I'm a Liar Pants

Confession #1:  I am a big, fat liar pants.
Confession #2: This is the most passive-aggressive blog post ever.

Sigh.  It's so close to Christmas and I know Santa is watching.  I haven't had the most stellar year and I feel the need to come clean.

Why the need for confession?  Well, I lied to a colleague yesterday.  Flat out told a big old fib.  It just rolled off my lips like nobody's business.  Didn't even think twice about it.

In an effort to redeem myself, I feel the need to offer up some excuses background.  I, like so many of my art teacher friends (and regular teacher friends to be sure) spend a ton of my own money for supplies in the beginning of the school year because I get very little money for supplies from my school.  It's just the way things are.  I deal with it and I do it without thinking twice.  Throughout the school year, when I see things that are on sale, or I have a coupon, or they are in the Dollar Spot at Target (can I get an amen! for the the Dollar Spot, my peeps?) I'll pick things up.  Ziploc baggies, little papier mache boxes, do dads, thing-a-majigs, metallic sharpies, ribbon. The list is endless. I like art supplies.  I don't mind sharing stuff with my kids if it means that we can do something cool and exciting and different.

My school purchase order at the end of the year looked like this: 2 reams of heavy drawing paper, tempera paint cakes in 9 different colors and 2 gallons of white glue.  That's it folks.  Supplies for 1 year and 300 + kids.  I also get to order construction paper with 'School Supply money' that I house in my room, and share (gladly) with the rest of the school, because when the other teachers use it, that means they are probably doing some cool projects in their classes.

I got a phone call from a colleague yesterday.  She asked me if I had some glitter and some glue for a project that I am sure that she needed in, oh, I don't know, 10 minutes or so, never mind that I was in the middle of a class of 6th. graders trying to put together star books. 

Instead of saying that I do, as a matter of fact, have glue in my storage closet and I do, indeed, have glitter (TONS of it!) in my desk drawer, I lied and said, "Uh, no.  I don't have any glue or glitter" and I hung up the phone.  But you know what?  I bought that glue with the $150.00 that I have to stretch between my 300+ students that I'll teach this year.  That same $150 dollars that you got at the end of the last school year for your class of 10 kids.  I bought that glitter with my own money because I saw it on sale last year and I had a coupon and I thought, even though I HATE glitter (what art teacher/custodian likes it?) I knew that on occasion I like to let the kids loose and kids FREAKING LOVE GLITTER for crying out loud.

I lied.  I could have given her some glue.  I could have given her some glitter.  But I didn't.  I was mad and selfish.  My pockets are not bottomless.  Plan ahead.  Anticipate needs. Go buy your own glitter.  Pffffft!

So I hope that Santa will forgive me my selfishness.  I could really use some love right about now.  And maybe a couple of gift certificates from Michaels, AC Moore, Hobby Lobby, Dick Blick, Sax, Cheap Joes, Triarco, Pearl, Binders, Jerry's Artarama, Nasco and so on and so on, ad nauseum.

 

Things That Break My Heart

Last week, I made these Lorax clay pots with my EC self-contained class.

I know that they are not particularly arty but I like to do things with this class that are in the moment.  I try to plan things that go along with what they are doing in their classroom or revolve around holidays and happenings, which I almost never do with my other classes.  Since Earth Day is tomorrow, I thought these would be fun to make. Tomorrow, we will fill them with soil and plant zinnia seeds while we watch The Lorax (the original, animated short one).  They will take them back to their classroom, put them in a sunny window, already prepared by their amazing teacher and hopefully, will have some truffula flowers growing shortly.

Why does this break my heart?  Because in the past week, students from my 'regular' classes have been looking at these little clay pots asking me, 'Are we gonna make these?' to which I have had to say 'No' which always gets met by a 'Why not?' I hate to tell them that I can't afford to buy already made clay pots (or clay to use in my kiln or glaze or so many other things) for my 100+ students that I am teaching this quarter or felt and googly eyeballs and pom poms so that they can make the Lorax pots, but I can afford it for the 12 or so kids in Mrs. P's class.  Sigh.  It makes me feel guilty but most of all it breaks my heart.  To tell them no.  Even though it's not my job to do cutesy stuff with them, it's not in my standards for sure, I know they like to to do craftsy stuff.  They probably don't ever get a chance to do things like this.  Budgets, or the lack thereof really stink.  Art is consumable.  And we consume a lot.  I recycle, I beg borrow and steal.  Well, I don't steal but you know what I mean.  It's rough to be an art teacher with about $1.50 a kid to spend on supplies. 

Which means, I guess, that maybe we will do some origami these next few weeks (only about 4 before we start testing) and that I will be breaking out the solar beads and cotton kitchen string to make solar bead bracelets (always popular) again this year.  And I'll be trying desperately to justify this with the common core, somehow.  Of course, I will just be wishing that I could afford to buy a bunch of para-cord and clippies for those bracelets as well.  Sigh.