Fixing the Blog and Teaching Summer School

For those that hadn't noticed, nor cared, the blog had been down for a while. On July 31 I logged on and got nothing. I had forgotten to pony up the $10 that was due the day before for a unique domain name and couldn't figure how to pay up.

Then a few days later my wife fell on the stairs, landed face first and not only broker her nose but dislocated her hip. She has been having equilibrium issues for some time and this was the worst outcome of those. She spent almost two weeks in the hospital being probed and tested for the cause of these episodes but she finally came home this past Tuesday, the day I fixed the blog.

So on to other matters.

I had a great summer. I taught summer school, phys. ed. in fact at a District 75 school in Manhattan and I must say it was one of the greatest experiences I ever had as a teacher.

The school was small and made up of autistic students and standardized students. It was kind of like a summer day camp I worked at in the mid-90's up in Dobbs Ferry. In fact, I was the sports director at that camp.

First, and this needs to be on the record. Not only were the teachers at the school some of the friendliest colleagues I have ever encountered, but the level of dedication from the entire staff, from teachers to paras to administration is amazing (mind you this is not taking away from any others teachers in the city). How dare anyone on the outside ever again knock teachers when I saw amazing work, dedication, and love day in and day out. This is what teachers and education is and should be about. Not being judged by some set of made up algorithm.

The students were phenomenal. Yeah, there were some moments. But they were minor and and handled easily.

I was able to be myself for the first time in years and the students saw that. I literally couldn't wait to arrive in the morning and was saddened when the last day came. The students grew on me. They really did.

There was one 3 year old pre-K student who would never take his nap (my coverage for his class always coincided with the teacher's lunch so I was there for nap time) and was wound up as heck and wouldn't sit down. But he pronounced Zucker as "Shujker" and would just say, "Hi Shujker!" when he saw me.

Other students just called me "coach," and that was fine as well. I got a lot of "Are we having you today?" and when I said no, I got a look of disappointment.

I'm going to take the good feelings I got this summer and what I learned about myself and do my darnedest to incorporate it in whatever I do this school year.