jfyi

I like acronyms. This past weekend my sisters and I were together. For the few who were with us it was slightly overwhelming. I believe I heard the phrases: "What's with all the acronyms" and "Why do you and your sisters use so many acronyms?" But it isn't just between me and my sisters that acronyms float through our conversations. Bex and I also incorporate and even invent acronyms in our conversations. Acronyms add a little spice to the plain white rice conversations. One of our recent creations is jfyi. No, it is not entirely our creation. It's just that we realized that when we said fyi, we usually said "just" before "fyi," so we figured we may as well add the "j" to the entire acronym. Speed things up a bit.

Well jfyi, I'm teaching summer school. They were desperate. Most teachers had to go through an extensive application process. Most teachers had to have an interview. Not me. They couldn't find anyone who wanted to teach English 11. Frankly, I didn't really want to either. I had gotten used to my lovely summer routine: long walk in the morning followed by crunches and push-ups and other things that made me feel healthy again; reading a novel every two days or so; working on various projects; taking classes (such as the Irish dance class and photo class mentioned in previous posts). It was great. But I felt sorry for our department chair. They were going to make her do it and she doesn't even teach English 11 and she wouldn't get a break. So I emailed them and told them I'd do it. They called me a few hours later to see if I would still be willing to do it. No application. No interview.

Anyway, back to the original story. So teaching summer school I have an enormous impact on young lives. Young lives who are in the process of reform. They have failed and are now reforming themselves to find success. Of course I use acronyms in my classroom. I used jfyi the other day. It took most of the kids a few seconds to figure it out. "Miss Thackeray, is that 'just for your information'?" they asked. And now they have come a long way in the past few days, those kids. They are on their way to success with each assignment they complete. Today one student, Max, was writing a Memo for his multi-genre research paper. In his closing segment he wrote: "I would be happy to further discuss my findings when we go to the spa next Tuesday. You're paying jfyi." Progress. Progress has been made.