Post-aches and Grading

Writing productivity comes in spurts (as a quick glance through this blog history clearly shows) and this generally correlates to the times when I least should be spending my time flapping my jaw (or my fingers against the keyboard as the case may be). However, I feel like the five hours spent out grading and planning tonight earned me some finger flapping time.
Well, grades are due again in less then a week (I know what you are thinking... didn't that happen like 3-4 weeks ago? Yes! It did! And that was so much fun we decided to do it AND parent conferences again almost exactly 1 month later! Woohoo!) As you can no doubt tell I am super thrilled about this. I mean, what's not to love? Yet another chance to tell students that who they are and what they know can be condensed into 4 letters belonging to vague acronyms and 1500 characters worth of scripted blabbing! It seems my tirades about the evils of grades and labels are falling on deaf ears here... shocker... what would we do without grades to point to as signifiers of success? Their next years teachers might have to assume that all of their students are brilliant and teachable little geniuses, and if psychological studies are to be believed, they might actually prove that to be a correct assumption!
Actually the last time my rant was aired at a team meeting the response back from one of my bosses was 'well, we have to give them grades at some point. I mean, it's really more for the parents then anyone else.' So I guess my get-rid-of-all-grades scheme is going to have to wait until I successfully brainwash the parental generation... ;)
Re-reading that I'm thinking maybe it's time to get some sleep so I can go teach the parts of the atom and the forms of energy to my 9 year olds tomorrow with maybe a tad less sarcasm then is dripping from this post. :)
Then again... the biggest compliment from my students today: "Ms. I am not a weird student, it's just that you are a really weird teacher." Immediately followed by another student saying (with a post it full of fraction conversions [correct ones I might add] stuck to his forehead that he had named 'post-tache' and a ridiculously big grin) "I LOVE our weird class."
Well, I love my weird class too, and I LOVE being a weird teacher!