Every once in a while I just have to use this blog to vent. Today is one of those days.
I am giving DE Assessment make-ups today. I’ve got kids from all over campus coming into my room to take, or finish, the English or Math assessments. Sounds easy right? Not if the server at your school goes down overnight it isn’t. We can still get Internet access, but we can’t get to anything located on our server drives. No problem for this assessment. Or so I thought.
I used my monitoring software, NetSupport, to turn all my machines on this morning and then tried to log them all in. I sat and watched as the big red “N” of our Novell login spun and spun without ever connecting to anything. Soon, the dreaded error message popped up that said the computer could not locate the server. Again, I wasn’t too worried.
As my first round of 7th graders filed into the room I made a very clear announcement. “Do not do anything to your computers just yet. I will tell you how to log on in just a minute.” Before you could say “Bob’s your uncle” (yes, I used to live in England), I had 3 or 4 students who had attempted to log in again. That big red “N” was once again mocking me from the monitor. I tried to take it in stride.
My next set of directions was also pretty clear, or so I thought. “Click OK on the error message, then make sure you click the box labeled ‘Work Station Only’ before you try to log in.” I got as far as “Click OK” when that big red “N” once again reared its ugly head.
I lost it.
I gave these kids a good 90 second lecture on the need to follow directions. I told them I didn’t care if they took the assessment or not. They were going to learn how to follow directions if it killed me.
We finally got everyone logged in and ready to take the assessment. I was a little calmer. My breathing had returned to normal. Blood pressure was fine. The sweat was gone from my upper lip. (OK, I’m making most of that up in case you have no sense of humor while reading this).
As I write this, this first round of kids are quietly taking their assessment. Peace and tranquility have returned to my room.
I pondered a bit on why it is that 7th graders have such a hard time following directions. Then I remembered that even Preparation H has to label their product to keep people from taking it orally.
What about you? What’s your “following directions” horror story?