This September, Spanish 31 teacher Señora Polonio reportedly delivered her best first day speech in years, sources confirmed. “I knew when the instructions I gave in Spanish were just met with blank stares that it was going to be a great year,” she said. “I am already planning for next year.”
Saying that she wanted her students to know the increased expectations now that they have moved from eighth to ninth grade, Señora Polonio emphasized the heavily weighted tests and nightly homework. “This isn’t middle school anymore,” the teacher reportedly emphasized. “There’s going to be more tests and new grammar structures. You may have gotten away with Google Translate and goofing off during class in eighth grade, but this is high school now.”
Next year, Señora Polonio hopes to throw in some anecdotes of students who failed freshman Spanish and had to retake it sophomore year, as well as some horror stories of low test grades just for fun. “You want to scare them, but not so much that the capable students try to drop the class immediately.”
One year, Señora went a little overboard and went from a class of 23 students to a class of just eleven in the first weeks of school. “I’m hoping to just scare them into doing their work, studying, and paying attention. I just need a couple kids to try to switch out of my class and I’ll be satisfied, but I don’t want a repeat of 2014.”
Later that period, Señora Polonio feared she had been a little too intimidating, and heavily emphasized the fun group projects and conjugation games she has planned for the year.