OK, so remember Mr. Monkey Skulls? I utterly changed my decision about how to handle him--and feel much better about what I did. The shift in approach began because I couldn't figure out how to stop him at the door, give him his "you're out" letter, and then avoid a confrontation/explanation. If I were a different kind of person I might have been able to feel I didn't need to explain anything but could say, "No, you can't come in. No, I won't explain why. It's in the letter. Go away and read that." Being the kind of person I am, I was envisioning an escalating conflict and (being the chickenshit that I am about confrontation), I decided I'd let him in but I'd give him his assignments and the letter at the end of class when I returned assignments to everyone else.
So he came in, and they all began with a freewrite. After I collected the freewrites, as some other handouts were slowly going around the room, under the guise of checking to be sure they all had remembered to put their names on the freewrites (in fact two had not), I took a glance at his--and from what I saw, it seemed sincere, even lovely. That was a quick glance, mind you: when I read it, I may see the same snarky, contemptuous stuff, but the apparent tone today gave me pause. I also had Paul's voice in the back of my head, asking, "Have you already talked to him about this?" I was so pissed off I didn't want to--until today. Today, I thought, "Let me talk to him and see what happens."
So, end of class, as I was returning everyone's assignments, I told him I wanted to see him briefly after class. There were still a few students in the room, but I took him way off to the side and very quietly said, "I read your assignments, but I didn't mark them. After reading them, I seriously considered ejecting you from the class permanently." He looked surprised and asked why, so I explained about the lack of respect, the contempt, the tone inappropriate for college work--but, I said, it occurred to me that he might not know what was OK and what wasn't. So I figured I'd rather give him an opportunity to learn that than just to kick him out without that chance. He listened respectfully; he nodded in agreement; he looked serious or smiled at the appropriate moments. I then said, "You do know what I'm talking about in these assignments, right?" He said, yes, he knew. So I said that I'd give him some kind of mark for those assignments but that from now on, I expected the kind of language suitable for college. He said he would comply and left on a positive note. No confrontation, no anger, no resistance or any of the responses I had been braced for when I thought I was going to just toss him.
And now, if he does it again, I have talked to him about it and can toss him without guilt.
But somehow I don't think he will. I'm not sure what was going on, but it feels sorted out at the moment. In the past, I have had students do outrageous things and I come to find out they are bipolar, or struggling to manage medications for some psychosocial problem, or are going through withdrawal, or living in some other kind of hell that causes them to act up. He may have been testing me to see where the limits are and whether I am tough enough to make him keep to them. (Uh, yeah. "Though she be but little, she is fierce.") And he genuinely may have thought that there are no rules in college; that one can do/say whatever one wants. (I've run into that before, too.) In any event, I anticipate some resistance from him about what I require of his writing (and especially about how rigorously I grade), but I believe generally he'll stay in line now.
It was a nice end to the day and the week. Despite waking up at 4:20 a.m. and getting up at 4:40 (alarm was set for 5), I still didn't get all of the silted-up ancient assignments marked and back to my last class. Close, but there are a few lingering bits. And now, of course, I have all of this week's homework to go through. This may mean I'll be at the office on Saturday, maybe on Sunday too--or I may need to crash on Saturday (it's supposed to be chilly and rainy: perfect for Dickens, tea, and serious napping, which my body may insist upon) and do life maintenance on Sunday.... It's just going to be like this until December. The nice bit, though, is that in my 101s on Monday and Tuesday, I don't have to do any of the heavy lifting at all: they do peer review of each other's papers and I'm just on call if they have questions. I may sneak in a little marking of stuff while they do that, too. Ah, whatever. Somehow it all gets done. How does it? It's a mystery.
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Do we still get to refer to him as Mr. Monkey Skulls? It's priceless.
ReplyDeleteWonderful stuff, here. Glad I finally remembered to click on the link.
Happy blogging!