JOURNAL: Spring Fever and Bad English

Last Tuesday, in my advanced middle school class, we were doing a listening and speaking excersise on employers monitoring their employees in the work place. My kids being the way they are, they helpfully pointed out the "class cams," claiming it "violated their privacy." One of the girls innocently said that the people who watch the children in the POLY classrooms really just sit back and "play with themselves." But back to my point.

The listening series we use employs actual radio broadcasts, usually from NPR, so they do spark some interesting debates. There is a reading section to go along with the listening section; in this week's reading selection, the journalist used the "Xerox scandal" as an example of how employers monitor employees, stating that 40 Xerox employees were fired after downloading pornography onto their work computers. The boy reading the article did a double-take, and I said,"Ah, Sean, you know what 'pornography' is?"

Without thinking, he answered, "Oh yes, I know very well what it is," then turned an interesting shade of pomegranate. Fortunately, only a few of the boys caught it (the girls looked puzzled).

One of the ways in which employees are being monitored, according the the article, is through cameras in the bathroom and other "private areas" (direct quote). The girls were horrified by this, even when I mentioned that it was done to prevent stealing and drug-dealing. (Connecticut is the only state that has banned this practice, btw.)

During group discussion, one of the other boys caused some more snickering, and even "teacher" nearly lost it. We were discussing alternative ways to monitor employees, ways that don't interfere with privacy overmuch. Only one boy defended the practice of bathroom cams, but his reason was, "If they put a camera in the bathroom, they can catch people performing immoral acts."

I only lost my composure for a moment; Sean was not so lucky. I backed the mildly embarassed boy up, "Such as..?" and he went on to talk about the stealing and drug dealing that goes on it the bathroom. He also advocated a "one person at a time" bathroom policy, but that didn't fly well with the class.

On another middle school note, my co-worker assigned her class to come up with a list of ten items each student would want to have if they were trapped on a desert island; they are reading LORD OF THE FLIES. Harry's number one answer? GIRLS!