Getting Ready To Go Pick Up Joseph Tambo

While cleaning up the house, getting ready for Joseph Tambo's arrival

I came across my old grade book from the C.E.G. Carnot,

a middle school, though, since there was no high school in the town,

and since there had been three years of teachers' strikes

the students were already teenagers, so it felt more like high school.

And since there were only six classrooms for hundreds of students

we were on a schedule that was more like college.

So, I was teaching only 15 hours a week,

but each of those hours meant dozens more spent in anxious planning, dreading, grading.

How to do this impossible thing?

Here is my grade book from my second year,

when I had a bit better handle on things.

This class had 87 students.

Notice the last one. . .