My denial almost ended today, then I thought of another way to put something off.

This time of year at the school where I work is the time of exam making. (Also known as “our time“.) Normally this would be a happy time of great joy and vengeance (because those things totally go together) but for some reason I find I can’t enjoy the making of the vengeful exam as much as I usually do.

Part of the problem is that because of the way we’ve been teaching the grade I’m in charge of there isn’t a lot of material for a final exam, especially one worth 50% of the final mark. The students have done lots of speaking projects, made visual aids and even “invented” something they called “new” superheroes in the same way that kid in Texas invented that clock.

The performances are usually pretty good, but there’s no way to put that on a test.

As a result I do what anyone would do: deny and delay. I tell myself I have lots of time, and even do significant amounts of advanced mathematics to prove it, right up until the moment I don’t have lots of time. (Note: this is exactly how I got through university.)

Today, even though I still have lots of time, I managed to do some work on vengeful exam. I was as surprised as everyone else. I then hit a moment where I’d have to start making decisions and ran through a thought process that involved using last year’s questions without any changes; using last year’s questions but changing the second listening; using last year’s questions but changing the order; using last year’s questions AND last year’s listening recording.

Mind you, I do not believe that even the students who took the test last year could pass it this year, but even I felt a twinge of guilt.

Then, during class, I got an idea for a question. i made a few notes, but I’ll get to them later. Vengeance is a dish best served eventually.