This morning in the staff room I was preparing what I was going to say to the girls about their dismal scores, when I saw some of the other teachers marking. They all had many completly blank papers, where a student really just wrote her name, maybe just guessed something for the first question, then waited for time to be up. All the teacher were like, these girls are absurd! However, I realised that not a single girl in either of my classes handed in a blank paper. And suddenly I realised that even that girl who got 11% was at least putting some effort. The wind was taken from my angry-speech-sails. Some teachers had zero students scoring above 70, and in grade 9 math, over a third did. I figured that a "I can tell you're not trying!" speech was no longer relevant.

Instead I made a game time decision and spent the class on goal setting. They were told to write their goal for their upcoming end of June test, their goal for their end of term exam, and their goal for the year long course. For the math class, they had to write their goal for grade 10, 11, and 12 but since physics is optional after 10, they had to say if they were going to take it, and if not, what they were going to take instead. Then they had to list steps to achieve their goals, and make three specific promises. Next they wrote what they needed from me, and then we both signed the paper as a pledge. I realise that if my high school teacher made me write goals, I'd never stop rolling my eyes. But I've also come to realise that maybe the point of a teacher isn't to cater to the kids already getting 90s.

I got some pretty hilarious answers. My favourite were, "I promise to pull up my socks" and "I promise to subtract my jokes and multiply my seriousness." For the what they need of me question, most said things like, "answer my questions when I ask" or simply, "help me" but some were goodies like, "we need to obey each other." They answered with such earnestness. Overall, I've never loved them more.

The girls get an hour for lunch. For the next two weeks, I've scheduled four of my math students to come in and we just work on problems on the board and an individual pace. Working in a small group like that helps me see what they need to work on personally, and them see trends that the whole class should brush up on. Then I write them some individual extra homework, that they must hand in to me the next morning. After the two weeks are up, I think I'll just have a daily open extra help session every lunch. I like that it would be completely optional, but the principal is always like, "these girls are lazy. Who needs and hour break for lunch? They just dawdle. Let's make them all go to extra math every day!"

I like that they have an hour break because it gives me something to take away, as leverage, you know? A bunch of physics girls didn't finish some homework, so I gave them detention I guess, and made them sit in the back doing extra problems while I worked with my four grade nine math girls. Study time is never optional- from 7 to 5 they must be accounted for in the class other than that lunch break. They don't have class the whole time, but they have to be studying in silence. Then the day students in home, and the boarders again must be in the classroom from 7 till 10. Hard life, right? Anyway, my goal for June tests are: in math, to have a class average of 70, and in physics, to have no more than 5 people get below 50. I've got my work cut out for me.