treehuggingwitchyteacher

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

imagine you're a fifth-grade teacher and one day a crow just flies into your classroom, steals some food, sits on some kid's head, and shouts "fuck off"

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Teaching as an extroverted introvert means most days I'm drained of all my extrovert energy at work and just want a good book & cozy couch in the evenings.

My PreK-ers graduated Friday, and after just 3 work days with no students I realized -

Oh! That's right! I DO like socializing with other adults 😅

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

I just don’t get it. How can our society act so goddamned normal about seahorses. How can anybody so casually accept that that’s a fish???

This is one of nature’s most anatomically perverse of all beasts. A FISH, like a carp or a bass or a beta is a fish, but it bent its body straight up only to bend its head permanently back down. It stretched its skull into a pipe. It tapered its tail like a lizard, specifically like a chameleon. It can also move its eyes independently by the way, you know, like a chameleon. Fun fact, it can change color to express its mood, like you know whatever does that. It doesn’t properly swim anymore. It buzzes its few remaining fins like an insect’s wings to float itself around at a snail’s pace. It lives its whole life clinging to coral branches or seaweed, which means it decided to become a “tree dweller” in an environment where gravity didn’t even matter anyway. The males get pregnant. They make noises at each other by rubbing some of their neck bones together. Every day, EVERY DAY a mated pair does a little dance and a little neck bone song so they remember which two seahorses they were. They’re a beautiful precious obscenity. Nothing so adorable ever made such a strong case against a logical creator.

They have as little skin and meat as they could get away with. Their skeleton is almost all they are.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

(Not counting naturally occurring things like people and rocks and plants)

Consider things like coins, books, or family heirlooms! Tell me about it in the tags!

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Bet you didn't even know that Claudette Colvin did it first! But she was too young and radical, so they got the more respected and reserved, older Rosa Parks to repeat the protest.

So yeah, most definitely a planned and thought out protest, designed to make exactly the point they wanted to make!

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Rules written 200 years ago by farmers were meant to be broken.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

I think people get mixed up a lot about what is fun and what is rewarding. These are two very different kinds of pleasure. You need to be able to tell them apart because if you don't have a balanced diet of both then it will fuck you up, and I mean that in a "known cause of persistent clinical depression" kind of way.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

I often see posts about curating your own online experience that make the point, “content creators aren’t your parents.” And, yes, that is absolutely true! And I try not to be like “as a parent,“ but as a parent…

EVEN PARENTS ARE SUPPOSED TO ENCOURAGE RESPONSIBLE READING/VIEWING BEHAVIOR. NOT filter everything ahead of time for their kid.

When my kiddo was 5, his pediatrician was asking him the usual Well Child Visit questions (“What are your favorite foods? What do you do to get your body moving? Do you know what to do if you get lost in a public place?” Etc.) and she asked, “What do you do if you see something on TV that scares or upsets you?”

I piped up like, “Oh, he doesn’t watch TV without one of us in the room,” which was true at the time and is still largely true now. She said, “Yes, but that won’t always be the case, so make sure you’re talking to him about what to do if he sees something that upsets him.”

So we started talking to him about that, and the answer is simple: “Turn it off or leave the room, and talk to someone you trust about what you saw and what you’re feeling.”

The answer is NOT “Ask your parents to make sure you never see anything upsetting again,” because that’s just not possible — and ultimately that would be doing the kid a disservice, since sooner or later he’s going to be out in the world where we can’t control what he watches or reads. That doesn’t mean we don’t try to make sure he’s watching/reading age-appropriate stuff, it just means that’s not the only safeguard he has — and that’s a good thing.

So yes, content creators aren’t your parents and aren’t responsible for making sure you never see anything you don’t like — but also, your own parents should have taught you what to do when that happens. So if they didn’t, take it from me, your internet mom:

Turn it off.

Walk away.

Talk to someone you trust about how you’re feeling.

And leave the person who created the thing that upset you alone.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

the white-tailed ptarmigan, also known as the snow quail, is a mountainous-dwelling bird and the smallest member of the grouse family. they are found at high altitudes in the continental united states, canada, and alaska. they have distinct ‘cryptic’ plumage, meaning that their plumage differs drastically throughout the year; during warm summers, they are speckled brown and black, going through an intermediary mottled phase before fully molting into their snow-white winter plumage. they primarily feed on insects and plant matter. their eggs are laid in a simple depression jn the ground; the chicks are precocial and leave the nest soon after hatching.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

being a pepper plant has to be so weird.

Imagine evolving capsaicin specifically to stop mammals from eating your fruits, and then a mammal comes along that not only will eat your fruits, but likes them specifically because of the capsaicin, so much that it starts using its weird paws to distribute and care for your seeds, which turns into a strong selective force that literally starts evolving you into producing MORE capsaicin and makes you a WAY more successful and wider ranged species than you ever were before

simply because this mammal LOVES Pain Chemical. that evolved specifically to produce pain in mammals. It's not that the capsaicin isn't WORKING. It's just that these freaks like it.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Pequeño pero matón

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Thanks 💕

But it's HARD when not ONLY do we care about our kids, but also that extra time makes our day go better (when it's used for prep and planning) AND often we just can't get everything we're contracted and expected to do done in our teeny tiny bit of prep time!

