dorsiebeth

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

Challenging

So today my 3rd period students decided to start testing me to see what they can get away with. It was pretty much my fault. I made a sarcastic comment and they took it and ran with it and I didn't stop them. It wasn't horrible, but it was certainly a learning experience. Which is, of course, why I am there. I'm there to make mistakes and to be corrected by my master teacher, but it is hard when everything has been going along pretty well, so have something pretty frustrating happen. This thing that bothers me the most is that I knew that the class was a bit out of control and I knew that I was having a hard time harnessing their energy, but I didn't think it was such a big deal until my master teacher kinda unloaded. I was a little taken aback by her vehemence. I understand what she was saying, but I'm not sure that I agree with her entirely. I do need to definitely watch the sarcastic comments because at 11 and 12 they just don't get it all the time, and yet they try to throw it back and it doesn't work. And I do need to stomp on the little rebellions, but I didn't think that it was too horribly bad.
My 7th graders on the other hand. I did a lesson that my master teacher in that class had prepared. They were all basically falling asleep. Literally. It was a video that they were supposed to be answering questions about and I was going through and pointing out where the answers to the questions were and they rewinding the tape so that they could watch that section again. Literally half the classroom was zoned out. I'm going to be writing my own lesson plans for that one in the future. Starting tomorrow, they are going to be awake! No more of this sleeping stuff.
Student teaching overall is going well. I am going to be a good teacher. I am frustrated at this point because I really just want to have my own classroom and be working on that, but I know I need this so that things that happened today will happen very rarely in my own room. It is a very strange position to be in when you are borrowing someone else's room, kids and materials. It is almost more stressful that having your own room, but at least this way you get feedback. I don't know how people who are defensive deal with this because I had a moment or two when I did not want to listen to criticism and I have had a lot of experience with it! Craziness. Oh well. At least I'm down to exactly four months from today.

1 Comments:

At February 16, 2005 at 4:38 PM, Blogger jkalea said...

Little fuckers! Kids are such turds, especially at that age. Your master teacher seems like a cunt, and if they're falling asleep during her lesson plans, who is she to criticize you? Just repeat the mantra, "That's an interesting idea. I'll think about it." And never think on it again. :-)

 

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