What does a'woofin' mean?

Question

For my homework we have to pick one word in the text that we dont know, so what does a'woofin' mean. I can't find it anywhere please help someone.

Its in chapter 4 of the outsiders and Ponyboy says it here i'll add a couple paragraphs: Nobody was around at two-thirty in the morning, and it was a good place to relax and cool off. I couldn't have got­ten much cooler without turning into a popsicle. Johnny snapped up his jeans jacket and flipped up the collar.
"Ain't you about to freeze to death, Pony?"
"You ain't a'woofin'," I said, rubbing my bare arms between drags on my cigarette. I started to say something about the film of ice....

Answer 1

Context is a big issue with meaning, where is the word being used. A Book, the Street?

Book may just be a short form for the dog is barking.

Street
1. woofin'

all bark and no bite

He's not gonna do nothin he just woofin'.

2. woofin'

lying, to not be telling the truth.

Yo yo yo, pres. Bush is a freakin' rocket scientist, that man got brains.
No way man, you be woofin'.

Answer 2

Woofing, (or woofin'), is a form of verbal intimidation which can threaten physical violence or boast of physical prowess. The term springs from the African-American tradition of "selling woof tickets," or, outside the African-American community, wolf tickets. Woofing is part of an African-American tradition of trash-talk, which is an integral part of the culture, evident in playing the dozens, the bravado of male athletes in games of street ball, and wisecracking players in games of bid whist, a form of spades.

Woofing commonly occurs in online sports forums, manifestigng in fans' boasts about the results of upcoming sporting events, or boasts about the (alleged) superiority of a given team or athlete. Generally, the term is reserved for remarks of an obnoxious, inflammatory, or unsubstantiated nature. Making general statements of support for a favorite team (that do not denigrate the opposition) is not considered woofing; nor is informed, articulate commentary on sports (even if it includes predictions or statements concerning a team's or athlete's relative merits).

The word "woof", when used in this context, is also occasionally spelled "weauxf". The origin of the faux French spelling is unclear; it may have originated from the fans of the LSU Tigers college football team, or their opponents, in reference to the Cajun culture prevalent in the state of Louisiana. Another explanation of the spelling is that it is part of a custom of "French-ifying," twisting (such as boo-coo for the French beaucoup, meaning many), or otherwise altering words as a part of word play, which is an integral part of the African-American oral tradition.

It is considered an article of faith in many online sports forums, dating back to the days of Usenet, that over-enthusiastic woofing will (via a sort of karmic retribution) doom the beneficiary team or athlete to a poor performance or embarrassing loss. This notion is formalized as Oliver's Woofing Theorem (OWT), named after longtime Usenet regular Jim Oliver, who first proposed it. While the theorem doesn't exist in a canonical form (it is part of longstanding Usenet tradition), one version of it states:

In any given athletic competition (team, individual, amateur, professional), the team/player who is the most over-hyped/over-praised by his/her/its fans/supporters is doomed to lose the competition.

OWT is frequently cited as a contributing factor whenever a heavily favored team suffers defeat at the hands of an underdog. To what extent sports fans really believe in OWT, or whether (like Godwin's Law) it is merely a convenient way to restrain excessive forum posters, is not known.

Answer 3

Do you mean "a whoopin'"?

A whooping is a beating. If you get a whoopin', you get beaten, spanked, whatever. If you're bad, you get a whoopin'. If you get into a fight and you lose, you take a whoopin'.