madness

Today's the first time I've observed a class in my school. The Year 8 IT class to be exact. I will be teaching them next term. Initial thoughts after observing & also helping some of the students in the double lesson?
- lost, as the students are too energetic & running around & mucking around in class & not being on task
- confused and disturbed, as other teachers and students also came into the computer lab and started using the computers and being disruptive (as they had music on)
- surprised & shocked, that a student is racially violent, according to my mentor
- sad, that about 6-7 students would not do any work and will get zero, because they are just not interested in doing 'work'
- stressed, as eventhough it's a small class (of 19 students), the class has a huge gap between the smart students, the average students and students who need one to one help and constant monitoring, so it's plenty of work to cater for the diverse range of student learning needs
- happy, that one of the 3 female students in the class, came up to me & gave me a hug and a handshake. And another student called me Miss Law to ask me for help on the work set for them.

This is the only Middle School class that I'll be teaching in Term 2. I am beginning to feel a little bit settled into the class but I am so wary about a couple of student's behaviours and attitudes because one had been suspended last year for being racially violence towards another student and his dad encourages it "Good on ya boy". I am truly saddened by this, because aren't we all the same? What makes him so much better than me or another Aboriginal boy? What makes his race so much more superior than others?

I have met my Year 11 S&E class. They are about a group of 10 students, of all ethnicity, ranging from Philipino Australian to African to Australian. I quite like that class I think.....I doubt I would have as much trouble getting them to do their work compared to the Year 8s.

What's with police cars? I do get the kick out of comign up close and personal with a police car on the weekend (Torrens River), but i didn't expect to be up close and personal with another police car so soon! lol, nah, i'm not IN one. What happened was, i was buying a few grocery items from ML Woolies, and then when i came out, i saw a police car pulled up and parked right behind my car.... It was a right angle 90' park... Apparently the car next to me was broken into... and the police has just arrived after the owner called them. They examined the front passenger seat door (i presume someone tried opening that door) - mind u, the owner was a lady with a baby as well... So there i was, wanting to get out of the parking lot, but being blocked by the police car, i had to 'excuse me,.... can u please move ur car?' lol The policeman did. But then he helped me to see if there's car behind me (or was he just checking out my plate number?) and signalled me 'it's ok to reverse'.... I wasn't sure how long the lady had been at the shopping centre but i was only there for 10-15mins tops. Luckily it wasn't my car that had been broken into...actually my car's alarm would go off bah ~ if the door or window had been broken into.