January’s Gone

By Kyle, January 31, 2008 10:55 pm

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Some people think that five days is too long to go without posting. To these people I say, “where’s your blog?” :)

So to summarize the past five days, I’ve been:

  • Victorious, due to the solid victory of the Teachers in the “Second bi-monthly Teacher v. Student soccer game”! [Pictured above...some of the teachers, clearly demonstrating their mad math skills].
  • Frustrated, given the fact that my PC’s rear hinge has begun cracking, meaning I have to abandon my blazing fast, ultra-superior, super-duper computer for the time being and use a machine that loads internet pages more slowly than I could recite ones and zeros.
  • laughing at some of my student’s responses to the Mid-Year Survey that I recently distributed in class. Some of my favorite responses:
    • Question: What is your favorite subject in school?
    • Answer: going home
    • Q: What colleges are you interested in attending?
    • A: Europe for soccer
    • Q: What types of math questions did you find the easiest?
    • A: none i got bored easily and wondered of to my imagination
    • A: like 5times 7 questions like that
    • Q: What types of math questions did you find the most difficult?
    • A: mostly all of them because (someone) didn’t explain it clearly to students
    • Q:How confident did you feel right before you were going to take a quiz?
    • A: as confident as when i’m going to play basketball
  • Finally I’m confused, now that I really have no clue who to vote for in Tuesday’s primary. As of yesterday, my candidate of choice had officially thrown in the towel. And, judging by the candidates’ playlists, there’s not much in the way to make this decision any easier.

…but on the bright side…

By Kyle, January 26, 2008 12:50 pm

Yeah, the rain has been awful, and forecasters say it’s going to get even worse tonight and tomorrow (with up to 5 inches expected)! But today, at least this morning, we got a little break in storm and as I walked out my door this morning, Los Angeles looked absolutely stunning!!!

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I took this photo from my front porch, and what I couldn’t believe is that I could actually see snow from my house! Yep, snow!

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Wet in LA

By Kyle, January 26, 2008 12:30 am

Things that happen in Los Angeles when it rains:

  • Soaking wet 8th graders arrive to class with an energy comparable to that of the energizer bunny on HGH.
  • Folks forget how to drive, which is funny, since most of them aren’t from LA anyway.
  • Computers turn off, like that of our good friends at the LA Times, who’s website has officially crashed as of 3 minutes ago:

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Urban Education

By Kyle, January 23, 2008 7:41 pm

“No one wins. One side just loses more slowly.” — Prez

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I’ve got to admit, I don’t watch much television. In fact, other than the occasional sporting event, newscast, or Simpsons episode, only one show has been able to capture my interest in all of the past four years. That show is NBC’s The Office. “Heard of it?” Anyway, now that all of television has officially run out of episodes, I haven’t been too terribly frustrated. Besides, there are plenty of other things that I can waste my time on (like writing blog posts).

Anyway, in the past two weeks, I think I’ve found a new addiction. HBO has just released on DVD the 4th season of The Wire, a police drama set in Baltimore. Now, I honestly don’t care much for scripted dramas, especially police dramas, but when I first heard NPR’s story that this series (which I had previously never even heard of) would be focusing on education, specifically the Baltimore public schools, my ears pricked up and I waited patiently for the DVD to be released just to check it out.

So far, I’ve been amazed! While carrying along the plotlines of other characters, the season’s episodes have focused around the characters of four 8th grade boys at Tillman Middle School, their parents, their teachers (particularly a brand new math teacher clearly in over his head), and the circumstances and situations they must deal with in and out of school.

While still definitely scripted, and definitely made-for-TV entertainment, this is one of the first media attempts to portray life in urban middle schools. Yes, they’re actually talking about social promotion, truancy, district bureaucracy, and the quiet desperation that not only afflicts students, but can afflict teachers as well. Again, while still fairly removed from my situation here in Los Angeles, it is by-far, the closest I’ve seen!

Kingdom Day Parade

By Kyle, January 21, 2008 7:33 pm

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[Disclaimer: This might just be my longest post ever so begin with caution].

Today started out awfully dreary. As I awoke and looked out the window, I could tell that it had rained the night before. Puddles had gathered at the base of our driveway, and the air was quite brisk. However, waking up at 8:30 or so on a Monday morning can be considered nothing short of a blessing! A few hours later, donning my upstate NY winter coat, my roommates Zack, Matthew and myself headed on out for the annual Kingdom Day Parade, sponsored by Stevie Wonder’s local radio station, KJLH (“Remember, don’t fight at the Kingdom parade”, encouraged one of the DJs as we listened on the way. “Save that for tomorrow, but leave it at home for today.”)

Taking the little known shortcut of West St. in order to avoid the traffic and delays of parade-route Crenshaw Blvd., we parked just a few blocks west of the parade’s main intersection, Crenshaw Blvd. and Martin Luther King Blvd. It had just begun to rain.

By the time we had taken our places along the western edge of the street, the rain had become thicker and with some great difficulty we were able to see the paraders past the barrage of umbrellas lining the streets.

As I looked around, I saw street vendors selling everything from sausages to silly string to t-shirts. And for every vendor there were at least ten others passing out literature: info for an upcoming anti-curfew protest, $1,000,000 bills that turned out to be Bible tracts from the local Assemblies of God church, and of course, the obligatory campaign flyers for the two leading Democrats in this year’s presidential race.

