Paradise Falls (Paradise Falls #1-5)(7)
She read off the list of names, acknowledging each grunt or feebly lifted hand. A quick headcount confirmed they were all there, but she needed to put names to the faces of the kids she wasn’t familiar with like a pair of transfer students, plus a few others that she didn’t know from her freshman classes.
Once that was done, Jennifer went around the room and had students volunteer to read sections of the syllabus that outlined her policy on attendance and make up work, a list of assignments to be completed throughout the semester, and a reading list some of the students groaned at.
A pale boy with long lanky hair and a tendency to dress in black raised his hand. “Do we have to read all of these?”
“Yes.” Jennifer said brightly.
Kelly raised her hand. Jennifer had her as a freshman. “It says here we pick five from the list.”
Jennifer smiled. “What does it say at the bottom?”
“Read the directions carefully,” Kelly intoned.
“Exactly.” She looked around. “That’s how I know you’ll pay attention. I often give written instructions. If you ignore the directions and ask me if you have to do all the assignments or read all the books, I’ll say yes.” She shrugged. “At least you might get some extra credit out of it.”
Several of them looked at her sharply, but said nothing. Jennifer kept her smile on her face, and strode around the room as she explained some of the syllabus’ finer points.
“You’ll see a writing prompt on the board.” She looked back at it. “I thought ‘tell me about your summer’ was a little trite, and frankly reading fifty of them would make my eyes bleed. So I’ll have you, as seniors, tell me about your future plans.”
“I ain’t got any paper,” one of the new boys said, sheepishly raising his hand.
Jennifer sighed and pointed to the supply table by the door.
“When I run out of paper, I’m out. The school only gives me so much,” she said.
“I forgot,” the boy shrugged.
“Did you ride the bus to school this morning?”
He nodded.
“Did the bus driver forget the bus?”
He shook his head.
“I think you see my point. In any case, there’s a supply list on the next to last page of the syllabus. I’d like to point that out again in case some of you missed it. You will be required to turn in your notebooks at regular intervals, and the journal and other requirements are thirty percent of your grade.”
“This is a lot of work,” said one of the girls. Jennifer had to think for a moment to place her. Jessica was her name, and she was in one of Jennifer’s sophomore classes.
“It’s nothing compared to what you’ll be doing in college, believe me.”
Jessica frowned.
“When it’s done, you’ll look back on it and be surprised how little it actually seems. This is the honors class. I have to push you, or I wouldn’t be giving you what you signed up for, would I?”
After she danced around a few more protests, she set them to writing. The assignment she gave them today would be the first of many for their notebooks. Truthfully, Jennifer hated the notebook assignment because it meant either lugging home fifty pounds of binders, or coming into the school on Sunday to get them graded. The work was incredibly mindless, as she mainly ticked off whether something was physically in the binder or not. She was sharp on spelling and grammar, but only in regards to essays, exams, and other formally graded assignments. If she read every journal entry that closely, she’d never sleep. The point was to get them writing and organizing their thoughts on a daily basis. preferably without hashtags. Jennifer’s soul died a little whenever she came across #YOLO in a student’s written assignment.
Procedural tasks occupied Jennifer as pens scratched on papers. She distributed the textbooks the kids would likely to keep at home and never actually use. A class set of ponderous tomes was provided at her own insistence. She still winced at the thought of arguing with Kazmeyer about it. The old man expected the kids to lug a text the size of a telephone book with them from their lockers to class, and then back home. Jennifer’s back hurt thinking about it. Rachel took her side and badgered the department head into ordering classroom sets of the books when they were replaced during Jennifer’s second year.
The books were woefully inadequate anyway. They took sections of great works out of context, and someone thought it was a good idea to teach the Odyssey to freshmen.
Of course, Kazmeyer wrote the curriculum, so there was no changing that. Jennifer was established enough that she didn’t have to worry about more than one freshman class unless she requested them.
An hour and a half always seemed daunting when it started, but Jennifer felt pressed for time by the end. She kept them in their seats until he bell rang, and grudgingly dismissed them. She nodded and smiled as they left the room, then sighed. She hated having first lunch, and preferred the last one. After this, she wouldn’t have a reprieve until the end of the day. Rachel would no doubt ask her to watch her class while she went to the bathroom or something at least once, or something else would come up.
She left her door open and returned to her desk, but a commotion in the hall stopped her from slumping in her chair A shriek followed loud shouting, and it sounded like a body hit the lockers. Jennifer limped as quickly as she could to the doorway. Two boys grappled with each other, twisting to shove the other into the walls.