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

That rabbit/hare post is messing me up. I’d thought they were synonyms. Their development and social behavior are all different. They can’t even interbreed. They don’t have the same number of chromosomes. Dogs, wolves, jackals, and coyotes can mate with each other and have fertile offspring but rabbits and hares cant even make infertile ones bc they just die in the womb. Wack.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Really tragic...

"My childhood was so awesome. Kids today don't even know!"

Isn't a flex.

It's a lament.

More people should understand that.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

I taught abroad for 9 years... And yeah, it was still hard work. & Could be stressful and exhausting. But (1) I had NONE of the behavioural issues to anywhere near the level I've seen in the US & (2) I actually had a decent amount of prep time within an 8 hour work day.

Did I still work overtime? Sure, sometimes.

Did I take work home and not stop thinking about it? Often.

Did I feel bone-shatteringly exhausted on a daily basis, or find myself too tired to not only not enjoy evenings, but to not enjoy weekends either? Never.

I've been back in the US 2 years. & I completely burned out at my last job. I lost so much confidence in myself as a teacher & severely damaged my mental health (probably physical too as I got sick a lot). My relationships suffered. I suffered.

I took a leave of absence and worked through a complete breakdown... Sort of built myself up at an amazing daycare center (that I miss!) over the summer, and now am at a very different school with a completely different grade level.

I've been up and down when it comes to hope for enjoying my career again... I'm with the littles, and that does help. But I'm still exhausted & overworked. The expectations are still innappropriate (for the kids, for me). The support is MUCH better but there's still some big issues.

So I don't know what words of encouragement I have...

...but I do want to say something about those other teachers at your school that are "fine" - they probably aren't. Either they don't care as much as you do (some people really just do the bare minimum to get a paycheck and don't care what they let slide...) or they're hiding it better than you. Some may have been in a certain grade or position long enough that it IS easier for them, no matter how hard some things still are. But I'm sure a lot of them are struggling too.

My only advice is (1) Do speak up. Be professional, choose your battles, but don't just accept everything. Speak up when deadlines aren't doable. Ask for grace. Ask for support. & (2) Remember there is a huge teacher shortage across the nation. So if speaking up doesn't help, if nothing you do helps, then do consider a change. You're more valuable than any school or principal, more needed.

Good luck! The kids need teachers who care - but you are a person first, a teacher second. So take care of yourself first, please 🥺💓🤗

Guys I am so tired. Teachers are not ok.

I have literal second graders saying the n-word and that’s not even the most pressing behavioral issue on my plate at the moment.

I was required to work an eleven hour day on Tuesday for no additional recompense. They didn’t even need me to be there.

I have a professional growth plan I have to finish by Friday and it’s gonna take at least two hours. I have NEVER had two uninterrupted hours at work since becoming a teacher.

I just found out I’m getting HALF A PAYCHECK tomorrow cuz HR fucked up and rent is due tomorrow and I’m already behind on my bills.

I explain assignments to my students and five seconds later they’re like “what are we supposed to be doing” like I didn’t JUST tell them.

I had a kid the other day SCREAMING that I was racist because I “never pull the black kids, only the Hispanic ones” which I AM AN ESL TEACHER OF COURSE I ONLY PULL THE KIDS WHO DONT SPEAK ENGLISH YET ALSO AT LEAST A THIRD OF MY HISPANIC STUDENTS ARE ALSO BLACK.

I am losing my mind here. I work with upwards of 60 students every day and NONE of them are getting the level of support they need. The good days are amazing but I can’t remember the last good day I had. I feel like an asshole for complaining because every other person at my school is going through it. I barely see my friends because I get home and am so exhausted that all I can do is watch one piece in my underwear. And I make significantly less than my friends who work from home and maybe do (by their own admission) two hours of work a day.

I just feel so disrespected by this entire profession. I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this

If anyone has words of support, I could really, really use it.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

Because kids with full bellies learn and think better...

...and it's really hard to maintain a class system with working poor if you ACTUALLY give people equal opportunity and support to get educated.

[treehuggingwitchyteacher]

I got fired from two schools in Myanmar for being gay.

I have to say, it's been liberating to be openly out at work here in the US - but it wasn't easy and didn't come naturally to me.

Being fairly femme (appearing) and CIS-passing, I spent too long letting people assume I was straight, even after marriage that I was married to a man...

Yet even in a liberal state and liberal city, once I started speaking up at my last school (about more than just queer issues, but the homophobia in our so-called "professional development" from an aggro cop was a trigger) I realized that the "safe space" and inclusivity was all just talk.

So yeah, we need it. We need to be out and proud. We need to stand up for ourselves.

& people like me who can pass as cis-het? We just need to be louder and prouder in our words and actions.

I'm done pretending, playing the "roommate" or "spouse" game (both things I've done at past jobs out of fear)...

I will wear the rainbows, go to gay bars, kiss my wife in public, and call her, "my wife, my wife, my wife" w/o stopping!!!

I also won't stay quiet about transphobia, kink-shaming, ace erasure, or ANY micro or macro-aggressions against others in the community!

god i am always the FIRST to rally against the failures of just fighting for tolerance from straight cis ppl, but also we haven't even fucking reached tolerance yet.

we still need "We're Queer We're Here Get Used To It", because i don't know about you guys, but from what I'm seeing, they aren't fucking used to it.

we need that old school "we're your hairdressers, your teachers, your neighbors, your siblings, your friends" energy back ASAP. quietly queer isn't cutting it for me anymore. in your face dykes fag queer trans forever until i'm fucking dead.