As my attention soon returned to the parade, I noticed the usual suspects who were present: LAPD Commissioner William Bratton, LA County Sheriff Lee Baca, City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo, LAUSD Board Member Marguerite LaMotte (who, may I add, I did not vote for in her recent re-election. Maybe if more than 7% of registered voters would have showed up for that one we’d have someone incredibly more effective doing the job that she obviously can’t.).Of course this is not to mention our maverick Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa who, instead of riding in his city vehicle chose to go bounding down Crenshaw Blvd with free smiles and handshakes for all.

 

Notably absent was LAUSD Superintendent Admiral David Brewer III, much to the dismay of my roommate who wanted to shout out, “When will I get paid right? as he would pass by. But just like Keith says, you can’t always get what you want.

Soon after these figureheads had passed and the marching bands got into their routines, the sun began to shine and we began walking down the boulevard to the finale of the parade, Leimert Park, where we could already begin to smell the fragrances of what has quickly become one of my favorite types of food out here, barbecue! The potato salad was great, the tri-top ribs were even better, but the greatest of all was Bilal Muhammad, “The Bean Pie Man”, who sold us pecan pie, carrot pie, and pineapple cheese pie! As we were finishing wolfing down the thick, juicy, and flavorful dessert and heading back to Crenshaw, the older Bilal had turned to a group of young ladies standing behind us and exclaimed “If sweetness is your weakness, then I’m your man!”

The day had finally come to a close and as we headed back up Crenshaw I heard from behind me, “Hi Mr. Hunsberger!” It turned out to be one of my students (actually the same one who “don’t play video games no more). I wished him a Happy King Day and said I’d see him Tuesday. This was not to be my final school encounter as later this evening I ran into Y——, a former student of mine whom I had taught 7th and 8th grade math to two years ago. She’s now a sophomore at a charter school in Venice and from what she says, she’s going very well! She’s one of the great examples of a kid who struggled with math in 7th grade, and then really came back with an amazing effort for her 8th grade year and really did well!

This is one of the things that I love the most about living in the same neighborhood as my school. The opportunity to interact with kids and their families outside of Room 216 is invaluable. It reminds me that after all, they’re just kids, and it reminds them that yes, I am human too. And as we celebrate the life of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, I wouldn’t want it any other way.

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Just Another Day Off?

By Kyle, January 21, 2008 10:15 am

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Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies
hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction….The chain reaction
of evil–hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars–must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of
annihilation.

Martin Luther King, Jr., Strength To Love, 1963.

The End of the World

By Kyle, January 17, 2008 8:19 pm

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So I’m trying to figure out which of the following is the worst part of this experience:

  1. That today’s biggest “news” as visually displayed on today’s NY Times online edition is not Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, but rather a ginormous ad from Apple, the evil empire of modern technology, fully enveloping over 50% of my screen.
  2. That the experience of trying to actually read the news was distracted by the fact that this “banner ad” was in full motion before I could even stop it.
  3. That not only was this a full-fledged TV advertisement stealthily cloaked as a web page banner ad, but that it actually took up TWO banner spaces and interacted between the two! Or maybe even worse yet,
  4. That despite all my hankerings about Mac, Apple, and what I consider to be vastly inferior technology guarded by a thick callous of elitism, the “Get a Mac” ads are (cringing as I say this) some of the most creative and entertaining pieces of propaganda in media today! I love watching them because they’re fun and they’re good fodder for trash talking with some of my mac-loving friends.

Indoor Rodents

By Kyle, January 14, 2008 5:07 pm

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After what seemed like an eternal week back at school followed by weekend that was nothing short of a blink of an eye, Monday proved to be an interesting day, peaking during lunch when a gray squirrel lost his sense of direction and found his way into the upstairs hallway of Johnnie Cochran Jr. Middle School. He must have been scared out of his mind, but luckily for him, no students were around and was thus able to escape by catapulting off the second floor balcony overlooking the front of the school. Well, that pretty much capped off the excitement of my day, unless you consider point-slope form innately riveting.

Guitar Hero 3

By Kyle, January 8, 2008 7:50 pm

depressed.jpgReal incidental dialogue that I overheard today in another teacher’s class:

Teacher to student: You’ve played Guitar Hero 3, right?

Student: I don’t play video games no more.

Teacher: What happened?

Student: My report card happened.

First Day Back Again

By Kyle, January 7, 2008 6:10 pm

binary-clock.jpgToday was the first day back at school following a 3 week break. Some highlights:

- For the first time in all my years at Cochran, the clocks did not work. When I got to school, all the school clocks said it was 3:20 and we apparently were dismissed at 10:00pm

- One of my students told me he celebrated his birthday at Chuck E. Cheese’s. Who knew that good old Chuck would still be relevant to today’s 14-year-old kids!

- The kept eyeing my new binary clock (pictured) trying to figure out first, what it was, and once they had figured out it was a clock, they spent a while trying to figure out how in the world to actually tell time by it. We’ll see how long it takes me before I teach them how to actually read the thing.

- Finally, I spent my lunch time visiting 6th grade homerooms trying to get them to apply for magnet schools. They weren’t to terribly intrigued until I told them I’d raffle off an iTunes gift card for one winner among all the students who brought the application back. It’s amazing what a little bribery can do.

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