunks of class periods for actual student learning, before testing knocked us out in the semi finals on Thursday and Friday.

Instruction is expected to stage a huge comeback on Monday.

Eduhonesty: The ratio of testing to instruction has become positively silly. Seriously, I tested all day, for every period, on Thursday, with the exception of my 45 minute tutoring period. Friday, I tested during three of my four classes. I did not write these tests, but I must give these tests despite the 9 days we recently missed due to other standardized tests. I will say it’s rather relaxing. I put on the CD I made from student song requests and I provided hints to the desperate. This week-end I will grade.

Planning for the day can be tedious. Detail, detail, detail. Where’s the video link? Do I want to download this Active Inspire flipchart? What’s my time situation? Can I fit this foldable in somewhere?

The task is made both simpler and harder by the ease of clicking on links. Teachers Pay Teachers will sell me many useful items and even has freebies. Google will help me find ideas for activities and presentations. My problem is that link on the rare black jaguar crossing the Amazon River. I like “jaguar” links.

Some mornings, it’s hard to stay focused.

I’ve had two students with stomachaches this week who wanted to see the nurse, one who had not eaten because she refused to eat anything the cafeteria provided, and another who skipped our cafeteria food in favor of a large quantity of super-hot, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. The actively sick are surrounded by the undernourished. Can we please get the government out of the school-lunch business?

Eduhonesty: I’m sure part of the problem is that my district has been teetering on the edge of insolvency for years. We don’t have the money to buy the delicious-tasting apples, although we manage to get apples. We don’t have the money to buy nutritious Asian food that meets the guidelines. We do have a population that’s about one-half Hispanic. About our only Mexican food has been cheap-chicken tacos that are weirdly sweet and kind of scary. I’d give that chicken to my cat or dog, but not to my children. I wouldn’t give too much of that chicken to the cat or dog, for that matter.

Those old, uncontrolled lunches? At least they tasted O.K. They even tasted good sometimes.

More importantly, the kids ate them.